Claim Number One Part 22

"There's a special stage out for Comanche at eleven," said William, his watch in his hand. "If I can get a seat I'll return on it. It's time I was back in the shop."

"For," he might have added if he had expressed his thoughts, "no matter what I think of you, Agnes, I see that it would be useless for me to hang around and hope. Dr. Slavens has stepped into the door of your heart, and there is no room for anybody else to pa.s.s."

But he left it unsaid, standing with his head bent as if in meditation, his watch in his hand.

"Two minutes more," he announced.

"I'm moving from the hotel," said she quickly, "to a room I've taken with a dear old lady in a funny little house among the trees. It's cheaper for me while I wait to file. I'll see you to say good-bye."

She hurried away, leaving the two men standing looking after her, Horace smiling, for he did not altogether understand. William could see deeper.

He knew that she was afraid lest her disappointment would burst out in tears if she remained to see Axel Peterson square his elbows on the shelf before the window and make entry on Claim Number One.

A clerk within the office was pounding on the window-sash, for the paint which the building had been treated to in honor of the occasion had gummed it fast. Axel Peterson, straining his long neck, swallowing dry gulps, looked to the right, the left, the rear. The ends of his fingers were fairly on Claim Number One; n.o.body was pressing forward to supplant him and take away his chance.

Of course, in case Boyle could not induce the holder of the first chance, in the event that he _might_ yet come, to file on the coveted land, then there would be a chance left for Peterson. So Peterson knew--Boyle had made that plain. But who could resist the amount Boyle was ready to give? n.o.body, concluded Axel Peterson, feeling a chill of nervousness sweep him as the window-sash gave and the window opened, showing the two clerks ready, with their pens in hand.

The preliminary questions were being asked; the card with Peterson's signature on it was taken out of the file for its identification--although he was personally known to everybody in the town--for no detail of caution and dignity could be omitted on an occasion so important as that; Axel Peterson was taking his breath in short bites, his hand trembling as he took up the pen to enter his name when that moment should arrive; his voice was shaking as he answered the questions put to him by the clerk.

There was a stirring down the line, and a crowding forward. From the outer rim of the people gathered to bear witness to the important ceremony there rose a subdued shout, like the expression of wonder or surprise. The volume of this sound increased as it swept toward the office. Those in the line, Axel Peterson first of all, saw a movement in the crowd, saw it part and open a lane for a dusty man on a sweat-drenched horse to pa.s.s.

One of the clerks arranged the detail-map of the reservation before him with great deliberation, his pen ready to check off the parcel of land when the entrant should give its description. The other spread the blank on the desk, dipped his pen, and asked:

"What tract do you wish to file on, Mr. Peterson?"

The man on horseback had forged through the crowd and brought his stumbling beast to a stand not a rod away from Axel Peterson's side.

Peterson had viewed the proceeding with a disturbing qualm. Boyle, as talkative before as a washerwoman, now grew suddenly silent. His mouth stood open impotently; the gray of a sinking heart came over his face as he looked long at the battered man, who had dropped the reins to the ground and was coming toward them on unsteady legs.

Then, in a flash, Boyle recovered his poise.

"Quick! Quick!" he called to the clerk, thrusting an impatient hand through the window. "Give him the paper and let him sign; you can fill in the numbers afterward!"

The clerk owed his appointment to Boyle's father when the latter was in Congress; so he was ready at heart to obey. But it was an irregularity which might rebound with uncomfortable result. Thus he hesitated a few seconds, and as he hesitated the road-stained horseman pushed in between Axel Peterson and the window.

"You're a little hasty," said the man. "It's a few seconds until nine yet, according to my time. My name is Slavens, and I am Number One."

The people in the crowd pressed closer, closing around the tired horse, which stood with its head drooping, its flaccid sides heaving. Jerry Boyle said nothing, but he put into his pocket the paper which he had been holding ready in his hand for Axel Peterson's signature the minute the entry should be made, and turned his back. A black-visaged man with shifting, greasy eyes shouldered, panting, through the press of people and put his hand on Slaven's arm.

"I'd like to have a word with you before you file," he requested.

Slavens looked at him severely from the shadow of his battered hat. The man lacked the bearing of one who inspires confidence; Slavens frowned his disapproval of the approach.

"It means money to you," pressed the man, stretching out his hand and showing a card with numbers penciled on it.

Axel Peterson had stood gaping, his card with numbers on it also in his hand, held up at a convenient angle for his eyes. Dr. Slavens had read them as he pushed Peterson aside, and the first two figures on the other man's card--all that Slavens could hastily glimpse--were the same. And, stranger still, they were the same as Hun Shanklin had recorded in telegraphed reply to the request from Jerry that he repeat them.

That was enough to show him that there was something afoot worth while, and to fortify him in his determination, strong in his mind every mile of that long night ride, to file on that identical tract of land, come of it what might.

"I'll talk to you after a while," said he.

Boyle said nothing, although the look he gave the forward man was blasting and not without effect. The fellow fell back; something which looked like a roll of bills pa.s.sed from Boyle's hand to Axel Peterson's, and with a jerk of the shoulder, which might have been intended as a defiance to his rival or as an expression of resignation, Boyle moved back a little into the crowd, where he stood whispering with his friends. Peterson's face lit up again; he swallowed and stretched his neck, wetting his dry lips with his tongue.

The preliminaries were gone over again by the clerks with deliberate dignity; the card bearing the doctor's signature was produced, his ident.i.ty established, and the chart of the reservation again drawn forward to check off the land as he gave the description.

"What tract have you selected, Dr. Slavens?" asked the clerk with the blank.

Dr. Slavens drew from the pocket of his coat a crumpled yellow paper, unfolded it, and spread it on the shelf.

"The northwest quarter of Section Six, Township Twelve, Range Thirty-three," he replied, his eyes on Hun Shanklin's figures.

Jerry Boyle almost jumped at the first word. As the doctor completed the description of the land he strode forward, cursing in smothered voice.

"Where did you get that paper?" he demanded, his voice pitched an octave above its ordinary key by the tremulous heat of his anger.

Dr. Slavens measured him coldly with one long, contemptuous look. He answered nothing, for the answer was obvious to all. It was none of Boyle's business, and that was as plain as spoken words.

Boyle seemed to wilt. He turned his back to the winner of Number One, but from that moment he stuck pretty close to Axel Peterson until something pa.s.sed between them again, this time from Peterson's hand to Boyle's. Peterson sighed as he gave it up, for hope went with it.

Meantime a wave of information was running through the crowd.

"It's Number One," men repeated to each other, pa.s.sing the word along.

"Number One got here!"

Hurrying to the hotel, Agnes was skirting through the thinner edges of the gathering at the very moment when Dr. Slavens turned from the window, his papers in his hand. As he went to his weary horse and took up the reins, the creature greeted him with a little chuckling whinny, and the people gave him a loud and hearty cheer.

When the cheering spread to the people around her, Agnes stopped and asked a man why they did that. She spoke a little irritably, for she was out of humor with people who would cheer one man for taking something that belonged to another. That was the way she looked at it, anyhow.

"Why, haven't you heard?" asked the man, amazed, but enlarged with importance, because he had the chance of telling somebody. "It's Number One. He rode up on a horse just in the nick of the second and saved his claim."

"Number One!" said she. "A horse!"

"Sure, ma'am," said her informant, looking at her queerly. "Here he comes now."

Dr. Slavens pa.s.sed within a few feet of her, leading his horse toward the livery stable. If it had not been that the wind was blowing sharply, turning back the flapping brim of his old hat, she would have repudiated him as an impostor. But there was no mistaking him, in spite of the strange clothing which he wore, in spite of the b.l.o.o.d.y bandage about his head.

And at the sight of that bandage her heart felt a strange exultation, a stirring leap of joy, even stronger than her pity and her pain. For it was his vindication; it was the badge of his honor; it was his credentials which put him back in the right place in her life.

He had come by it in no drunken squabble, she knew; and he had arisen from the sickness of it to mount horse and ride--desperately, as his condition told--to claim his own. Through the leagues of desert he had come, through the unfriendly night, with what dim hope in his breast no man might know. Now, sparing the horse that had borne him to his triumph, he marched past her, his head up, like one who had conquered, even though he limped in the soreness of bruised body.

People standing near wondered to see the tall, pale woman put out her hands with more than a mother's pity in her eyes, and open her lips, murmuring a name beneath her breath.

The Bentleys, who had seen Dr. Slavens arrive, had not been able to force their way to him through the crowd. Now, with scores of others, they followed him, to have a word with him after he had stabled his horse. As they pa.s.sed Agnes, William made his way to her.

"He arrived in time!" he cried triumphantly, the sparkle of gladness in his honest eyes. "He has justified your faith, and your trust, and your----"

She put out both her hands, tears in her eyes, as he halted there, leaving unsaid what there was no need to say.

"I'll tell him where to find you," said he, pa.s.sing on.

In her room at the hotel Agnes sat down to wait. Peace had come into her soul again; its fevered alarms were quiet. Expectancy trembled in her bosom, where no fear foreshadowed what remained for him to say. Her confidence was so complete in him, now that he had come, that she would have been satisfied, so she believed at that hour, if he had said: