Bruce of the Circle A Part 34

"Yes, I drove him out here! He might never have come back, if it hadn't been for me. I ... n.o.body else knows this, Benny; maybe n.o.body ever will but you, but I've got to make you understand. He ... She ... His wife's been in town a month. She come out here to throw herself away on that rat, when she don't ... when she hates him.

"I can't tell you all of it, but yesterday he saw her for th' first time.

"He must have raised h.e.l.l with her ... because of me, because I've known she was out here and didn't tell him. He took her away an' she ... sent for me....

"Don't you see that I'm to blame? h.e.l.l, it's no use hidin' it; he took her off to get her away from me! He's bringin' her here, th' nearest place to a home he's got. If 't wasn't for me, he wouldn't have started for this place; he'd stayed there. Don't you see, Benny, that I'm drivin' him into your hands. You may be justified in killin', but I ain't justified ... in helpin' you!"

"If it's that way ... between she an' you ... you'd ought to be glad....'

"Not that way!" Bayard exclaimed. "Not that, Benny! He's everything you've called him, but I can't foul him. I've got to be more'n square with him because he is ... her husband an' because she did ... send for me!"

For a moment the miner seemed to waver; a different look appeared in his eyes, an appreciation for the absolute openness of this man before him, his great sense of fair play, his honesty, his sincerity. Then, he remembered that minutes had been consumed, that his game was drawing to a climax.

"I can't help it," he said, doggedly, drawing back, "We understand each other now, Bruce, an' my advice to you is to clear out. Things'll happen right soon."

"What do you mean?" slowly, with incredulity.

"Don't you know they wasn't a mile behind you, on th' other side of them low bluffs?"

Bayard half turned, sharply, as though he expected to find Ann and Lytton directly behind him on the trail.

"G.o.d, no!" he answered in a hushed tone. "Rough country, that's why I didn't see 'em."

"Well, that's them ... a man an' woman. They ought to be here any minute."

Lynch's voice sank to a whisper on the last and he drew the gun from its scabbard, peering down the trail, listening. On sight of the colt, a flicker came into Bayard's eyes, his jaw tightened, his shoulders squared themselves.

"I'll go down an' meet him," the miner said quite calmly, though the color had gone even from his lips. "It's ..."

With a drive of his hand, Bayard's fingers fastened on the gun and the jerk he gave the weapon tore Lynch from his footing.

"You'll not, Benny!"--in a whisper, securing the gun, and flinging it into the brush behind him, gripping the other man by his shirt front, "You won't, by G.o.d, if I have to choke you black in the face!"

Lynch drew back against the cabin wall, struggling to free himself.

"It's my fight, Bruce!" ... breathing in gasps, eyes wide, voice strained almost to the point of sobbing.

"I'll let go when you promise me to go into your house an' sit there an'

keep quiet until I finish my work ... or, until you're molested."

"Not after two years! Not after my dad...."

Tears stood in the miner's eyes and he struck out viciously with his fists; then Bayard, thrusting his head forward, flung out his arms in a clinging, binding embrace and they went down on the trail, a tangle of limbs. Benny was no match in such a combat and in a trice he was on his face, arms held behind him and Bayard was lashing his wrists together with his bridle reins.

"Stand up!" he said, sharply, when he had finished.

He picked up the revolver and, with a hand under one of the bound arms, helped Benny to his feet.

"I'll apologize later. I'll do anything. I came out here to prevent a killin', Benny, an' my work ain't done yet."

The miner cursed him in a strained voice and the come and go of his breath was swift and irregular. He trembled violently. All the brooding he had experienced in the last months, all the strain of waiting he had known in the recent days, the conviction that his hour of accomplishment was at hand, and the sudden, overwhelming sense of physical helplessness that was now on him combined to render his anger that of a child. He attempted to hold back, but Bayard jerked him forward and, half dragged, half carried, he entered the kitchen of the cabin he had helped build, which had been stolen from him and which was now to be his prison at the moment when he had planned to make his t.i.tle to the property good by killing....

Bayard, too, trembled, and his gray eyes glittered. He breathed through his lips and was conscious that his mouth was very dry. His movements were feverish and he handled Lynch as though he were so much insensate matter.

Benny protested volubly, shouting and screaming and kicking, trying to resist with all his bodily force, but Bruce did not seem to hear him. He handled his captive with a peculiar abstraction in spite of the fact that they struggled constantly.

Bayard kicked a chair away from the table, forced Lynch into it and holding him fast with one arm, drew the dangling bridle reins through the spindles of the back and lashed the miner's bound wrists there securely.

"I can't help it, Benny," he said, hurriedly and earnestly, as he straightened. "You and I ... we'll have this out afterwards.... Your gun ... I'll leave it here,"--putting the weapon on top of a battered cupboard that stood against the wall behind Benny.

"I'm goin' down to turn him back towards town, Benny.... I won't give you away; he won't know you're here, but I've got to do it myself. I can't let you kill him to-day.... I can't, because I'm to blame for his comin' here!"

He was gone then, with a thudding of boots and a ringing of spurs as he ran from the room, struck into the trail and went down among the pines at a pace which threatened a nasty fall at every stride. And Benny, left alone, whimpered aloud and tugged ineffectually at the knots which held him captive in his chair. After a short interval, he stopped the struggling and strained forward to listen. No sound reached his ears except the low, sweet, throaty tweeting of quail as they ran swiftly over the rocks, under a clump of brush and disappeared. The world was very quiet and peaceful ... only in the man's heart was storm....

Bayard ran on down the trail toward the edge of the timber where he might look out on the valley and see those two riders he had followed and pa.s.sed without seeing. He had no plan. He would tell Lytton to go back, would _make_ him go back, with nothing but his will and his naked hands. He wanted to laugh as he ran, for his relief was great; there was to be no killing that day, no blood was to be on his conscience, no tragedy was to stand between him and the woman who had called for aid.

His pace became reckless, for the descent was steep and, when he emerged from the timber, his whole attention was centered on keeping himself upright and overcoming his momentum. When he could stop, he lifted his eyes to the country below him, searched quickly for the figures of Ned and his wife and swore in perplexity. He did not see sign of a moving creature. He knew that there was no depression in that part of the valley deep enough to hide them from him as he stood on that vantage point. Had Lynch been mistaken? Had he deceived him artfully?

He looked about bewildered, wholly at a loss to explain the situation.

Then ran on, searching the trail for indication of pa.s.sing horses. They could not have turned back and ridden from sight in the short time that had elapsed since Benny saw them ... if he had seen them. Where could they go, but on to the mine?

The worn trail still led him down grade, though the pitch was not so severe as it had been higher up; however, he did not realize the distance he was from timber when he came upon fresh horse tracks. They had ridden up to that point at a walk; they had stopped there, and when they went on they had swerved to the right and ridden for the hills with horses at a gallop.

Bayard read the tell-tale signs in an instant, wheeled, looked up at the abrupt slopes above him and cried,

"He's gone around for some reason ... in a hurry.... To come into camp from behind!"

And trembling at thought of what might be happening back there in the cabin, he started up the trail, running laboriously against the steep rise of the hill.

CHAPTER XVIII

THE FIGHT

Bayard had guessed rightly. After miles of silent riding Lytton had pulled his horse up with a jerk, had laid a hand on Ann's bridle and checked her pony with another wrench.

"Who's that?" he growled, staring at Bayard.

She had looked at the distant horse, floundering up the slope beyond them, recognized both Abe and his rider and had turned to stare at her husband with fear in her eyes.

"Who is it?" he demanded again, and she dropped her gaze.

"So that's it!" he jeered. "Your lover is trying to play two games. He's come to beat us to it, has he?"--he licked his lips nervously. "Well, we'll see!"

He hung his spurs in and fanned her horse with his quirt and, still clinging to her bridle, led his wife at a high lope off to the right, swinging behind a shoulder of the hill and climbing up a sharp, wooded draw.