Desert Conquest Part 45

He jumped to his feet, gun in hand, as the chair set against the door sc.r.a.ped back from it. Out of the darkness staggered Sheila McCrae.

Water dripped from her old pony hat and ran in little rivulets from a long, yellow slicker. From head to foot she was spattered with mud. Her face was pale, drawn, and dirt-smeared, and blood oozed slowly from a jagged cut above her left eye. She swayed from side to side as she walked.

Kitty Wade cried out; Clyde rose swiftly in quick sympathy. But Casey was before her.

"Sheila--girl--what's the matter?" he exclaimed.

She stretched out her arms to him gropingly.

"Where's Tom, Casey? They're after him. Maybe they're after you.

Father's hurt. Sandy----I can't talk, Casey. I guess--I'm--all in."

He caught her as she fell forward, lifting her in his arms as easily as if she had been a child, and laid her on a couch.

"No, no," he said, as Clyde would have put cushions beneath her head.

"Let her lie flat." He unb.u.t.toned the slicker, and opened her dress halfway from throat to waist, stripping it away with ruthless hand. A bare shoulder and arm showed bruised and discoloured. "She's been in some mix-up--had a fall or something. Wade, get me some whiskey and water!" His long fingers closed on her wrist. "She'll be all right in five minutes, unless something's broken. Mrs. Wade, get in here and loosen her corsets. Give her a chance."

Kitty stooped obediently, and straightened up in amazement.

"Why--she----"

"Well, how did I know?" snapped Casey. He ran his hand down her side.

"No ribs broken; arms all right. Good!"

Sheila's long lashes fluttered against her cheeks, she sighed and opened her eyes.

"Casey," she said, "never mind me. Look out for yourself. Where's Tom?

There are men coming to-night. I was afraid----"

"All right, Sheila," he interrupted. "Tom is safe. The men have gone.

No trouble at all. Just lie quiet till things steady a little. Have a drink of this."

Clyde brought water, sponge, and towels. She cleansed Sheila's face and hands, and deftly dressed the cut in her forehead.

"You make me feel like a baby," said Sheila. "I never fainted before in my life. I didn't think I could faint. I'm all right now. May I sit up, please?"

"You may lie up, if you like," Casey replied. "Let me put some pillows under you. You've had a bad shake-up, old girl."

"Beaver Boy fell," she explained, "and threw me. I must have struck my head. I don't know how I caught him again. I don't remember very clearly. I had to hang on to the horn sometimes--dizzy, you know. I never had to pull leather before. He was afraid of the lightning, and I wasn't strong enough to handle him afterward. The fall took it out of me. I just had to let him go. He knew it, and acted mean. I'll show him whose horse he is next time."

"You rode on your nerve," said Casey. "Tell us all about it. Tell us about your father and Sandy. You were going to say something when you keeled over."

The girl's keen face clouded. "Oh, heavens! Casey, my head can't be right yet. I'd clean forgotten my own people. There's been nothing but trouble in bunches all day. The drivers ran away this morning, smashed the rig, threw father out, and broke his leg. This afternoon this man Gla.s.s, whom we all took for a harmless nuisance, arrested Sandy."

"What?" Casey exclaimed.

"Yes, he did. Gla.s.s is a railway detective. He worked quietly, nosing around the ranches talking to everybody, while the other detective attracted all the attention. n.o.body suspected Gla.s.s. Who would? Anyway, he and another man arrested Sandy for blowing up the dam."

Casey whistled softly, casting a side glance at Wade.

"Where's Sandy now? Where did they take him?"

Sheila laughed, but there was little mirth in it.

"They didn't take him anywhere, but I don't know where he is. I saw him with the two men down by the stable. I thought they were talking about land. Half an hour afterward he came to the house with his parfleches, and asked me to put him up a couple of weeks' grubstake. He had the men locked up in the harness room, but he didn't tell me how he had done it. He took his pack horse and his blankets and hunting outfit, and pulled out. I didn't know what to do. I didn't tell the folks. The ranch hands know, but they won't let the men out. And then it must have been after ten o'clock when one of our men told me of the shooting. He had heard it from somebody on the road. He said that Cross' friends were talking of lynching McHale, and perhaps you. I didn't believe it at first, but after a while I got nervous. Everybody was asleep, and anyway there was n.o.body I could ask to go; so I came myself."

"And Tom and I will never forget it, Sheila," said Casey. "I don't know another girl who could have made it after a fall like that in this storm."

"It was perfectly splendid of you!" cried Kitty Wade, with hearty admiration.

Clyde, obeying a sudden impulse, leaned forward and kissed the bruised forehead. Sheila was unused to such endearments. She had no intimates of her own s.e.x; with the women she was courteously distant, repelling and rather despising them. She had felt Clyde's instinctive hostility, and had returned it. Surprised and touched by her action, the tears started to her eyes. Clyde put her arms around the slender, pliant waist.

"Come with me, dear, and get some sleep. You're badly shaken up. We'll sleep in, in the morning."

"But I have to go back," Sheila objected. "n.o.body knows I've gone. I have to be back by morning. And then there's Beaver Boy! My heavens! I left him standing outside. Oh, I've got to----"

Casey gently pressed her back as she would have risen.

"I'll stable the horse, old girl; and I'll be at Talapus by daylight to tell them where you are. Don't you worry, now, about anything--not even Sandy. If he's gone back to the hills I'll bet he finds Tom. They'll be all right."

"Do you think so, Casey? And will you do that much for me? I'm awfully sore and tired. Every bone and muscle of me aches."

"You poor little girl." He raised her in his arms. "Come on, girls, and put her to bed. I'll carry her in."

CHAPTER XXV

With the first streaks of dawn Casey and Simon mounted and rode for Talapus. But before they had ridden five hundred yards Casey discovered an extraordinary thing. In his ears sounded a sustained, musical murmur, nothing less than the happy laugh of running water.

"By the Lord Harry!" he e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed. "There's water in the ditches."

Simon nodded. "Ya-as. _Hiyu chuck_ stop, all same _skook.u.m chuck_," he observed, signifying that there was a full head of it, like a rapid.

The ditches were running to the brim. After the soaking rain of the night the water was not immediately needed, but it showed that the irrigation company's works no longer controlled the supply. When they reached the river they found a swirling, yellow torrent running yeasty-topped, speckled with debris.

"S'pose cloud _kokshut_!" Simon observed.

"Cloudburst, eh!" said Casey. "Looks like it. Then either the company's dam has gone, or it can't take care of the head."

The former supposition seemed the more likely. Somewhere up in the heart of the hills the black storm cloud had broken, and its contents, collected by nameless creeks and gulches, had swooped down on the Coldstream, raising it bank high, booming down to the lower reaches, practically a wall of water, against which only the strongest structures might stand. Temporary ones would go out before it, washed away like a child's sand castle in a Fundy tide.

Ignoring trails, they struck straight across country. The land had been washed clean. Beneath the brown gra.s.ses the earth lay dark and moist. A hundred fresh, elusive odours struck the nostrils, called forth from the soil by the rare moisture, a silent token of its latent fertility.

On the way there were no houses, no fences, no cleared fields. The land lay in the dawn as empty as when the keels of restless white men first split the Western ocean; and more lifeless, for the great buffalo herds that of old gave the men of the plains and foothills food and raiment were gone forever.

The sun was up when they reached Talapus. Mrs. McCrae had just discovered her daughter's absence; and her husband was cursing the leg that held him helpless. Casey told them the events of the night, and Donald McCrae was proud of his daughter, and but little worried about his son.

"Show me another girl would have ridden in that storm!" he exclaimed.