The One-Way Trail Part 56

Peter Blunt paused, staggered, then with a great effort pulled himself together. Mighty man as he was, he had reached the limits of his strength, for he had run nearly a mile, carrying Elia in his arms. Eve now clung to his great arm for support.

Peter set the boy on his feet and supported him. A great fear was in him that a perverse fate would yet rob them of justice. Elia was dying, and he knew it. He needed no examination to tell him so. It was there, written in the glazing eyes, in the hideous blue pallor stealing over the lad's face.

"We're in time, laddie," he said hoa.r.s.ely, with his mouth close to Elia's ear. "Speak up and say the truth."

Then he looked up to encounter the keen eyes of the doctor.

"What's all this?" the latter demanded harshly. But there was a sudden light of hope in his fierce eyes.

"It's him. He's got something to say. It's the truth about the killing." Peter indicated the boy. "Speak up, laddie, they're all friends. Speak up--for Jim's sake." Eve looked on with hands clasped.

She was still breathing painfully from her exertions.

The crowd gathered round. All but Smallbones, who never for a moment removed his eyes from Jim's face. It was a bitter moment for him. He felt he was about to be robbed of his prey, and he resented it with all that was mean in him. But Elia did not speak. His eyes were half closed, and a terrible helplessness seemed to have suddenly seized hold of him.

Peter urged him again with a sinking heart.

"Aren't you going to tell them, laddie? Aren't you going to tell them all you've told me--and save Jim?"

It was Jim's voice that answered him.

"Don't bother the lad," he said. He could not see, but instinctively he knew that Elia was in a bad way.

Peter caught at his words.

"Do you hear, laddie? That's Jim talking. You've come to tell the truth and save him. They've got him all bound up, and the rope's hanging over him. Eh? I didn't rightly hear."

He had seen the boy's lips move, and he strove by every means in his power to encourage him to a dying effort.

But in the pause that followed Smallbones' mean voice was suddenly heard.

"This ain't no sort o' justice. Wot's these folks b.u.t.tin' in fer?

They've stuffed him full o' lies 'cause he's sick an' dying. I tell yer it's a trick, an' when he speaks it'll be to tell his usual lies----"

"It ain't lies, I tell yer it ain't lies." It was Elia speaking, suddenly roused from his stupor by the vicious charge. His words came in a high, shrill voice. "I don't need to tell no lies. I killed Will Henderson. I killed him! I killed him! He's kicked me to death, an' I killed him with Jim's knife. It was lyin' ther' wher' he'd left it after he'd fixed them rags on his face. I killed him, I tell yer. An'

I'm glad. 'Cos I--I--hate him, an'--he's--killed--me."

The boy's voice had risen to a shriek, and then died suddenly away to a whisper as he fell back into Peter's arms. It was the final effort, which Peter had been unable to rouse him to, but which, to his own chagrin, Smallbones had achieved.

The boy was dead. The one honest action of his life had been performed with his last breath. Such was the overmastering cruelty of his nature that, in comparative health, and with all his faculties alert, the one spark of good, somewhere deep down in his heart, had had no power to shine. The flesh had been too strong for him--and now, now perhaps he had fulfilled his mission, and that one little step forward would carry him beyond the jaws of evil which had been so tightly shut about his poor, weakly spirit. Peter laid him gently upon the ground.

Then he stood up about to speak. There were tears in his eyes, and without shame he dashed them away with the back of his hand. But Eve stayed him with a gesture. She took a step forward. Her eyes were shining as she glanced round upon the familiar faces. Her mind was made up. There was no shrinking now at the disgrace she had in her cowardice so feared before. Jim had shown her the way to a loyal courage. She understood now why he had gone to his death shielding the real murderer. He had done it to save her, he had done it as once before he had sought to help her. She loved him, and no longer feared to tread the path he had so willingly, so readily trodden for her sake.

"I want to tell you all the things that I should have told you long ago," she began, in clear ringing tones, "but I couldn't, because--because he was my husband."

A startled sound went round the listeners. The doctor's eyes flashed suddenly in Jim's direction. But before she could continue, the latter suddenly urged her to silence.

"There's no need to speak of him, Eve," he cried. "Leave it to me, and I'll tell them how Will came by his death--now."

But the doctor interfered. He signed to one of the men to release the prisoner.

"We'll have Mrs. Henderson's story first," he said decidedly. "You'll please get right ahead, ma'am."

There was just the briefest possible hesitation. For a second Eve's eyes wandered over the faces now gathered so closely about. It was not that she was any longer afraid. It was merely that she looked for one friendly glance. She found it in the round face of Angel Gay. He was smiling on her. And at once she plunged into her story.

"Will Henderson--my husband, was the cattle-thief," she said. And for a moment she could go no further. Had she desired to create a sensation, she amply succeeded. The doctor had to call for silence so that she might proceed.

Having made the plunge, her story came clearly and concisely. She told everything without sparing either herself or her husband. She began from the time when Will had been ordered out of Barnriff, and told all the pitiful, sordid details, right down to his final return after escaping from the doctor's men at the Little Bluff River. Everything she told as she knew it, except the part Jim had played in his actual escape. This she could not bring herself to speak of.

The story took some time in the telling, but there was not a man amongst those a.s.sembled that did not hungrily take in every detail of it. And as it unrolled, to the final scene of Will's return, when again he ill-used her and departed in search of Elia to kill him, and his final promise to return later and kill her, a fierce light of understanding grew on the swarthy, rough faces, and muttered imprecations flew from lip to lip. All bitterness for Jim had pa.s.sed from their thoughts, all except, perhaps, from the thoughts of Smallbones.

And Jim remained silent all the time. He, too, was listening. He, too, shared again in the thoughts which now a.s.sailed the others. The hideous brutality, as it appeared, told in Eve's simple words, set his blood boiling afresh against the dead man. Though he knew it all only too well, it still had power to rouse the worst side of his nature.

At the conclusion, Doc Crombie suddenly turned to Jim. He offered no comment, no sympathy.

"Now, I guess, you'll talk some," he said, in his usual harsh tone.

But somehow his words seemed to contain a smile.

"The boy has told you who killed Will Henderson," Jim answered at once. "I can't, because I didn't see him killed. I'll tell you the part I had in the affair. It's not pretty." He paused, but went on almost at once. "I happened along to Mrs. Henderson's house directly I came in to town. I had news for her. You know the news. Will had escaped."

"Yes," cried Smallbones, unable to keep silent longer, "because you helped him, an' bluffed the Doc. Oh, I'm wise to you."

"You look wise to a good deal," retorted Jim, with a cold smile. Then without further concern he went on with his story. "I came to her house and found her bound and gagged. Will had not long left her. She told me what had happened, that he had gone off to kill Elia, and I rode out at once to the bluff. I found Will kicking the life out of the poor boy. I jumped from my horse and hit him with my fist. I frankly admit I desired to kill him, and my whole intent was in that blow. He fell to the ground with his jaw badly smashed, and--and I was glad. I left him there and looked to Elia. He was in a pretty bad way, but he did not seem so bad as I now realize he must have been.

However, when I saw that I had been in time to save him, my anger began to pa.s.s, and I felt I could not leave the wretched man lying there with his wound dripping, and--well, I thought I'd better do what I could for him. So I sent Elia over to my horse--I intended that he should ride home--while I fixed Will's face up some.

"Well, I had nothing much to do it with except my handkerchiefs," he went on, "so I knelt down beside him, took out my sheath-knife and ripped up my white handkerchief into a bandage and folded my neck-scarf into a pad, and bound it on his broken jaw. Then I got up, and now I know I must have left my knife on the ground beside him. I didn't know it at the time. Anyway, I left him and went back to my horse expecting to find Elia. But he was not there. I was alarmed at once, and began to search round for him, calling at the same time. You see, I thought he'd maybe collapsed somewhere near by. But I got no answer, and so circling round and round I again came to where Will Henderson was lying. At first I didn't notice anything, it was fairly dark; then, of a sudden, I saw he was lying on his back, where before he had been on his side. The next thing was that I realized the bandages were off his face. Then, as I knelt down beside him again, I found that--other. My knife was sticking up in his chest. Then I knew the reason of Elia's absence, and--what he had done."

Jim ceased speaking, and presently his eyes sought Eve's face with a look of trouble in their dark depths. He had wanted to spare her all this, and now--

The doctor's voice was questioning him.

"And you come right into the village, wher' your flavor was mighty strong, to tell us he was dead?" he asked almost incredulously.

Jim shrugged. All eyes were upon him, silently echoing their leader's question.

"Why not?" he said. "I hadn't killed him. Besides, what else was there to do? The evidence was d.a.m.ning anyway. And I sure couldn't run away.

I guessed I'd best trust to circ.u.mstances. Y'see my last words to Mrs.

Henderson were a threat to kill her husband--if he'd killed Elia."

The doctor shook his head.

"Them things sure may have influenced you, but----"

"I think I can tell you."

Doc Crombie turned at the interruption. It was Eve who spoke. Her eyes were shining, and she looked fearlessly into his face.

"Yes," she cried, with rising emotion, "I think I can see the rest. It was to shield Elia, and, shielding him, to save me from pain and the disgrace which he knew I was too cowardly to face. He did it as he did that other thing, when he set out to carry a warning to Will, simply to help me, and save me from my troubles. Oh, doctor, haven't you heard and seen sufficient? Must you stand here demanding all the inmost secrets and motives of two people's lives? Let us go. Let Jim go. I have yet to bury my dead."