openly admitted that he wanted to rouse me against Louis Peele. ‘Louis did that!’ he said, pointing to the heap where Bruce and Harry lay. ‘He killed them both. I saw him do it. Killed Bruce, and his own brother Harry!’
“I asked what Bruce was doing there. ‘Why, that holdup was pulled right back there,’ he said. ‘Bruce was coming back from Tenville, and he ran into us in the hills. He got curious as to what we were up to and followed us. After the holdup, Harry tried to stop one of the gang from getting away with the cash. Harry got it and started to run with it. Bruce jumped in and tried to take it from Harry. Louis shot them both down. And you—you have to get Louis Peele.’
“ ‘Why don’t you get him yourself?’ I said. He answered that he was afraid to try it. He was a poor shot. I’ve always been a good shot. He knew it. Well, I believed that Porky was telling the truth. But I didn’t know it. That is, I couldn’t prove it. Louis, remember, had proved that he wasn’t near the scene of the holdup at the time it had taken place. I went back to the ranch a very sick boy, Doe. My entire family was gone. I was utterly alone. With the help of the sheriff I sold the ranch and got out of there.
“Before I left, three men of Peele’s gang had been arrested, tried, convicted, and sent to the penitentiary. They were all men I had never seen before—a little rat with mean eyes, George Sidney; a gun-toting fellow named Jean Bluex; and a big ugly bruiser with a curly beard, Halvord Creegan, called ‘Vord.’ I saw them only at a distance, as the sheriff was taking them to jail. The week I left there, Porky Ellerton was found dead at the base of Hell’s Hill. He had tried to get Louis after all, and had failed—but nobody could prove it.”
“And you drifted down this way, and bought this ranch,” Doe added thoughtfully. “And Louis found you out, and followed you. Why?”
Hardin sighed. “I think I know, Doe, boy. I have never stopped trying to get something definite on Louis. He must realize that. Ever since he came here, I have held my hand and waited for him to break loose and give himself away.
“He knows how I loved Bruce. He’s afraid I will find evidence against him some time, and he’s bound to get rid of me, no matter what the price. He will never rest easy so long as I live. But he is too cunning to shoot me down in cold blood. He doesn’t want to hang, nor go to the penitentiary for life as those three of his gang did. He wants to force me to fight, so that he can kill me—in self-defense.”
“Oh!” breathed Doe again. “I’m beginning to see clear.”
“Yes. He’s on the rough edge, Doe. Yet—I know without asking you that there is no proof that he and his men killed Lonny Pope.”
“You’re right.” Gaston lifted miserable eyes to Hardin’s face. “There’s no proof that he carried Mary Silver off, either. But we all reckon he did. He knew well enough that her brother Mel had gone in to Pendleton to ride in the roundup, and that she was therefore there alone. He got the hands of the J Bar B all riding along the Diamond W line, helping Warde’s outfit—trying to catch some rustler that had been raiding the herds of both ranches. He was the rustler. But can we prove it? Hell, no! And while all the men of the Valley were down there, Mary disappeared. I know as well as you do who did it all, but none of us has any more proof than a jack rabbit.”
“What did you do when you found Lon?” demanded Hardin.
“I went straight to the J Bar B taking Lon with me. I didn’t dare accuse any one till I had something to go on. I did say that Louis Peele might have some knowledge of what had happened to Lon. The J Bar B crew don’t love Louis any better than the Diamond W boys do, o’course. We all went flying down to Peele’s ranch. It was plumb deserted, Gage. Not a soul there. Not a thing out of order, not a suspicious sign. That was when I went south after you.
“When I got back—what do you guess? One of Peele’s men came in, as smooth as cream. He said he had come back to take care of the ranch till Louis and the rest of the crew returned; that they had gone to Pendleton to the round-up and he had ridden with them as far as Sky Gulch. Could anything sound more reasonable? And how were we to prove that he wasn’t telling the truth?
“Even Warde and Baker cooled off. They told me I shouldn’t go off half-cocked and get dangerous notions against Louis and his outfit till I had some proof to back me up, even if we didn’t any of us like them too well. What was there left for me to do, Gage?”
“Exactly what you did do, Doe—send for Guy Shawnessy. It’s a damn mess. The Four from Hell’s Hill gone with the sheriff to hunt Louis Peele! But we can’t waste time sitting here shooting the breeze, Doe. Mel will be getting back from the round-up——”
“But he won’t!” Doe interrupted. “A bad horse piled him and broke his left hip. He’ll have to stay there in the hospital for months. We just got word.”
“That’s bad, Doe! Bad for him, and for us, right now when we need him too——” Hardin cut himself short, as there came from the night outside the drumming sound of a horse’s hoofs, approaching at a hard gallop. He turned his head swiftly to stare at Gaston.
They sat rigid, listening. The wildly running horse reached the lane, raced down it, and came to a staggering blowing halt in the rear yard near the house. The sound of a man’s spur chains clinked through the silent night, as the rider of the horse heaved himself from the saddle and advanced toward the house.
Hardin sprang to his feet, half drawing his right-hand gun. He leaped to the door and swung it open.
Guy Shawnessy lurched up the back steps and staggered across the porch. Hardin fell back a step as the sheriff stumbled into the room.
Shawnessy was hatless. His thick, blond, curling hair was matted with blood that had oozed from a wound in the scalp above his right temple. His pale face was streaked with blood and grime, drawn with pain and weariness.
His clothes were torn in numerous places and caked with dirt. His left arm hung limp. The shirt over his left shoulder was bullet-torn and dark with blood. There was a bullet hole in the top of his right boot, but the bullet which had made it had barely scored the skin.
In his arm he held Mary Silver. The right arm gripped her against his chest. Her lax body was further supported by the suspenders he had removed and tied about his body and hers for the purpose.
Her clothes were soiled and torn, also, spotted with blood from his wounds, but she was uninjured. Her face was drawn and white under the grime of dust and sweat. Racked by terror, vitiated by exhaustion, she was as soundly asleep as a person drugged.
Doe gaped at them, with appalled eyes, utterly unconscious of his scant garb.
Shawnessy turned a glassy gaze on Hardin. He seemed to be striving fully to convince himself that he had reached his destination at last. “Take her, Gage. Quick, man!”
Hardin dropped his half-drawn gun into its holster, slammed shut the door, and leaped to meet Shawnessy’s swaying figure, all in one coordinated movement. He jerked asunder the suspenders that held Mary Silver’s knees to the sheriff’s side.
As he took her unconscious body into his arms, Shawnessy, relieved of the dead weight, closed his eyes and fell forward on his face.
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