Whispering Smith Part 13

Lance Dunning waved his hand as an ultimatum. "Cross where I tell you to cross, or keep off the Stone Ranch. Is that English?"

"It certainly is. But in matter of fact we must cross on the survey agreed on in the contract for a right-of-way deed."

"I don't recognize any contract obtained under false representations."

"Do you accuse me of false representations?"

Lance Dunning flipped the ash from his cigar. "Who are you?"

"I am just a plain, every-day civil engineer, but you must not talk false representations in any contract drawn under my hand."

"I am talking facts. Whispering Smith may have rigged the joker--I don't know. Whoever rigged it, it has been rigged all right."

"Any charge against Whispering Smith is a charge against me. He is not here to defend himself, but he needs no defence. You have charged me already with misleading surveys. I was telephoned for this morning to come over to see why you had held up our work, and your men cover me with rifles while I am riding on a public road."

"You have been warned, or your men have, to keep off this ranch. Your man Stevens cut our wires this morning----"

"As he had a perfect right to do on our right of way."

"If you think so, stranger, go ahead again!"

"Oh, no! We won't have civil war--not right away, at least. And if you and your men have threatened and browbeaten me enough for to-day, I will go."

"Don't set foot on the Stone Ranch again, and don't send any men here to trespa.s.s, mark you!"

"I mark you perfectly. I did not set foot willingly on your ranch to-day. I was dragged on it. Where the men are grading now, they will finish their work."

"No, they won't."

"What, would you drive us off land you have already deeded?"

"The first man that cuts our wires or orders them cut where they were strung yesterday will get into trouble."

"Then don't string any wires on land that belongs to us, for they will certainly come down if you do."

Lance Dunning turned in a pa.s.sion. "I'll put a bullet through you if you touch a barb of Stone Ranch wire!"

Stormy Gorman jumped forward with his hand covering the grip of his six-shooter. "Yes, d.a.m.n you, and I'll put another!"

"Cousin Lance!" d.i.c.ksie Dunning advanced swiftly into the room. "You are under our own roof, and you are wrong to talk in that way."

Her cousin stared at her. "d.i.c.ksie, this is no place for you!"

"It is when my cousin is in danger of forgetting he is a gentleman."

"You are interfering with what you know nothing about!" exclaimed Lance angrily.

"I know what is due to every one under this roof."

"Will you be good enough to leave this room?"

"Not if there is to be any shooting or threats of shooting that involve my cousin."

"d.i.c.ksie, leave the room!"

There was a hush. The cowboys dropped back. d.i.c.ksie stood motionless.

She gave no sign in her manner that she heard the words, but she looked very steadily at her cousin. "You forget yourself!" was all she said.

"I am master here!"

"Also my cousin," murmured d.i.c.ksie evenly.

"You don't understand this matter at all!" declared Lance Dunning vehemently.

"Nothing could justify your language."

"Do you think I am going to allow this railroad company to ruin this ranch while I am responsible here? You have no business interfering, I say!"

"I think I have."

"These matters are not of your affair!"

"Not of my affair?" The listeners stood riveted. McCloud felt himself swallowing, and took a step backward with an effort as d.i.c.ksie advanced. Her hair, loosened by her ride, spread low upon her head.

She stood in her saddle habit, with her quirt still in hand. "Any affair that may lead my cousin into shooting is my affair. I make it mine. This is my father's roof. I neither know nor care anything about what led to this quarrel, but the quarrel is mine now. I will not allow my cousin to plunge into anything that may cost him his life or ruin it." She turned suddenly, and her eyes fell on McCloud. "I am not willing to leave either myself or my cousin in a false position. I regret especially that Mr. McCloud should be brought into so unpleasant a scene, because he has already suffered rudeness at my own hands----"

McCloud flushed. He raised his hand slightly.

"And I am very sorry for it," added d.i.c.ksie, before he could speak.

Then, turning, she withdrew from the room.

"I am sure," said McCloud slowly, as he spoke again to her cousin, "there need be no serious controversy over the right-of-way matter, Mr. Dunning. I certainly shall not precipitate any. Suppose you give me a chance to ride over the ground with you again and let us see whether we can't arrive at some conclusion?"

But Lance was angry, and nursed his wrath a long time.

CHAPTER XV

THE SHOT IN THE Pa.s.s

d.i.c.ksie walked hurriedly through the dining-room and out upon the rear porch. Her horse was standing where she had left him. Her heart beat furiously as she caught up the reins, but she sprang into the saddle and rode rapidly away. The flood of her temper had brought a disregard of consequence: it was in the glow of her eyes, the lines of her lips, and the tremor of her nostrils as she breathed long and deeply on her flying horse.

When she checked Jim she had ridden miles, but not without a course nor without a purpose. Where the roads ahead of her parted to lead down the river and over the Elbow Pa.s.s to Medicine Bend, she halted within a clump of trees almost where she had first seen McCloud.

Beyond the Mission Mountains the sun was setting in a fire like that which glowed under her eyes. She could have counted her heart-beats as the crimson ball sank below the verge of the horizon and the shadows threw up the silver thread of the big river and deepened across the heavy green of the alfalfa fields. Where d.i.c.ksie sat, struggling with her bounding pulse and holding Jim tightly in, no one from the ranch or, indeed, from the up-country could pa.s.s her unseen. She was waiting for a horseman, and the sun had set but a few minutes when she heard a sharp gallop coming down the upper road from the hills.

All her brave plans, terror-stricken at the sound of the hoof-beats, fled from her utterly. She was stunned by the suddenness of the crisis. She had meant to stop McCloud and speak to him, but before she could summon her courage a tall, slender man on horseback dashed past within a few feet of her. She could almost have touched him as he flew by, and a horse less steady than Jim would have shied under her.

d.i.c.ksie caught her breath. She did not know this man--she had seen only his eyes, oddly bright in the twilight as he pa.s.sed--but he was not of the ranch. He must have come from the hill road, she concluded, down which she herself had just ridden. He was somewhere from the North, for he sat his horse like a statue and rode like the wind.