The Trail of Conflict Part 26

"They see us! They see us!" she shouted, and laughed exultantly all the while waving the lantern madly. The whistle of the oncoming engine blew a frenzied warning. Greyson turned his wheel way over. The flivver literally jumped the rails and ran along a siding which joined the main track. The girl slid into her seat limp with exhaustion. With groaning and grinding of brakes and clanking of wheels the long train trembled to a stop. Which one of the cars carried the treasure, Jerry wondered, just as a rough Irish voice thundered in her ear:

"For the love of Mike! What we got here? Escaped lunatics, or I miss my guess." The light of a lantern was flashed in the faces of the occupants of the car. The man who held it swore with an ease and facility which took Jerry's breath. "It's a man and a woman, crazy as coots," he called to someone behind him. Then in a magisterial tone, "It's a hunch we got the new division superintendent aboard this trip. He can see for himself what held us up; he'd never believe it if I told him. Now what'd you flag this train for?" demanded the violator of the second Commandment, truculently. A group of men had gathered round him.

Greyson stepped from the flivver and drew Jerry after him. What would he say, she wondered anxiously. Their errand must not be suspected. They must get aboard the train and interview the division superintendent. A sudden mad thought suggested itself. Without an instant's hesitation Jerry slipped her arm under Greyson's, rested her head against his sleeve and smiled audaciously into the broad, weather-beaten face glowering at her.

"Don't scold, Mr. Brakeman. It was reckless, but--but--you see, we just had to flag this train. We--we want to get to the coast.

We're--we're--eloping."

"Good G.o.d!"

Greyson's inarticulate protest was submerged in the hoa.r.s.e e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.n.

Jerry wheeled. Behind her stood Stephen Courtlandt.

CHAPTER XVIII

It seemed to Steve as he looked at the girl, with her hair, which wind and rain had lashed into clinging tendrils of glinting bronze, pressed close against Greyson's arm, that his universe tore itself from its...o...b..t and hurtled into fathomless s.p.a.ce. For thirty throbbing seconds the blue eyes challenged the brown, then he turned away.

"Courtlandt!" called Greyson dominantly, but Steve was speaking to the division superintendent who, white with anxiety, had hurried up.

"Sure they'll have to go along with us, Steve," rea.s.sured the autocrat of the train. He turned to Greyson. "We'll take you to the coast, all right, but you won't get off the train till you've paid a good fat fine for stopping it. You and the lady get aboard, p.r.o.nto. Steve, lock her up in one of the compartments. I'll look after the man. Mac, if anything else tries to hold us up you shoot and shoot quick, no matter if there are skirts mixed up in it." He rushed off in company with the burly brakeman. Greyson caught Courtlandt's arm.

"Look here, Steve, you must listen. Jerry----"

"You needn't apologize for my--my wife, Greyson. She's coming with me."

He put his hands none too gently on the girl's shoulder.

"But, Steve, you don't understand," Jerry protested. "I----"

"All aboard there!" yelled the brakeman angrily. Steve fairly lifted the girl to the platform of the Pullman. He hurried her along the corridor to a compartment.

"Come in here, Jerry, and no matter what you hear don't come out. I'll send the maid to help you get your clothing dry." He turned to go, but she laid her hand on his arm.

"Steve, you must listen to me. I want to tell you----"

"What can you tell me except that you love Greyson and ran away with him? I can't hear that now--I won't. You're mine and I keep what is my own. And remember this, if you try to communicate with him while you are on this train--I'll shoot him." His eyes were black; there was a white line about his nostrils.

"Steve, you're all wrong,--but if you won't trust me----" she shrugged the remainder of the sentence. Then her voice was pleading. "Did Bruce--Mr. Greyson,--get a chance to speak to the division superintendent?"

"Did he? I'll say he did. What Nelson isn't saying to your--your gallant friend at this minute, isn't worth saying." He looked at her suspiciously as she laughed. He took a step nearer.

"No, I shan't have hysterics, Stevie. Now that I know that my gallant friend, as you call him, is explaining our late plan to the division superintendent, I haven't a care in the world,--in fact," with a dainty, politely repressed yawn, "if I could have this place and the maid to myself, I might take a nap. I shall have plenty of time. It is a long way to the coast," with another irrepressible ripple of laughter. Then as he lingered, "You needn't stand guard. I shan't run away again. An encore lacks the snap of a first performance," audaciously.

Courtlandt opened his lips to reply, thought better of it, closed the door smartly behind him and went in search of the maid. Back in the compartment which the division superintendent used as an office he lighted his pipe, and paced the floor back and forth, back and forth as he tried to marshall order from the chaos of his thoughts. Why didn't the fool train start, he wondered, as he listened to what seemed an endless amount of backing and starting and grinding of brakes.

His mind went back to the moment in Lower Field when Johnny Simms had handed him a letter and bolted. He could see every word on the tear-blotted page now:

"Ranlett doesn't want the cattle. He cut the fences so that the Double O outfit would follow the Shorthorns into the mountains.

He and his bunch are figurin' to rob the west-bound to-night at Devil's Hold-up. Government silver. Watch out! Ranlett has spies everywhere."

There had been no signature, no mention of Simms, but Courtlandt felt sure that he was in on the deal and that the wife was trying to keep her husband from being caught in what might easily prove to be more than robbery. His first reaction from the message had been amused incredulity. It was absurd to believe that in these enlightened days a man of Ranlett's intelligence, and he was infernally intelligent, would try to get away with such a mid-eighties stunt. The sense of amus.e.m.e.nt was succeeded by startled conviction. The fact was that Ranlett did think he could put it across and was to make the attempt that night. He must hustle through his work and make Slippy Bend in time to board the train. He could neither wire nor 'phone if it were true that Ranlett had spies everywhere. He must keep his own counsel until he could talk with the official in charge of the west-bound.

After that he had followed trails and conferred with ranch section heads. As clouds began to spread out from the southwest he galloped into Slippy Bend. He had supper in a leisurely fashion at the one hotel, dropped into the post-office for a chat with Sandy, who was sorting his mail for the morrow's trip, and discussed crops and stock and tractors with the group of men gathered there. He had reached the railroad station about ten minutes before the treasure train was due. He hailed the railroad man-of-all-work whose slouch relegated him unquestionably to the preefficiency era.

"West-bound on time? I'm going up the line to follow some steers that have mysteriously wandered off. I'm not looking for trouble, but----" He tapped the holster which hung from his belt. Baldy Jennings, whose head resembled a shiny white island entirely surrounded by a fringe of red hair, chewed and spat with intriguing accuracy as he listened. Steve's explanation had precipitated a flow of observation.

"Shucks! The world's sick. Most of it don't want to work and them that does won't be let by them that don't. The majority seem to figur' that it's a darned sight easier to pick the other man's pocket than to fill their own by honest sweatin' labor. Sure, it never wa'n't none of my b.u.t.t-in, but I used to tell old man Fairfax that Ranlett was narrer between the horns. Oh, you don't hev to mention no names, I know who took them steers,--but cripes, it didn't do no good, he wouldn't listen to Baldy Jennings. And now the coyote's knifed you! An' your old man givin' him every chanct. Human natur'! Human natur'! Well, I gotta get busy. The railroad don't pay me sixty bucks per fer swappin' talk even with the owner of the Double O. Here comes the west-bound." A shrill whistle echoed back and forth among the hills like a shuttlec.o.c.k. The vibration of the rails announced the coming train.

Courtlandt's pipe went out, he stopped his restless pacing of the narrow compartment as he visualized the first person who had stepped from the train. It had been Nelson who had been a captain in the battalion in which Steve had served overseas. His face, which had been white and tense when he reached the platform, had suffused with color as he recognized Courtlandt.

"Well, you can knock me for a gool, if it isn't the Whistling Lieut.!"

he cried eagerly. "What are you doing in this teeming mart of trade?" he added, as he glanced at Baldy Jennings staring open-mouthed at the meeting and beyond him to the few coatless, vested, bearded favorite sons who leaned against the sagging building.

Courtlandt had laughed. When the fog of surprise had lifted he had seen that the years had not changed Nelson. His black eyes were as keen as ever, his little mustache had the same moth-eaten effect, the network of veins on his slightly bulbous nose were redder perhaps, and he was in civilian clothes. That realization wrinkled Steve's brow in perplexity.

"What are you doing here? Last I heard you had joined the regular army and were stationed somewhere around Phila----" Perception of the situation came in a blinding flash. Nelson's eyes met his steadily.

"There are some occasions when a soldier appears in mufti. Especially when he is pa.s.sing as the newly appointed division superintendent of a railroad." Steve drew a breath. So that was it. His eyes traveled over the train. Which was the treasure car? Obviously the one in the middle which looked like an ordinary baggage-car. The rest were brilliantly lighted coaches, from the windows of which eyes peered out curiously, indifferently or interestedly as the temperaments and minds behind them dictated. His glance came back to Nelson.

"You're the man I'm looking for. I've lost some cattle, and I'm going up the line a way to look for them. I must give you all particulars. I'm counting on you to help me, if there should happen to be any rough stuff pulled off, see?"

The two men had stood apart from the confusion of the station. The rain beat down. Over among the mountains thunder and lightning held high carnival. Courtlandt drew Nelson into the lee of the building. He struck a match and held it above his pipe till the wood burned down to his fingers. In the flickering light he and the superintendent, pro tem., had regarded one another steadily. Nelson moistened his lips:

"Sure, I see, Steve. Glad to have you along." He raised his voice as one of the train hands approached. "Make yourself comfortable in my quarters. Perhaps I can find a couple to make up a little game."

Courtlandt was quite unconscious of the rumble of the train as in imagination he relived the time he had spent waiting for Nelson to join him in the double compartment which had been fitted up as an office for the superintendent. Minutes seemed hours. When he did come the smile had left his lips. His eyes were stern. He closed the door with a bang.

"Deal out what's coming, quick!" he had commanded and Steve had told him almost word for word what Mrs. Simms had written. "You're sure of this?"

"I've given the message as it came to me. The person who sent the warning had every reason to keep mum."

"I get you." Nelson pulled down a map which was rolled against the side of the car. He studied the maze of lines and dots and dashes. "Going along with us?" he had asked casually.

"The surest thing you know." Steve remembered how absurdly light-hearted he had felt. Nelson looked so thoroughly equal to his job.

"Then you'd better--now what the devil is _that_?" he growled as the engine blew a furious warning and the brakes ground on with a suddenness which threw both men against the desk. "We can't have reached Devil's Hold-up yet."

And then--Courtlandt's crowding thoughts had reached the moment when he had heard a girl's voice say:

"Don't scold, Mr. Brakeman. It was reckless--but--but, you see, we had to flag this train--we--we want to go to the coast. We're--we're eloping!"

Jerry and Greyson! And he would have staked his life that she was true blue, that even if she felt that she could never love the man she had married she would have trampled temptation. The intolerable ache in Steve's heart maddened him. She should not carry out this mad plan. He wouldn't let her go if she hated him eternally. He'd make her love him, love him as he had loved her from the moment he had looked up to see her enter the living-room of Glamorgan's apartment. He had been so infernally proud that he had tortured himself by pretending indifference and now he had been brutal. He should have let her explain--he'd go now and listen to what she had to say. G.o.d help him to act the man no matter what it was. He would be tender, he would be sympathetic--but--he'd never give her up.

Nelson entered and closed the door softly behind him. His face was white, there were tiny flecks of foam on his lips, his eyes blazed.

"In five minutes we'll slow down to a crawl before entering Devil's Hold-up. The bandits counted on that. I'll go forward to the cab. Trail along after me. Leave your holster here. The pa.s.sengers mustn't get the idea that we're packing guns; get me?"