The Boss of the Lazy Y Part 17

"A snake," said Calumet in a voice loud enough for Betty to hear.

"A snake! Holy smoke!" growled Dade in disgust. "Wakin' people up at this time of the night because you wanted to shoot at a measly snake.

Tomorrow we'll lay off for an hour or so an' I'll take you where you can shoot 'em to your heart's content. But, for the love of Pete, quit shootin' at 'em when a guy's asleep."

Calumet looked up sardonically, not at Dade, but at Betty. "Was you all asleep?" he inquired in a voice of cold mockery. Even at that distance he saw Betty redden, and he laughed shortly.

"A foxy snake," he said; "one of them kind which goes roamin' around at night. Lookin' for a mate, mebbe." He turned abruptly, with a last sneering look at Betty, and made his way around the house.

CHAPTER XIV

JEALOUSY

Dade was asleep when Calumet got into bed, and he was still asleep when Calumet awoke the next morning. Calumet descended to the kitchen. When he opened the kitchen door Bob's dog ran between his legs and received a kick that sent him, whining with pain and surprise, off the porch.

Dominating everything in Calumet's mind this morning was the bitter conviction that Betty had deceived him. There had been ground for Taggart's talk in the Red Dog--he saw that now. Taggart and Betty were leagued against him. When he had brought Taggart face to face with Betty that morning more than a month ago the Arrow man had pretended insolence toward Betty in order to allay any suspicion that Calumet might have concerning the real relations between them. It had been done cleverly, too, so cleverly that it had convinced him. When he remembered the cold, disdainful treatment that Betty had accorded Taggart that afternoon, he almost smiled--though the smile was not good to see. He had championed her--he knew now that it had been a serious championship--and by doing so he had exposed himself to ridicule; to Betty's and Taggart's secret humor.

He discovered an explanation for Betty's conduct while he fed and watered Blackleg. It was all perfectly plain to him. Neither Betty nor Taggart had expected him to return to the Lazy Y. Betty's actions on the night of his arrival proved that. She had exhibited emotion entirely out of reason. Undoubtedly she and Taggart had expected to wait the year specified in the will, certain that he would not appear to claim the money or the idol, or they might have planned to leave before he could return. But since he had surprised them by returning unexpectedly, it followed that they must reconstruct their plans; they would have to make it impossible for him to comply with his father's wishes. They could easily do that, or thought they could, by making life at the ranch unbearable for him. That, he was convinced, was the reason that Betty had adopted her cold, severe, and contemptuous att.i.tude toward him. She expected he would find her nagging and bossing intolerable, that he would leave in a rage and allow her and Taggart to come into possession of the property. Neither she nor Taggart would dare make off with the money and the idol as long as he was at the ranch, for they would fear his vengeance.

He thought his manner had already forced Betty to give him his father's letters and admit the existence of the idol--she had been afraid to lie to him about them. And so Betty was "stringing" him along, as Taggart had suggested, until he completed the repairs on the buildings, until he had the ranch in such shape that it might be worked, and then at the end of the year Betty would tell him that his reformation had not been accomplished, and she and Taggart would take legal possession.

But if that was their plan they were mistaken in their man. Until he had worked out this solution of the situation he had determined to leave.

Betty's deceit had disgusted him. But now, though there were faults in the structure of the solution he had worked out, he was certain that they intended working along those lines, and he was now equally determined to stay and see the thing out.

Of course, Taggart was trying to make a fool of Betty--that was all too evident. A man who has serious intentions--honorable intentions--toward a girl does not talk about her to his friends as Taggart had talked.

Taggart did not care for her; he was merely planning to gain her confidence that he might gain possession of the money and the idol. The very fact that he was meeting Betty secretly proved that she had not given him the treasure. Perhaps she had doubts of him and was delaying.

Yes, that was the explanation. Well, he would see that Taggart would never get the treasure.

He went in to breakfast and watched Betty covertly during the meal. She was trying to appear unconcerned, but it was plain to see that her unconcern was too deep to be genuine, and it moved Calumet to malevolent sarcasm.

"Nothin' is botherin' you this mornin', I reckon?" he said to her once when he caught her looking at him. "Clear conscience, eh?" he added as she flushed.

"What should bother me?" she asked, looking straight at him.

"I was thinkin' that mebbe the racket I was makin' tryin' to kill that snake might have bothered--"

To his surprise, she pressed her lips tightly together, and he could see mirth in her eyes--mocking mirth.

"You are talking in riddles," she said quietly.

So then she was going to deny it? Wrath rose in him.

"Riddles, eh?" he said. "Well, riddles--"

"That reptile was sure botherin' you a heap," cut in Dade; and Calumet shot a quick glance at him, wondering whether he, also, was a party to the plot to "string" him.

He thought he detected grat.i.tude in Betty's eyes as she smiled at Dade, but he was not certain. He said no more on the subject--then. But shortly after the conclusion of the meal he contrived to come upon Betty outside the house. She was hanging a dish towel from a line that stretched from a corner of the porch to the stable.

Looking at her as he approached, he was conscious that there was something more than rage in his heart against her for her duplicity; there was a gnawing disappointment and regret. It was as though he was losing something he valued. But he put this emotion away from him as he faced her.

"You're d.a.m.n slick," he said; "slicker than I thought you was. But I ain't lettin' you think that you're stringin' me like you thought you was." He put vicious and significant emphasis on the word, and when he saw her start he knew she divined that he had overheard the conversation between her and Taggart.

Her face flushed. "You were listening, then," she said with cold contempt.

"I ain't ashamed of it, either," he shot back. "When a man's dealin'

with crooks like--" He hesitated, and then gave a venomous accent to the words--"like you an' Taggart, he can't be over-scrupulous. I was sure listenin'. I heard Taggart ask you if you was still stringin' me. If it hadn't been for that new pup which I just brought Bob I'd have done what I was goin'--"

He stopped talking and looked sharply at her, for a change had come over her. In her eyes was that expression of conscious advantage which he had noticed many times before. She seemed to be making a great effort to suppress some emotion, and was succeeding, too, for when she spoke her voice was low and well controlled.

"So you heard Taggart talking to me?" she mocked, mirth in her eyes.

"And you shot at him? Is that it? Well, what of it? I do not have to account to you for my actions!"

He laughed. "Nothin' of it, I reckon. But if you're stuck on him, why don't you come out in the open, instead of sneakin' around? You made it pretty strong the day I smashed his face for talkin' about you. I reckon he had some grounds."

He was talking now to hurt her; there was a savage desire in his heart to goad her to anger.

But he did not succeed. Her face paled a little at his brutal words, at the insult they implied, and she became a little rigid, her lips stiffening. But suddenly she smiled, mockingly, with irritating unconcern.

"If I didn't know that you hate me as you do I should be inclined to think that you are jealous. Are you?"

He straightened in astonishment. Her manner was not that of the woman who is caught doing something dishonorable; it was the calm poise of st.u.r.dy honesty at bay. But while he was mystified, he was not convinced.

She had hit the mark, he knew, but he laughed harshly.

"Jealous!" he said; "jealous of you? I reckon you've got a good opinion of yourself! You make me sick. I just want to put you wise a few. You don't need to try to pull off any of that sweet innocence stuff on me any more. You're deep an' slick, but I've sized you up. You made a monkey of the old man; you made him think like you're tryin' to make me think, that you're sacrificin' yourself.

"You soft-soaped him into smearin' a heap of mush into his letters to me.

It's likely you wrote them yourself. An' you hoodwinked him into givin'

you the money an' the idol so's you an' Taggart could divvy up after you put me out of the runnin'. Goin' to reform me! I reckon if I was an angel I'd have to have a recommendation from the Lord before you'd agree that I'd reformed. You couldn't be pried loose from that coin with a crow-bar!"

He turned from her, baffled, for it was apparent from the expression of mirth deep in her eyes that his attack had made no impression on her.

Calumet went to the stable and threw a bridle on Blackleg. While he was placing the saddle on the animal he hesitated and stood regarding it with indecision. He had intended to refuse to accept Betty's orders in the future; had decided that he would do no more work on the buildings. But he was not the Calumet of old, who did things to suit himself, in defiance to the opinions and wishes of other people. Betty had thrown a spell over him; he discovered that in spite of his discovery he felt like accommodating his movements to her desires. It was a mystery that maddened him; he seemed to be losing his grip on himself, and, though he fought against it, he found that he dreaded her disapproval, her sarcasm, and her taunts.

It seemed to him puerile, ridiculous, to think of refusing to continue with the work he had started. As long as he was going to stay at the Lazy Y he might as well keep on. Betty would surely laugh at him if he refused to go on. He fought it out and took a long time to it, but he finally pulled the saddle from Blackleg and hitched the two horses to the wagon. When he drove out of the ranchhouse yard he saw Betty watching him from one of the kitchen windows. He felt like cursing her, but did not.

"I reckon," he said as he curled the lash of the whip viciously over the shoulders of the horses, "that she's got me locoed. Well," he cogitated, "any woman's liable to stampede a man, an' I ain't the first guy that's had his doubts whether he's a coyote or a lion after he's been herd-rode by a petticoat. I'm waitin' her out. But Taggart--" The frown on his face indicated that his intentions toward the latter were perfectly clear.

CHAPTER XV

A MEETING IN THE RED DOG

Of the good resolutions that Calumet had made since the night before, when he had re-read his father's letter in the moonlight while standing beside the corral fence, none had survived. Black, vicious thoughts filled his mind as he drove toward Lazette. When the wagon reached the crest of a slope about a mile out of town, Calumet halted the horses and rolled a cigarette, a sullen look in his eyes, unrelieved by the prospect before him.