Bloom of Cactus Part 18

"Oh, no. Slade and Cochise started the business. Cochise rounds up the hosses and cattle when Slade tells him of a good chance, and the 'Paches rustle 'em and bring 'em into the Hole and make the brands over, and then they run 'em out h.e.l.l Canon, and Slade sells 'em under his other name. Dad's share is for the feed and the use of the Hole."

For the first time Lennon's suspicions of the Dead Hole partners were clarified and confirmed. The gang were not only moonshiners but horse and cattle thieves. Slade was the ringleader and brains of the gang, while Cochise and his followers were the crafty and probably murderous rustlers and brand-blotters.

Farley was a more or less willing accomplice. He may have been forced into the criminal partnership, but now refused to attempt an escape.

Rather than give up his share of the loot, he chose to risk the great danger to his little foster-daughter.

The realization that Slade was even more of a criminal than the moonshining and bootlegging had indicated, quickened Lennon's compa.s.sion for the girl. She was so artless and clinging and helpless----

He put his free arm about her quivering shoulders. In a twinkling her hands were clasped about his neck and she was smiling up into his face in nave delight.

"Dear, dear Jack!" she whispered. "You're just awful nice to me. I believe, really and truly, I love you even more than Mena."

The girl was too childlike in mind to realize the meaning of her sweet emotion. Lennon made allowance for her innocence, but her allusion to Carmena startled him, though the words were ambiguous. Elsie may only have meant that she loved him more than she loved Carmena--not that she loved him more than Carmena loved him.

The girl's upturned piquant face was more than tempting. Its flowerlike delicacy and prettiness and the glow in her wide blue eyes were more than he could withstand. He bent down and pressed a kiss upon her half-parted lips.

"You darling!" he said. "You adorable little Blossom!"

She sought shyly to draw away from him. He held her fast. The kiss had put an end to his last doubt.

"Wait, dear, do not try to get away from me," he commanded. "I am going to keep you--always. Until I get you out of here--safe from Slade and Cochise--I shall be just your Brother Jack. But I love you, dear, and when we reach a town we shall be married."

"O-o-oh! Then I'll belong to you--I'll be your woman?"

"You will be my darling little wife. I will be good to you and take care of you--always."

"Oh, you dear, nice Jack! And Mena--she'll go along too and help take care of me and love us? Won't she? You know I couldn't ever bear to go away and leave Mena."

Along with his amus.e.m.e.nt over the child's nave suggestion Lennon was conscious of an odd thrill. He remembered the look in Carmena's dark eyes when she saved him from the poison of the Gila monster and at the end of their desperate flight across the Basin. They had risked death together--and _she_ was not a child.

But close upon these pleasantly disquieting remembrances of the older girl came the harsh afterthought of his suspicions against her. He bent to kiss Elsie with almost aggressive fervour.

From the doorway behind him came a stifled cry that might have been a sob. He held fast to Elsie and glanced over his shoulder. Carmena was standing in the doorway, with her head bent. As Lennon looked, she straightened and came toward him, cold-eyed and determined.

"What are you doing, Jack Lennon?" she demanded. "I trusted you. I believed that you were not the kind to take advantage of Blossom. I thought you----"

Elsie struggled free from Lennon to fling her arms about her foster-sister.

"Oh, Mena, please, please don't be cross with Jack! I love him so, and--and he loves me back!"

Lennon met Carmena's hard stare with a gaze no less cool and resolute.

"Elsie is to be my wife," he declared. "I shall marry her as soon as possible."

"Your wife? Marry her? You mean that?"

"Yes."

Carmena's fixed gaze wavered and sank. But almost immediately she looked up again, her eyes l.u.s.trous with soft radiance.

"She is very precious to me, Jack. She deserves to be safe and happy all the rest of her life."

Before Lennon could reply, the girl gently freed herself from Elsie and turned to go.

"Pardon me--one moment, Miss Farley," appealed Lennon. "There is something I must tell you. I happened to overhear Slade speak to your father. He insists that the lost mine is a gold lode and proposes to take possession when I have led him to it."

The girl smiled a bit mockingly.

"What else could you expect?" she asked. "If he hadn't believed it a gold lode he wouldn't have made the deal with you. When you show him the copper, it will be up to you to hold him to his bargain. We have no chance unless he splits with Cochise."

"Why not persuade your father to slip out of the Hole with us--start immediately? The Apaches have gone off. I'll engage to tie up Slade. We would have an all-night lead."

"No," refused Carmena. "The Hole belongs to Dad. He will not leave it.

Besides, there are at least three Apaches on watch in h.e.l.l Canon."

Lennon realized the uselessness of arguing with the girl. If, as he still half suspected, she was scheming with Slade, the less said about her father's share in the stock stealing the better.

"Very well," he acquiesced. "I shall try to manage Slade. If he is unreasonable, I will do as I think best."

"So will I," replied Carmena, her eyes sombre.

"Come on, Blossom. Slade said he would leave at daybreak."

She abruptly turned away, and made no remonstrance when Elsie offered her lips to Lennon for a good-night kiss.

Left alone, he sat down in one of the big chairs and fell to planning how, after the relocation of the copper lode, he would make his escape.

He would bring a sheriff's posse to arrest Slade and his fellow criminals. Elsie would then be freed from all danger, and the mine could be developed.

CHAPTER XIV

THE PROWLER

From his plans for the breaking up of the criminal gang Lennon's thoughts drifted into pleasant reveries about his adorable little wife-to-be. Drowsiness crept upon him. When the lone candle on the table burned down, flickered, and went out, he was too sound asleep to waken.

But his sleep was troubled with uneasy dreams.

In the midst of a nightmare that lived over his flight from the bronchos across the desert, he was roused with a start to alert wakefulness. Some heavy-breathing creature was stealthily shuffling about in the black night of the unlighted room. A thump, followed by a muttered curse, betrayed the ident.i.ty of the prowler. With utmost caution Lennon slipped his arm from the sling, drew Farley's revolver, and barricaded himself behind the chair. Slade shuffled nearer--so near that his whiskey-poisoned breath struck in Lennon's face. Again came a thud and a curse. The prowler had stubbed his stockinged toe against a chair leg.

Lennon aimed the revolver toward the sound, in expectation of an upflaring match. Discovery would mean instant attack by the huge-framed scoundrel. Of that he had no doubt. Slade would not be groping about in the dark in this stealthy manner unless intent upon an evil purpose.

But no match flamed. The shuffling feet moved past Lennon to the wall and along the wall toward the doorway that opened upon the short pa.s.sage to the girl's room. No door barred the pa.s.sage at either end. The purpose of the prowler was now unmistakable.

For the second time Lennon had cause to be thankful that he had not changed to his boots. His moccasined feet noiselessly felt their way after the heavy-footed shuffler. Slade was already through the doorway into the pa.s.sage. Lennon followed. The finger-tips of his outgroping left hand touched the back of the prowler.

A startled grunt warned Lennon to dodge back a step and crouch. A heavier grunt told him of a violent out-clutch or blow, which, meeting only empty air, had wrenched the breath from the big body of the striker.