The Trail of Conflict Part 29

"I understand. While I'm doing that try to get the Double O on the 'phone, will you? Tell them to get Gerrish here as soon as possible."

"I will. The sheriff wants to see you at the jail when you can manage it. He's sent a posse after Ranlett. He's in or near that shack in Buzzard's Hollow, that is, he was."

"He's there, all right. I signaled with the rockets as Phil directed. He may be getting a little uneasy at the non-arrival of his bad men by this time though. How the d.i.c.kens did you know about it?"

"Beechy put a bullet into his leg. Jerry will tell you----"

"Beechy and Jerry!"

"Don't look like that, Steve. Jerry is safe and Beechy has made good, gloriously good. Get the little girl to tell you about it. She--she's a wonder! Meantime the sheriff waits. He wants to talk to you about Simms.

There can be no doubt that he shot Denbigh. He wants your deposition.

Perhaps it is a cold-blooded way to look at it, but I can't help thinking that with Simms out of the way his wife and kids will have a chance at real living. That's an awful indictment of a man, isn't it?"

It was morning when Courtlandt dismounted in the corral of the Double O.

Slowman hurried up to take Blue Devil. The two men talked in low tones while dawn streaked the sky in rosy peaks and the stars paled. The gra.s.s glittered with diamond-like dew, the fairies had spread their squares of gossamer everywhere. The boys had come in with the shorthorns, the corral boss reported, not one missing. The outfit had got news of the affair at Devil's Hold-up and were fit to tie that they hadn't had a chance to clean up Ranlett and his gang.

After the turmoil of the last few hours the ranch-house seemed weirdly quiet as Courtlandt entered the living-room. The night air had been keen and a few coals, like observant red eyes, glowed at him from the hearth.

Scherherazade, the white Persian cat, occupied the wing-chair. She opened her topaz eyes wide as Steve approached the mantel; she watched unblinkingly as he laid his arms upon it and looked up at the portrait above him. He spoke softly as though he and the smiling woman were comrades and confidants.

"They said that Phil went out like a candle, Mother. Where did he go?

Where are you? It can't be the end. If it were I shouldn't feel as though you were with me wherever I am. Was I a brute to Jerry? Will she ever forgive me? Would you if you were in her place?" The tender eyes must have rea.s.sured him for with a husky, "Good-night, Betty Fairfax!"

he straightened his shoulders and turned away. For an instant he stood looking across the room. As he went toward his own door he whistled softly his favorite "Papillions." Scherherazade craned her ruffed white neck to follow the sound, her eyes narrowed to ruby slits. The coals on the hearth crumbled and fell. She sprang to the back of the chair and listened. Across the room a door had latched softly.

Out in Buzzard's Hollow a white-faced, haggard-eyed man was turning over his three prisoners to the deputy sheriff. Overhead a great bird hung motionless for an instant as it glared down at the curious creature with mammoth outspread wings that lay below.

CHAPTER XX

Breakfast in the court was a late affair the morning after the hold-up.

Steve did not appear. Tommy had given Jerry a sketchy account of his adventure of the night before, minimizing his part in it. Ming Soy hovered about the table with what, in an Occidental, would be tearful devotion. The world was as clean and fresh and sweet as wind and rain and suns.h.i.+ne could make it. Faintly from the corral came the voices of riders coming and going; the skip and cough and stutter of tractors drifted in on the breeze. Benito, with much fluttering and s.h.i.+vering and croaking, was taking his matutinal plunge in the basin of the fountain.

Goober lay beside Jerry's chair, his tawny eyes fixed unblinkingly on the parrot, his tongue hanging, his white teeth gleaming.

The girl, in a pink and white frock that suggested the daintiness of morning-glories, had been absorbed in the thoughts induced by Tommy's story. It was some time before she became conscious of the obstinate silence maintained by the usually talkative Peg, who was a bit more bewilderingly lovely than ever in a frock just a trifle less blue than the sky above her. Benson was tenderly solicitous of her comfort. Would she have more honey? Hopi Soy had broken his own record with the waffles; sure she wouldn't have one? Peg answered his questions with an indifferent shake of her head. Jerry observed the two in silence for a few moments before she protested:

"Don't grovel, Tommy. I don't know what you've done to displease her royal highness, but knowing you as I do I am sure that it was nothing to warrant such rudeness. 'Fess up, children, what has happened? 'Who first bred strife between the chiefs that they should thus contend?'" she quoted gayly. "That is worthy even of you, Tommy."

"You may think it's funny, Jerry," flared Peg indignantly. "But if you had been--been----"

"Say it! Tell the gentlemen of the jury just what happened, Miss Glamorgan," prompted Benson in a judicial tone and with a glint in his blue eyes. "You won't?" as the girl responded only with a glance of superb scorn. "Then I will." He disregarded her startled, "Don't dare!"

and announced, "I--I kissed her yesterday, Mrs. Steve."

"I won't stay to hear!"

"Yes, you will!" He caught Peggy gently but firmly by the shoulders. He stood behind her as he explained. "You see--I want--I intend to marry your sister, Mrs. Steve. Yesterday I staked my claim. I kissed her once."

"Hmp! Squatter rights!" interpolated Peggy angrily.

"Only once! Are you--sure, Tommy?" Jerry's voice was grave but there was a traitorous quiver of her vivid lips as she asked the question.

"Only once, on honor. I told her that I should never do it again until she gave me permission. I meant it. I know that she is young. I expect to wait until----"

Peggy twisted herself free from the restraining hands on her shoulders.

Half-way across the court she turned. Her hazel eyes were brilliant with laughter, her lips curved tormentingly as she flouted the two at the table.

"I--I hate--quitters!" she flung at Benson before she disappeared in the path which led to the office. Tommy followed her with his eyes, then turned to Jerry.

"I always watch where my ball falls so that I can find it quickly," he explained. The a.s.surance had drained from his voice when he asked, "What--what do you think of my p.r.o.nunciamento? Will your father stand for it, Mrs. Steve?"

"If you and Peg decide that you really care for one another he will have to," encouraged Jerry gravely.

"Peg has told me how he feels about family. Mine is the finest ever--but we don't date back to Colonial days on this continent. I suppose that we must have existed somewhere before we came to this country, we couldn't have been prestidigitated out of the everywhere into the here, could we?

There is plenty of money behind us but--but that angel girl thinks I'm poor."

"Don't enlighten her. Let her think so--it may--make her kinder. When the time comes I'll talk with Dad. I'm with you heart and soul, Tommy, but I am afraid you have a long road to travel before Peg says 'Yes.'"

"You are wasting your sympathy. 'I scorn to change my state with kings!'" he declaimed dramatically before he disappeared into the path which had swallowed up Peggy.

Jerry rested her elbows on the table, her chin on her clasped hands, and gazed thoughtfully after him. Subconsciously she noted the sound of horses' hoofs on the hard road in front of the house. Who was arriving at ten o'clock in the morning, she wondered idly before she returned to thoughts of Peg and Tommy. She sat motionless for so long that Goober rose, stretched and poked his cold nose under her hands. She stroked his head gently.

"Where is your master?" she whispered into one of his big ears. The dog shook his head, sneezed violently and looked up, his eyes eloquent with reproach. "Did it tickle? I'm sorry." She reached for a lump of sugar in the squatty Dutch silver bowl. "If you could say please----" Goober rose on his hind feet, dangled his crossed forepaws and with head on one side avidly regarded the enticing white morsel in the girl's fingers. He gave a short, sharp bark. She tossed him the sugar which he crunched between his strong teeth. She patted his head. "Do you know, Goober, I think that any dog is more interesting than the average human. Wait for me.

I'll get my hat and we'll take Patches a lump of sugar."

Obediently the dog took up his position beside her chair. Humming lightly Jerry went toward the house. What a glorious morning. The nightmare of yesterday already seemed like an impossible dream. Some day she would explain that elopement business to Steve and they would laugh about it together. She caught her breath as a vision of his face as he had held her in his arms crowded itself into her mind. She raced up the court steps to elude her clamorous thoughts. At the door of the living-room she stopped as though galvanized. She brushed her hand impatiently across her eyes. Coming into the shadowy room from the gleaming world outside certainly did queer things to one's vision.

That--that couldn't be Steve with a woman's arm about his neck! There was an inarticulate sound in her throat as she took a step forward.

Courtlandt heard it. With a muttered imprecation he loosened the clinging arm. His face was white, his eyes inscrutable as they met Jerry's.

"Felice, here is Mrs. Courtlandt. I have been telling Mrs. Denbigh of her husband's----" the woman beside him interrupted.

"Steve forgets that I haven't had a husband for several years. I confess the news was a shock. I had no idea that he was in this part of the country. I suppose that detestable Fairfax man knew it when he suggested to Bruce Greyson that he invite me here for the summer. Does that surprise you, Steve?" as Courtlandt stifled an exclamation.

"If--if I can do anything to help you----" Jerry had produced an apology for a voice at last.

"Thank you, no. Steve is all I need. He is such a comfort. Would anyone but he have had the sympathetic understanding to wait until he thought I would be awake before coming with such news to the X Y Z? But I came here to help him. I have had his happiness on my mind since I found this on the bench outside the door just after Mr. Greyson had received a mysterious summons." She held out Steve's campaign hat with its black and gold cord and the band of silver filigree which Jerry had added the day before. There was malice thinly disguised with solicitude in the tone in which she added, "Then--then I understood that--that you and he had gone----"

"Felice, cut that out! When I want your intervention in my affairs I'll ask for it," Courtlandt's tone lashed. "Now that you have returned the hat you may go. Greyson has made arrangements for you to leave on the east-bound train in the early afternoon. Your maid is packing for you."

"But why should I go East, Steve? Phil Denbigh is nothing to me, while you----" her tone was drenched with significance. She looked defiantly at Jerry who was conscious that she was giving an excellent imitation of an automaton. Only her eyes felt alive, they burned, and the pulses in her throat throbbed. She knew that if she opened her lips it would be to hurl words at Felice of which she would be utterly ashamed later, that if she unclenched her hands it would be to strike the mocking woman. She was terrified at the tumult which shook her. Without a glance toward the two near the window she crossed the room, entered her boudoir and closed the door behind her. She leaned against it and listened. She heard the front door close, footsteps on the porch, voices, then the sound of horse's hoofs. They had gone!

With the realization, something inside her seemed to crash. The barrier of ice which she had erected between her heart and Steve was swept away in a surge of pa.s.sionate emotion. She knew now why she had been so terrified last night when she had heard that a man had been wounded, she had feared it might be Steve; why she had been so furiously angry at Felice; why it had hurt so intolerably to see her in Steve's arms. It wasn't because she thought him false and untrue--it was because she loved him.

With confused consciousness that she must escape from her own thoughts she ran into the living-room. She and Goober would take that sugar to Patches and then----The smiling, tender eyes of the portrait over the fireplace drew her like a magnet. She crossed her arms on the mantel and smiled back at them, valiantly.

"Mother dear----" she implored breathlessly. "Mother!"

Comforted in some inexplicable way she dropped her head on her arms. In retrospect she went back to that evening in her father's apartment when she and Steve had entered into their matrimonial engagement. He had staked his future for money, she for social advancement. Old Nick had been right. How could a man love or respect a girl who would marry for position? Now that Felice was really free, not merely legally free, would Steve----Absorbed in her thoughts she was conscious of nothing in the room till Courtlandt's voice behind her announced authoritatively: