a moment before had been beating desperately against the bandit’s broad chest, now crept up around his neck, and her mouth became warm and alive beneath his.
Tearing his mouth away from hers, the bandit gazed down at her for a moment, breathing heavily. Then jabbing his heel sharply against his horse’s flank, he sent the animal galloping back to the stagecoach.
By this time, Steve had recovered her poise and put up a pretty good fight for the benefit of Andy and the passengers inside the coach. It was only a half-hearted struggle, however, she was chagrined to discover. What was wrong with her? She should have been thoroughly enraged but all she felt was weakness and a fluttery feel-ing in her stomach.
“Let me go, you brute!” she shouted with as much indignation as she could manage.
“Anything for a lady,” the bandit said, swinging her up on the driver’s seat. Chuckling through the mask he had pulled back up over his face, he remarked, “And you are a lady, I find. I’m amazed. You dress and behave like a man, but you kiss like a woman. You’re wasting your time as sheriff, believe me. That is what that star on your chest means, isn’t it?”
Choking with sure enough rage now, Steve noted the man’s glance, lingering on the spot where the badge was pinned to her shirt.
“Oh!” she gasped and cracked the driver’s whip over the backs of the horses, sending-the stagecoach off in a cloud of dust.
She felt rather than heard Andy’s laughter, and it made her even more furious. She cracked the whip over the backs of the horses again and was rewarded by the screams of fright which emanated from the rear of the stagecoach.
“Easy there, gal!” Andy shouted. “No need to wreck this here stagecoach just ’cause you’re mad at that black-masked, gun-totin’ Cassanova,” and he grabbed the whip out of her hand, which suddenly went limp.
“I’ll have his hide for this!” Steve swore, shaken and close to tears from anger and humiliation.
Andy, who had seen everything that happened, knew what was troubling Steve most. He hadn’t missed that soft arm which had stolen of its own will around the bandit’s neck.
In an effort to divert Steve’s mind from that one moment of weakness, Andy said, “That feller wasn’t the same one that held me up last week. This one was a lot bigger and had red hair. Besides, that hombre last week had a short, pudgy pal helping him.” Andy chuckled. “This boy didn’t need help, did he?”
Ignoring Andy’s last remark, Steve asked, “Are you sure this wasn’t the same one who stole the gold shipment last time?”
“Stake my life on it. This one was different, even acted different. Never have seen a hold-up man act like he did.” Andy chuckled again.
“I’ll appreciate it if you’ll keep your remarks to yourself,” Steve said sharply.
“Anything you say, miss. I was just— Well, I’ll be!”
The cause of his exclamation was a cloud of dust to the right and two masked horsemen emerging from it. The sun glinted blindingly on their drawn guns. There was no use trying to outrun them.
“Whoa! Whoa, there,” Andy yelled at the horses.
Speechless with amazement, Steve watched the two strangers approach the stagecoach. Two holdups within a matter of minutes! It was unbelievable!
“What do you want?” she shouted down at the two men as the stagecoach came to a quivering stop.”
“The gold shipment,” the thin dark one who was covering her replied. “Hand it down.” The other one was keeping watch over the passengers.
“You’re a little late, fella,” Steve said; “we were held up a few miles back.”
A dry chuckle escaped her at the sight of the man’s sagging jaw and the consternation which appeared in his face at her news.
At the sound of her chuckle, he recovered himself. “Stop the funny stuff, sister, and hand over that box,” he demanded.
“But I don’t have it,” Steve insisted.
“She’s telling the truth,” Andy put in; “some feller stopped us back aways and took the box full of gold.”
“What’s the trouble up there?” the short, pudgy gunman called from the rear.
“Says they were held up several miles back and haven’t got the gold,” the thin man called without shifting his glance from Steve and Andy. His gray eyes were cold and menacing. “You’d better be telling the truth or the both of you’ll end up as buzzard meat.”
Steve shrugged her shoulders. “Look for yourself.”
The man stared at her for a moment and then yelled over his shoulder to his companion, “See if the chest is back there.” He moved forward carefully and proceeded to search every corner of the driver’s seat with his sharp eyes. His gun never waivered. Steve knew it would be hopeless to try anything.
“Nothing back here,” the man from the rear announced.
“Humm. Nothing up here, either.” His attention snapped back to Steve’s face. “If this is some trick,” he said, his eyes glinting dangerously, “you’ll pay for it.”
“You’re a suspicious cuss,” Andy said sourly. “How long do we have to sit here?”
“In a hurry, grandpa? Well, we’ll help you get started.” The man fired his gun in the air, and the horses were off like lightning.
* * * *
“Now, those are the fellers that took the gold last time,” Andy explained when he had got the horses under control again. “They kinda got crossed up this time. Can’t understand it. Where’d that red-headed bandit come from?”
Shaking his head musingly from time to time, Andy drove the rest of the way to Pine Junction in silence. Steve too was puzzled about the events of the past few hours’. She was grateful for Andy’s silence. It gave her a chance to do some thinking.
She tried to figure out the meaning of the two holdups, but the answer kept eluding her. Every time she neared a solution, the red-headed, gunman’s face came back to her and the feel’of his kiss was once again warm on her lips. What a nerve he had had! She’d—she’d. Well, what wouldn’t she do if she could only capture him. And her time would come, she told herself.
It wasn’t easy for her to explain to the man at the railroad office that she, the sheriff, had allowed the railroad’s gold to be stolen from the stagecoach while she was on it. The man’s ungraciousness increased her hurt pride. When she finally left the office she was still stinging from the man’s obvious contempt.
Explaining to Ben was even harder. “He came up out of nowhere, Ben; we didn’t have a chance. It would have been curtains if either Andy or I had made a move.”
She was sitting on the edge of his desk in the little office at the rear of the bank building. Ben had been leaning back easy and relaxed in his swivel chair until she came to the part about the lone bandit. When she mentioned the fact that there had been only one bandit, he stiffened suddenly and sat up straight.
