The Cattle-Baron's Daughter Part 45

Flora Schuyler laughed. "We are not to be put off. Tell us what you found--and you needn't have any diffidence: we are quite accustomed to hearing the most astonishing things at Cedar."

"The trouble is that I didn't find anything. I spent several most unpleasant hours watching a railroad-trestle in blinding snow, until the cattle-train went by in safety. n.o.body seemed to have the slightest wish to meddle with it."

Without exactly intending it he allowed his eyes to rest on Hetty a moment, and fancied he saw relief in her face. But it was Flora Schuyler who turned to him.

"What did you do then?"

"I and the boys then decided it would be advisable to look for a ranch where we could get food and shelter, and had some difficulty in finding one. In the morning, we made our way back to the depot, and discovered that a gentleman you know had hired a locomotive a little while after the cattle-train started."

"Larry, of course!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Chris Allonby. "I wanted to stake five dollars with Clavering that he would be too smart for him again."

Cheyne looked at him inquiringly. "I don't quite understand."

"No?" and Allonby's embarra.s.sment was unmistakable. "Well, there is no great reason why you should. I have a habit of talking at random occasionally. There are quite enough sensible people in this country without me just now."

"Then," said Cheyne, "I went on to an especially forlorn place called Boynton, and discovered with some difficulty that Mr. Grant, who hired the locomotive, had stopped it at a dangerous curve and picked several men up.

He took them on to Boynton, and there they seem to have disappeared, though it was suggested that they had departed for a place unknown, either on the top of, or underneath a fast freight train."

Chris Allonby chuckled. "Well," he said, "we haven't the least use for Larry here, but I am almost proud he was a friend of mine."

Cheyne glancing round at the others fancied there was a little glow in Hetty's eyes and a trace of warmer colour in Flora Schuyler's face. It was only just perceptible to him, but he had less doubt when he saw that Miss Allonby was watching her companion covertly, for he was quite aware that the perceptions of the average young woman were likely to be much keener than his own in such affairs.

"I can't help fancying you have a clue to what really happened, Miss Torrance," he said.

"Yes," said Hetty quietly. "It is quite plain to me that Larry saved the train."

Cheyne glanced at her sharply, and then turned to Allonby. "It strikes you that way, too?"

"Of course," said Allonby unguardedly. "It is too bad of Larry. He has beaten us again, though Clavering fixed the thing quite nicely."

Cheyne's face grew stern. "I am to understand that you did not warn the engineer or any of the railroad men?"

"No," said Allonby, with evident embarra.s.sment. "We didn't. It was necessary to make the thing as ugly for Larry's friends as we could, and we knew you would be at the bridge. If you had caught them in the act, with the train not far away, it would have looked ever so much better for us--and you."

He stopped, with an unpleasant feeling that he had blundered. Cheyne's face had become grimmer. Miss Schuyler's lips were curled in a little scornful smile, and there was a curious sparkle in Hetty's eyes.

"I wonder if you quite recognize the depth of Mr. Grant's iniquity yet?"

Flora Schuyler asked.

Cheyne smiled. "I confess I should very much like to meet the man. You see, my profession prevents my being a partisan, and the cleverness and daring of what he has evidently done appeals to me. He took the chances of his own men turning on him to save them from an affray with us, brought them off, and sent your cattle-train through; and what, it seems to me, was more than all, disregarded the probability of his enemies a.s.sociating him with the contriving of the outrage."

"Wouldn't you have done that?" asked Miss Allonby.

"No," said the soldier quietly. "I don't think I should. A man who would do what this one has done would be very likely to take a hand in that kind of thing."

Again there was an almost embarra.s.sing silence broken by Miss Allonby. "I wonder who could have told him."

n.o.body spoke until Cheyne felt it advisable to break the silence.

"You have no sympathy with Grant, Miss Allonby?"

"No," said the girl plaintively. "I don't go quite as far as Mr. Clavering and my cousin do--though Chris generally talks too much--but Larry is a nuisance, and really ought to be crushed. You see, we had everything we wanted before he and the others made the trouble here."

"That is quite convincing," Cheyne said, with somewhat suspicious gravity.

He looked at the others, and fancied that Hetty would have answered but that Flora Schuyler flashed a warning glance at her.

"One could almost fancy that most of us have too much now," she said. "Are we better, braver, stronger, or of choicer stuff than those others who have nothing, and only want the little the law would give them? Oh, yes, we are accomplished--very indifferently, some of us--and have been better taught, though one sometimes wonders at the use we make of it; but was that education given us for our virtues, or thrust upon us by the accident that our fathers happened to be rich?"

"You will scarcely approve, Miss Allonby?" said Cheyne.

The girl's lips curled scornfully. "I never argue with people who talk like that. It would not be any use--and they would never understand me; but everybody knows we were born different from the rabble. It is unfortunate you and Larry couldn't go up and down the country together, convincing people, Flo."

Cheyne, seeing the gleam in Miss Schuyler's eyes, wondered whether there had been malice in the speech, and was not sorry that Torrance and Clavering came in just then.

"I have just come from Newcombe's and heard that you had failed," said Torrance. "If you will come along to my room, I should like to hear about it."

Cheyne smiled as he rose. "I don't know that failed was quite the correct word. My object was to protect the track, and so far as I could discover, no attempt was made to damage it."

Torrance glanced at him sharply as they moved away. "Now, we were under the impression that it was the capture of the man responsible for the affair."

"Then," said the soldier drily, "I am afraid you were under a misapprehension."

He pa.s.sed the next half-hour with Torrance amicably, and it was not until he was returning to the hall with Clavering that he found an opportunity of expressing himself freely. Torrance, he realized, was an old man, and quite incapable of regarding the question except from his own point of view.

"I am just a little astonished you did not consider it advisable to follow the thing up further, when you must have seen what it pointed to," said Clavering.

"That," said Cheyne, smiling, "is foolish of you. I would like to explain that I am not a detective or a police officer."

"You were, at least, sent here to restore tranquillity."

"Precisely!" said Cheyne. "By the State. To maintain peace, and not further the cattle-men's schemes. I am, for the present, your leader's guest; but I have no reason for thinking he believes that in any way const.i.tutes me his ally. In his case I could not use the word accomplice."

Clavering flashed an observant glance at him. "It should be evident which party is doing the most to bring about tranquillity."

"It is not," said Cheyne. "I don't know that it is my business to go into that question; but one or two of the efforts you have made lately would scarcely impress the fact on me."

"You are frank, any way," with a disagreeable laugh.

"No," said Cheyne, with a twinkle in his eyes, "I'm not sure that I am. We occasionally talk a good deal more plainly in the United States cavalry."

He pa.s.sed on to the hall and Clavering went back to Torrance's room. "We have got to get rid of that man, sir," he said. "If we don't, Larry will have him. Allonby had better go and worry the Bureau into sending for another two or three squadrons under a superior officer."

Torrance sighed heavily. "I'm 'most afraid they are not going to take kindly to any more worrying," he said. "In fact, now it's evident how the feeling of the State is going, I have an idea they'd sooner stand in with the homestead boys. Still, we can try it, any way."

It was about the same time that Grant flung himself wearily into a chair in the great bare room at Fremont ranch. His face was haggard, his eyes heavy, for he had spent the greater part of several anxious days and nights endeavouring to curb the headstrong pa.s.sions of his followers, and riding through leagues of slushy snow.

"Will you hurry Tom up with the supper, while I look through my letters?"

he said.