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Title: The man-killers

Author: Dane Coolidge

Release date: June 14, 2023 [eBook #70972]

Language: English

Original publication: United States: E. P. Dutton & Company

Credits: deaurider, Graeme Mackreth and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive)


*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE MAN-KILLERS ***



 THE MAN-KILLERS

 BY
 DANE COOLIDGE

 AUTHOR OF "THE FIGHTING FOOL,"
 "WUNPOST," ETC.




 NEW YORK
 E.P. DUTTON & COMPANY
 681 FIFTH AVENUE




 COPYRIGHT, 1921,
 BY E.P. DUTTON & COMPANY

 _All Rights Reserved_


 _First printing_      _March, 1921_
 _Second_    "         _April, 1921_


 Printed in the United States of America




CONTENTS


  CHAPTER                                   PAGE

  I The Trap                                  1

  II Meshackatee                              9

  III The Neutrals                           19

  IV Maverick Basin                          30

  V The Casuist                              40

  VI The Ultimate Cause                      47

  VII A Showdown                             57

  VIII The Good Old Simple Plan              65

  IX Ambush                                  74

  X The Sheep-War                            81

  XI Allifair                                88

  XII The Man-Killing Bassetts               96

  XIII Back from the Dead                   104

  XIV A McIvor                              112

  XV The Castle in the Air                  122

  XVI There's Always a Way                  130

  XVII Indian Tactics                       141

  XVIII I Claim Red                         151

  XIX Apaches                               160

  XX Up Horse-Thief Canyon                  167

  XXI The Randolphs                         175

  XXII The Flight                           183

  XXIII The Eagles' Nest                    193

  XXIV No Trail                             201

  XXV Live Bait                             208

  XXVI The Man-Trap                         218

  XXVII Winchester Takes the Long Chance    226

  XXVIII The Honor of the McIvors           232




THE MAN-KILLERS




CHAPTER I

THE TRAP


There was a hush, a boding silence, in Deadman Canyon, and skirling
hawks, flying high against the cliffs, settled down and watched
expectantly. A man was riding warily up the Maverick Basin trail, and
ahead, like hunting animals, two men were skulking forth to cut him
off at the creek. Above them, stuck tight as mud-wasp's nests to the
shelves of sun-blackened crags, the white houses of cliff-dwellers, now
desolate and tenantless, gazed down upon the age-old tragedy; but the
man rode on, his rifle beneath his knee, and at the stalking place of
the Scarboroughs he stopped. A stream of cold water, gushing out of a
deep side chasm, formed a swirl in the tepid waters of the creek; and
close to its edge a flat stone had been laid, where a man could kneel
and drink. He knelt, and when he rose up he was looking down a gun.

"Put 'em up!" commanded a voice, and he started back defiantly, at
which a second voice came from the side.

"Right quick!" it added, and as the stranger obeyed Isham Scarborough
stepped out from behind his rock.

He was tall and slim, as befitted a Texan, with a red, freckled
face, lips swollen by the sun, and eyelashes bleached yellowish
white. A huge, black hat made him tower like a giant as he glowered
down insolently upon his captive and after a long, searching look
he jabbed him in the ribs and reached out to take his gun. But the
stranger stepped away with waspish quickness and at the look in his
eyes Isham flinched and drew back while his brother rose up to shoot.
Red Scarborough was short and chunky, with flaming red hair and eyes
with a piggish glint; and when he shouted out a warning the stranger's
hands shot up, for he, too, had learned to read eyes. Red strode forth
wrathfully and twitched away the prisoner's gun, then whirled on the
startled Isham.

"You're going to get killed," he warned, "if you don't quit monkeying
with these fellers."

"Huh, huh!" scoffed Isham, and swaggered up to the man, he regarded him
with his head on one side. "You're bad, now; ain't ye?" he demanded.
"Well, we'll soon break you of that. Where d'ye think you're going with
that horse?"

The stranger blinked and regarded him intently, then drew down his lips
to a line. He was dark and slender, with flashing black eyes and the
high cheek-bones of a fighter, but now he was ominously calm.

"I am going," he said, "to Maverick Basin. Is this a hold-up, or what?"

"It's a hold-up," replied Isham, "and you're dad-burned lucky it didn't
turn out a killing. I had my six-shooter on your heart and if you'd
ever went for that gun--we'd've left you here for the buzzards. What
takes _you_ over into Maverick Basin?"

"That is _my_ business," replied the prisoner, suddenly matching his
arrogance, and Isham glanced meaningly at his brother.

"Oh, it is, eh?" he observed, reaching over behind a rock and fetching
out a rawhide rope. "Well, I'll damn soon show you that it's mine!"

He shook out a loop, flipped it back into the sand and then, with the
practiced skill of a cowboy, snapped it over his prisoner's head.
Before he could move, the stranger's arms were pinioned; and as the
rope was jerked taut Red caught him from behind and tied his hands hard
and fast.

"Now!" cursed Red, "come through, Mister Man--are you going in to join
them Sorry Blacks?"

"Never heard of 'em," answered the man, and Red's sunburned lips drew
back in a hateful, distorted grin.

"I _know_ that's a lie," he said, "so we'll jest cut you off right
here."

He motioned to Isham, and, with their prisoner between them, they
toiled up a trail to the east. The canyon wall was low on that
side of the creek and at the base of the cliff there was a row of
cliff-dwellings, strung along under the overhang of the rim.

It was from behind their loopholed walls that the Scarboroughs watched
the trail, to cut off such chance travelers as he, and as the prisoner
climbed up his lip curled scornfully at the sight of their elaborate
precautions. In spite of their bluster something still seemed to tell
him that they were not as bad as they looked; although often, as he
knew, the most hideous crimes have been committed by cravens at heart.
They entered a low door and passed on from room to room until at last
he was thrust into a dark and noisome space and bound with his back
against a post.

It was one of those black holes which the cliff-dwellers themselves
had apparently used as a prison and against the square of light which
poured in from above he saw the heavy lattice of bars. Wooden bars, and
something else--and as he looked again he saw the sinister outlines of
a loop. It hung from a beam like the slack body of a snake, and there
was a hangman's knot on the end!

"Now," began Isham Scarborough, "perhaps you can talk. You ain't the
first Sorry horse-thief that has tried to hold out on us, but they
danged sure talked--or hung. So you never even heard of the Sorry
Blacks?"

"No, I never did," answered the prisoner stoutly, and Isham shook down
the loop.

"Say, now listen," he warned, "we know doggoned well that you ain't
no friend of ours. We're from Texas, see, and back where we come from
no white man rides a saddle like that. So you're ditched at the start
by that center-fire rigging and the danged fresh way you've got, but
before we stretch your neck we'll give you a chance to tell where you
got that horse."

He paused and opened up the hangman's loop, and the prisoner found his
tongue.

"I bought him in Bowie," he declared in a passion, "and I've got the
bill of sale in my pocket. But I swear I never heard of the Blacks in
my life--and I don't know what you're talking about."

"Well, the Bassett gang, then!" broke in Red Scarborough roughly,
"ain't you never heerd tell of the Dirty Black Bassetts? Well, that's
the outfit we're talking about!"

"Well, why didn't you say so?" demanded the prisoner resentfully. "Of
course I've heard of the Bassetts. But is that any reason for holding a
man up and threatening to hang him for a horse-thief? You must be some
of the Scarboroughs, but they informed me back in Tonto----"

"Well, what did they inform you?" prompted Isham hectoringly, and the
prisoner drew himself up.

"I was _informed_," he said, "that the Scarboroughs were Southern
gentlemen."

"Uhr," jeered Red, but Isham stood silent.

"Well?" he inquired.

"And as a Southerner myself," went on the prisoner, but Isham cut him
off short.

"You ignorant, black rascal," he burst out in a fury, "don't you dare
to open your mouth and say a word agin the Scarboroughs or I'll kick
your doggoned head off. You've got Injun blood yourse'f, if I'm any
judge, and I know for a certainty you're going into the Basin to throw
in with them dirty, black Bassetts!"

"No, you are mistaken," answered the prisoner firmly. "I'm just looking
for a certain party that I know."

"Oho!" exclaimed Red, stooping to feel for his badge, "so we've picked
up an officer, have we?"

"No, again," replied the prisoner. "I am looking for a friend, and your
quarrels are nothing to me."

"Well, er--who is this friend?" inquired Isham suspiciously, but the
stranger shook his head.

"I cannot tell you that, but I give you my word of honor I am not
going in to join the Bassetts. And now, if you'll kindly untie these
ropes----"

"Don't you think it!" raged Isham, "not after what you did! You
murdering black hound, you started to grab your gun and gut-shoot me
before I could pull. You're a Bassett gunman and you'll never git past
here, so you might as well say your prayers. Come on, Red; let's string
him up!"

"Naw, leave him wait!" answered Red impatiently. "I want to keep my eye
on that trail. Let's git that other jasper and throw him in here too;
and then, if they don't come through, we can hang 'em!"

They withdrew hurriedly and as he listened to their footsteps the
prisoner ventured the ghost of a smile. It was very impressive, with
the hangman's knot and all, but in spite of their bluster he still
doubted their big words and their threats to take his life. And as
for this other prisoner--he dismissed him with a shrug and turned to
inspect his cell. But as he gazed at the blank walls he heard a scuffle
without and the thud of heavy blows, and then a hoarse voice burst out
in frightful oaths which were smothered as the struggles increased.

"You ain't _man_ enough!" it roared, suddenly blaring out again. "No,
you can't _put_ me in there, the two of you!"

There was a rush and a slapping of feet, choking curses and a chorus
of grunts, and then Isham plunged through the doorway, heaving away at
a rope, while his brother fought the prisoner from behind. The rope,
which had once been thrown about the prisoner's neck, was clutched back
by a huge, hairy hand; and as Red pushed him in the other hand swept
out in a last, bearlike swipe at his head. But the Scarboroughs were
powerful men, accustomed to roping and tying steers, and despite his
efforts they dragged him to a post and tied his hands together behind
it.

"Oh, we cain't, hey?" they taunted, and the prisoner panted angrily as
he shook back his tumbled black hair.

"You danged, ornery cow-thieves," he began in measured tones, "I know
what's the matter with you--you're jealous. You want all the stealing
for yourselves. You ain't satisfied with taking what comes your way;
you want to hog it all. But I'll see you in hell first, you low-down
Texican polecats, before I'll----"

"Shut up!" broke in Isham, giving him a boot in the ribs, and as he
burst out in wicked curses they crawled out the doorway and closed it
with a huge flat stone. There was a hush, as their footsteps clumped
away into silence, and then, beneath the shadow of the hangman's knot,
the prisoners sat and stared at each other.




CHAPTER II

MESHACKATEE


The man-trap of the Scarboroughs had caught a wampus when it snared
this second rider of the trails. He was huge, and bearded like Olympian
Zeus--a black, curling beard which stood out in bunches beneath strands
of long, towsled hair. His nose was small and snubbed, his mouth a
cavern of noise, and the rolling blue eyes revealed a depth of ferocity
which argued him near to the brutes; yet as he gazed at his fellow
prisoner the savagery fell away from him and his smile was almost human.

"Hello there, pardner," he greeted with a nod, "so they've got you in
here, too. Well by grab, I never thought, after all I been through, to
git caught with a bait like that; but when I sees that rock I piles off
my horse and drops down to git me a drink, and I'll be shot if Isham
Scarborough wasn't right behind that boulder with his Winchester ready
to shoot. I surrendered--I had to or the dirty, Texas cowards would
have killed me like beefing a steer--but you wait till I git out of
here and if I don't lift their hair my name ain't Meshackatee, that's
all! I'll throw in with 'em if I have to--because the Bassetts are no
better and I don't aim to die by hanging--but it's gitting pretty rank
when a man can't ride this canyon without being roped and tied. How'd
they work it to pick you up?"

"The same way they caught you," confessed the other. "I got down to
take a drink and when I looked up I was covered. If there hadn't been
two of them----"

"Yes," nodded Meshackatee, "I know how you feel--I reckon you're a man
of some nerve. But them boys would've killed you without batting an
eye--by the way, what'd you say your name was?"

"My name is Hall," replied the stranger after a silence, and the giant
bowed to him gravely.

"Glad to meet you, Mr. Hall," he responded cordially. "You might've
heard of Meshackatee? No? Well, that's the name I go by, the same as
yours is Hall--I got it among the A-paches. Wahoo Meshackatee, but some
ignorant old wallopers still insist on calling me Jinglebob. Name I
had in New Mexico--got mixed up in a range war--but out here they all
call me Meshackatee. Kind of an Injun name--or maybe it's Irish--the
circumstances was something like this.

"I got run out of New Mexico--or maybe I moved--anyhow, I come away,
dragging my tracks out behind me, and I butted right into some cavalry.
They was out trailing Injuns--a bunch of A-paches that had left the
Reservation on a raid--and the lieutenant in command, seeing that my
hair was kinder long, inquires if I could talk A-pache. Well, to tell
you the truth now I couldn't speak a word of it, but in order to git my
teeth into some of that Army grub I told him I could _habla_ it fine.
He took me on as scout and Injun interpreter at five dollars a day and
found; but at the end of two days we ran spang into them Injuns, and
the lieut, he sent me out.

"Well, I rode up on a hill where they could see me good and held up my
hand for a talk, and when the old chief and a couple of bucks rode out
I hollers:

"Wahoo meshackatee!"

"The old chief then, he r'ars back on his hanches and cuts loose with a
bunch of A-pache; and finally the lieutenant, who was fresh from West
Point, rides up and asks what he says. Well, it was up to me then to
make good or bust; so, knowing the dirty dastards, I made a bold guess
and by grab it turned out I was right.

"'He says, sir,' I reports, 'that his men want to fight; but if you'll
give him some grub, and some coffee and tobacco-smokum, they'll think
about coming in.'

"Well, we brought up the grub and the tobacco-smokum and when them
bucks saw it they laid down their guns and come into camp on the lope.
I was a hero, by crackey, until we got back to San Carlos and rustled
up a real interpreter; but the colonel was so tickled that he kept me
on the payroll, under the name of Wahoo Meshackatee. Never could speak
the lingo but them A-paches all know me and we git along somehow, by
signs; but say, where you going--on your way to join the Bassetts--or
was you jest passing through?"

"No, I was just passing through," answered Hall uneasily, "and by the
way, who are these men, anyway? I'm a stranger in this country and I
can't make out yet why they take so much interest in my business."

"Who, these fellers? Why, them's Isham and Red John Scarborough, two of
the dangest cow-thieves unhung; and, as I told 'em just now, they're
jealous. There's three brothers of 'em, altogether, and three of the
Bassetts; and they used to be hand in glove. They throwed in together
to steal old Jensen blind, but now it's dog eat dog. The Bassetts
are part Injun and don't want no trouble, but these biggoty Texicans
are crowding 'em so hard that I look for the fireworks any time. The
Scarboroughs are hiring gunmen--you might git a job yourself--and
fixing to run the Bassetts out of the country; and the Bassetts, for
revenge, are going to bring in some sheep, and that sure will start a
war. They're just watching each other now, and guarding the trails, but
there ain't no use of your trying to git in there unless you join one
of the gangs. If these boys'd let you pass, the Bassetts would sure git
you; and so on, plumb through the Basin. We're all split up, and I've
favored the Bassetts; but under the circumstances, and considering how
we're fixed, I think we'd better join the Scarboroughs."

He glanced up at the loop of the hangman's knot and winked with a
knowing leer, but the back of the other prisoner suddenly straightened
against the post and fire flashed up in his eyes.

"What, join these men after they've held me up and accused me of being
a horse-thief? I'd die first--I'd let them hang me, before I'd even
consider it. They're nothing but a pair of criminals!"

"Well, suit yourself," observed Meshackatee, glancing uneasily towards
the door, "but you don't need to holler quite so loud."

"I'll say it to their faces!" cried Hall in a passion. "They're a
disgrace to the name of Southerners. I'm from the South myself, and
back in Kentucky a man holds his honor above his life. Do you think
I'll submit to being branded a horse-thief and not call them out, if I
live?"

"From Kentucky, eh?" grinned Meshackatee, "well this is Arizona, a
whole lot further west; and over in the Basin, where they're all from
Uvalde, the term 'hawse-thief' is jest a pet name."

"'Uvalde'?" repeated Hall. "I don't quite understand you."

"Uvalde University! Didn't you ever hear of Uvalde? That's a school
for Texas cow-thieves. The teacher in this college is an old,
busted-down cow-puncher that's spent half his life in the Pen., and his
school-house is a corralful of dust. He starts them boys off at drawing
brands in the dirt, and then he puts 'em to work altering 'em; and when
a boy can burn every cow-brand in Texas he sends him out west with his
diplomy. The diplomy? Oh, that's jest one of these here running-irons,
to use on his neighbor's cows."

"Yes, I see," responded Hall, smiling absently, and fell into a
ruminative silence. "Is it a fact," he asked at last, "that over in
Maverick Basin the people are as desperate as you say? I can understand
this feud but I can't conceive of a community where a man will let you
call him a thief."

"Well, they're Texicans, you know," explained Meshackatee glibly,
"ain't supposed to have no morals, nohow. They're a cowardly bunch,
too--jest look how they roped me--I never did see but one brave one.
He's dead now, the rascal, but they called him One-eyed Tex--I was
there when he got his name. It was over in New Mexico and he got
into a shooting-scrape and the other feller plugged him through the
eye. Bullet went plumb through his head and blew out part of his
brains--made him feel kinder dizzy for a spell. Then he come to himself
and drilled his man dead center, after which they took him to the
doctor. The doctor wouldn't touch him till they told him it was Tex,
and then he sewed him right up. Said a feller from Texas never would
miss his brains nohow and he'd heal up and grow hair in a week.

"Well, Tex he got well, and I will say for him that there was one
sure-enough brave Texan. He'd take on anybody and give 'em the first
two shots and git off for self-defense. He come on over to Bowie, or I
believe it was Lordsburg, but anyway his reputation had preceded him.
He was known to be bad, and he shore run it over them Mexicans. You
couldn't kill the scoundrel and there warn't no way to stop him, until
some of them Rawhides chopped his head plumb off one night and hid it
out in the brush. He starved to death in about a week--but there was
one brave Texican."

"But he's dead, eh?" grinned Hall, and then they both laughed while
Meshackatee leered at the door.

"Ever spent much time exploring these cliff-dwellings?" he inquired,
suddenly changing the subject, "well they sure are an interesting
study. Supposed to have been built about a thousand years ago by the
ancestors of the Aztecs or the Hopis; but let me tell you, pardner,
they ain't all vanished yet--I found some, up here in a cave. I was
riding along one time when I seen an old man, with his beard plumb down
to his knees; and he was sitting down outside of a cliff-dwelling and
crying like his heart would break.

"'What's the matter, old man?' I says, and he bursts out worse than
ever.

"'My daddy whipped me!' he says, and I seen right there he was touched.
He was a hundred years old if he was a day and his back-bone was
sticking through like a fish's, and of course he didn't have no daddy;
but I was kind of sorry, the way he took on, and I gits down and pats
him on the head.

"'Well, don't cry,' I says, 'what did he whip you for?'

"'Fer throwing stones at grand-pap!' he says, and cries like his heart
would break.

"'Aw hell,' I says, 'you ain't got no grand-pap!'

"'Yes I have!' he sobs, 'he's right up in that house!' And he points to
one of these dwellings.

"'Well, don't cry,' I says, 'mebbe I can fix it up for you. Is your
daddy up there, too?'

"'Yes,' he says, 'he's in that first room, gitting ready to trim his
corns.'

"Well, of course I knowed he didn't have no dad--or at least it didn't
seem possible--but jest to snoop into things and git to look around I
went up the trail to the house. It was one jest like this, with the
doors and windows sealed, but when I looked in there was an old, old
man, sharpening a butcher-knife across his shin. He was so old and
dried up there warn't no skin on his shin bone and his back was bent
plumb to his knees. By grab, I was skeered--it didn't look natural--but
of course I never let on.

"'Hello!' I says, 'what are you whipping your kid for? He's down there
crying his heart out.'

"'Well, I don't keer,' he says, 'he's got to quit pestering his
grand-pap. The old man is gitting feeble and don't like to be
disturbed, and that boy is always pelting him with stones.'

"'Where is the old man?' I asks at last, and he points to a room in
behind.

"It was one jest like this--you couldn't hardly see and it smelled
kind of dead-like and close--and when I looked around I couldn't find
nothing but an old, dried-up bundle of bones. Well, I tiptoed my way
out of there and I says to the old timer--the one that was trimming his
corns:

"'Your father ain't alive--he's _dead_!'

"'No he ain't!' he says, 'he only seems that way. But you take him down
and throw him into the crick and let him soak for a while and he'll
tell you about things that happened _a thousand years ago_!'"

Meshackatee threw back his head and joined in the laugh which followed
his _chef-d'œuvre_ and then he leaned over and nodded at Hall while he
took him into confidence with a wink.

"On the level, now," he said, "ain't you an officer of the law? You've
sure got that man-hunter look. No? Nothing like that? Well, all right
then, I'll quit guessing--you was going in to join the Bassetts."

He nodded again, wisely, but the stranger shook his head and tugged at
his bonds impatiently.

"No," he said, "I never heard of the Bassetts till I asked about
the Basin in Tonto. And I never heard of the Scarboroughs until the
livery-stable keeper recommended them highly as Southern gentlemen.
It appears he was mistaken, for I never met men yet who were their
match for out-and-out insolence; but did it ever occur to you that
a man might be going through here on business that concerned no one
but himself? You have been connected with the Bassetts, and the
Scarboroughs have trapped you--very well, join whichever side you
will. But I for one will never join either, for I know what these
family feuds lead to. I have seen whole counties plunged into a war
that has lasted for twenty years; I have seen brave men--yes, and
women and children, too--shot down and their murderers unpunished. I
left my own home to escape just such conditions as these Scarboroughs
are trying to bring on, and, without professing any knowledge of the
rights of the matter, I maintain that both sides are wrong. Whatever
their differences they should endeavor to reconcile them before things
have gone too far; for after the first shot, after the first man has
been killed, his blood will cry out for more. Then brother must avenge
brother and fathers their sons; and so on forever, as far as I know, or
until God performs some miracle. And you, my friend, if you will take
my advice, will withdraw from this quarrel now; because after the first
bloodshed it will be too late--you cannot desert your friends. I know
whereof I speak, for I come from Kentucky where there is never an end
to these wars; and so I entreat you, for you seem a good man, to flee
from this feud while you can."

"For cripes' sake," muttered Meshackatee, "we must have caught a
preacher." And then he raised his voice.

"It's all right, boys!" he bellowed. "Come on in and turn us loose.
He's nothing but a Christian gentleman."

The stone against the doorway was thrown back with a thud and the
Scarboroughs stepped in again, grinning.




CHAPTER III

THE NEUTRALS


It was the evident purpose of the Scarboroughs to gloss over their
misdemeanors by an affectation of jovial good-humor, but the victim
of the jest sat back with narrowed eyes while he glanced from them to
Meshackatee.

"Oh, I see," he said, with a mirthless smile, "this is supposed to be a
joke."

"That's the idea," responded Meshackatee, "but it didn't work out. We
thought all the time you was a Bassett."

"And if I had been?" inquired Hall, and Isham looked up from where he
was untying the ropes.

"We'd a stretched your damned neck," he replied succinctly. "Plain
shooting is too good for them rascals."

"And what now?" went on the stranger, "do I get my horse back, with an
apology for all this rough treatment; or must I----"

"You do not!" returned Isham. "We don't apologize to nobody. You're
lucky to git off alive."

"Very well," answered Hall, and the tone of his voice suggested
reprisals to come.

"What d'ye mean?" flared up Isham. "You're pretty danged fresh for a
man that's jest saved his neck."

"Perhaps so," he assented. "Am I still your prisoner, or am I free to
go?"

"You'll wait until I ask you a few more questions." And Isham beckoned
his brother to one side. They talked together with their eyes on their
prisoner, and then Isham Scarborough returned. Though he was the leader
of the gang, both Red and Meshackatee seemed to regard him with scant
respect; yet he was their spokesman, being by nature loud and boastful,
while Red was watchful and silent, and he began with some general
remarks.

"Now lookee here, my friend," he said, stepping closer and looking his
prisoner in the eye, "you don't want to think, jest because you're bad,
that anybody around here's afraid of you. The _hombre_ don't live that
can make me apologize, and you'd better not make any threats; but if
you'll answer a few questions and act like a gentleman we'll let you
go into the Basin. Now, who is this feller that you're looking for so
hard--and does he belong to the Bassetts or the Scarboroughs?"

"Not to either, that I know of--he may not be in the Basin--but I give
you my word that this mission of mine has nothing to do with your
quarrel."

"Yes, but what's his name?" persisted Isham shrewdly. "If we knowed who
he was we could danged soon find out for you----"

"I cannot give his name," answered the stranger firmly, and Isham
reared up his head.

"Aw, let 'im go on," broke in Red John impatiently. "But say, what
about that horse?"

"Well, make your own talk," replied Isham sulkily, and Red came over
with a grin.

"That's all right, pardner," he said, "sorry to make you any trouble
but we've got to keep watch of these trails. Now about that horse,
he's got a New Mexico brand on him and that's liable to git you into
trouble; but I've got a big bay that everybody knows, and jest to ride
him will git you by anywhere. I'll trade you the bay and ten dollars to
boot----"

"No, I'm sorry," returned Hall, "but my horse is a pet and I couldn't
consider a trade."

"Give you twenty-five dollars!" urged Red John eagerly, but the
stranger shook his head.

"No," he said. "And now can I go?"

"You can go," spoke up Isham, "but I'll have to send along a guide to
protect you against the Bassetts. Because if they ketch you now, after
you've been stopping with us----"

"I can protect myself," answered the stranger shortly, and Red broke
into a laugh.

"Why didn't you do it, then?" he taunted, "when we nabbed you by the
spring? I reckon you're pretty green in these parts."

"Yes, I'm green," admitted Hall, "but I'm beginning to learn--and I'm
willing to take a chance on the Bassetts."

"Oh, you think they ain't so bad, eh?" broke in Isham intolerantly.
"Well, let me tell you a few things about the Bassetts. They're a cross
between a horsethief and a Digger Injun squaw, and they's more than one
man that's dropped suddenly out of sight while he was riding across
their range. They're the most treacherous dastards that ever was born
and them that knows 'em best trusts 'em least. They're jest naturally
bad with a yaller stripe down their belly as broad as the flat of your
hand. They'll do everything but _fight_, and you can't crowd 'em to
it--not if you call 'em every name you can lay your tongue to. And
they're the orneriest-looking rascals that a white man ever seen--like
an Injun, but black as niggers. You ain't going to throw in with an
outfit like that--and call yourself a Southerner?"

"Whoever said I was going to throw in with them?" demanded Hall with
outraged dignity. "Haven't I told you distinctly that I am just going
through the country and that I don't give _that_ for your quarrels?"

"Yes, you've told me," retorted Isham, "but perhaps I don't believe
you. I wasn't born yesterday, and if you don't want to join them why do
you object to going in with Meshackatee?"

"I _don't_ object!" replied the prisoner tartly, "and if that's a
condition I agree to it. But since my word of honor means nothing to
you gentlemen I must ask permission to withdraw it."

"W'y, sure!" mocked Isham, bowing low and with a smirk. "By grab, boys;
we've sure caught a preacher."

"Nope, he ain't no preacher," corrected Meshackatee grimly. "And say,
if we're going, let's start."

"Take him over to the Rock House, then," ordered Isham gruffly, "and
don't let him git away."

"Very well, sir," answered Meshackatee, and with a half-mocking salute
he led his prisoner away.

They were well up the trail before either of them spoke and then
Meshackatee broke the silence.

"I'll take your word of honor," he said, "that you won't try to quit me
on the trail. They'll hold me responsible, now."

"You have it," replied Hall at length, "but I must say I'm surprised to
find a man like you in the company of such unprincipled hounds."

"Oh, they ain't so bad," responded Meshackatee cheerfully, "except
when Isham runs off at the head. He makes more enemies by shooting off
his mouth than he can hire gunmen at ten dollars a day. That's me,
you understand--I'm a hired bravo, as they call us in the _Geronimo
Blade_--but when a man buys my services he doesn't buy _me_, and I
think what I dad-blamed please."

"Well, what do you think, then, of the Scarboroughs' methods of holding
up strangers on the trail? I've seen some rough work but the way they
treated me made the blood fairly boil in my veins!"

"It sure makes 'em sore," observed Meshackatee philosophically, "to
be roped that way at the spring. And that hangman's knot and all, it's
downright insulting--a man never quite gits over it."

"No, he doesn't," assented Hall, and rode on in brooding silence, for
he was still in the hands of his enemies.

"And yet," went on Meshackatee, "it ain't what they do so much as the
way they do it. You can take a man's gun without jabbing him in the
belly and threatening to leave him for the buzzards; and if you'd give
'em a few drinks and kinder jolly 'em along the chances are that most
of 'em would join. But that's the Scarboroughs--overbearing as hell,
and nobody but a Teehanno will stand for 'em. Jest the minute they see
your rigging they was dead set agin ye, because a Texican won't admit
that a single-cinch saddle can be rode by a scholar and a gentleman.
It's all double-rig with them, and tie to the horn; and any man that
comes by with a dallywelta outfit is due to get a hazing. But I'm
broadminded myself and I sure throwed the hooks into 'em when I was
telling about One-eyed Tex. I was looking for Red to come through that
stone door when I made that last crack about Texicans, and I still
maintain that you can't hurt a Teehanno by hitting him on the 'haid.'
I've heard 'em admit it themselves. And what I was telling you about
them being from Uvalde is true as gospel script. They're the prize
cow-thieves in the world, bar none."

"Then how can you reconcile the matter with your conscience, if you
accept money which has been gotten by stealing cows?"

Meshackatee grinned and scratched his shaggy beard; after a sudden,
searching glance at his prisoner.

"Well, in the first place," he said, "my conscience ain't the kind that
worries much over trifles; and in the second place this money never
come from stealing cows--it's all in brand-new bills."

"New bills!" repeated Hall, and then, after silence, "well, where do
they get these bills?"

"Search me," shrugged Meshackatee, still watching him narrowly, "_is
that what you come to find out_?"

"Why--why no!" exclaimed Hall. "Why certainly not. What gave you such a
curious idea?"

"Ain't you an officer?" challenged Meshackatee. "I won't hold it agin
ye--might even be an officer myself! No? Honest? Gimme your word of
honor? Well, somehow I can't hardly believe it. I go by hunches, see;
and the first time I saw you I says: 'There goes an officer!' But if
you ain't, you ain't--and I know it's danged unhealthy for an officer
that's caught in these parts--but it's the common report that this
money of the Scarboroughs' was taken from a Government paymaster."

"I see!" nodded Hall, and his eyes flashed sudden fire though his face
remained fixed like a mask.

"Yes," went on Meshackatee after waiting for him to speak, "and the
Government never forgets. Somebody robbed the ambulance and shot two
or three soldiers, right up on the Camp Verde road; and you're the
kind of man, if I was picking 'em out, that I'd send in to look the
matter up."

"Nevertheless," returned Hall, "I must beg you to believe that I have
nothing to do with such work. I am a private citizen and the mission
I am on will not injure a human being in the world. I admit there was
a time when I was drawn into a struggle that left a certain mark on
my face; but that time is past, and some day, I trust, the marks will
be less apparent. In brief, while I may have the look of a fighter, I
come into this country with malice towards no man. I intend to remain
strictly neutral."

"H'm; 'neutral,' eh?" sniffed Meshackatee, shifting his ponderous bulk
and striking back the hair from one ear, "do you see that little mark
on my ear? Well, that broke me of being neutral."

Hall looked, and the lower lobe of the ear had been sliced down and
left dangling by a segment--that's what the cowmen call a "jinglebob."

"I got that," went on Meshackatee, "in the Lincoln County War, when
Billy the Kid was still working for Chisholm and branding every
cow-brute he could rope. He'd ride along the road with a bunch of them
tough cowboys, take the oxen out of them Mexican freight-teams and
brand 'em while they was still in the yoke. That was Billy the Kid; but
me, I was neutral--I wouldn't have no truck with such doings. Well,
one night I was camping with another outsider when this outfit rode
up--drunk.

"'Who ye fur?'" they says, and I speaks my little piece.

"'I'm neutral,' I says, and they ropes me.

"'A neutral's a maverick on this here range,' they says, and I'm a
doggoned Mexican if they didn't jinglebob my ears and burn a big
fence-rail on my ribs. Don't believe it, hey? Well, take a look at that
and tell me if you're still a neutral!"

He tore open his shirt and exposed a long, red line, burned deep into
the tender flesh--then struck back the hair from his ears.

"That's the old Chisholm brand," he nodded grimly, "and they ran it
on my pardner, too. He was a revengeful sort of cuss and tapped two
of 'em, later; but me, I jest let my hair grow long and moved on to
Arizona. But I've switched my system now, and whichever side is on the
prod I throw right in with them. It's the only way to do--ain't it
the innocent bystander that always gits shot in the neck? There's no
principle involved--one's as bad as the other--so what's the use of
being a fool? I'm out for the ready money. I'm a hired bravo, drawing
my ten dollars a day and doing the heavy thinking for the gang; and if
you want to join in with us while you're looking for this party I'll
see that you get a job. Don't even have to stay with us if you don't
like Isham's ways--go over and join the Bassetts and you'd be worth
that much more than you would be sticking around with the gang. But
whatever you do, for cripes' sake don't stay neutral. You can see what
happened to me!"

He brushed back the hair over his slit and mangled ears and a steely
look came into his eyes.

"I'm looking for a certain party myself," he said. "Reckon we all
are--would you like to come in?"

"With you--yes," assented Hall, "but never with the Scarboroughs. I
have taken a great dislike to Isham and his kind--and the ills which
come to a man who stays neutral are nothing to what happens to a
partisan. The partisan must fight whether he is right or wrong or be
branded a traitor by his clan; and if for one moment he shows kindness
to an enemy he is hounded by both sides alike. That is the unforgivable
sin--any sign of humanity, any suggestion that the butchery should
cease--and as the fighting goes on the worst element takes the lead
while men of finer feeling drop out. And to drop out is to be branded a
coward. But no man is truly brave until, for a principle, he is willing
to be called a coward. And here--since you have shown me the rewards of
being neutral, there is mine for being a partisan!"

He stripped back his shirt--from the same left side that Meshackatee
had bared to show his brand--and there, between two ribs, was a smooth
round hole, where a bullet had passed through his body. It was a mere
pit of red against the white skin, and just above the scar his heart
beat on rhythmically as if nothing could still its pulse. Meshackatee
stared, then leaned over closer and glanced up with a scared look in
his eyes.

"How'd you happen to live?" he asked at last, and the stranger pointed
solemnly to the sky.

"A miracle!" he said, "if miracles still happen to men as unworthy as
I am. I was left for dead--and so I still remain to those who sought
my life--but I crawled to a cave and recovered from my wound without
medicine or care of any kind. In the mountains my name is added to the
list of those who have died in the feud; but God has spared me--or so I
think--to bring peace once more to Tug Fork."

"And where's that?" demanded Meshackatee, still staring at him
curiously; and the stranger seemed to wake from a trance.

"I shouldn't have said that!" he burst out regretfully, "I shouldn't
have mentioned Tug Fork. But as you are a gentleman----" He paused
expectantly and Meshackatee held out his hand.

"Enough said!" he exclaimed, and they clasped hands in silence. For
between gentlemen what need is there for words?




CHAPTER IV

MAVERICK BASIN


The trail to Maverick Basin led north up Turkey Creek; and on both
sides of the canyon, in caverns and beneath huge crags, the white
houses of the cliff-dwellers caught the eye. The mountains rose up in
jumbled and shattered terraces, split here and there by dark and jagged
chasms which revealed the far heights beyond. These were covered with
black pines and Douglas spruce, clinging close to the shelving slopes;
and below them the oaks and junipers crept in, while at the bottom
there was cactus and mesquite. It was a rough and thorny trail, winding
in and out and up over brushy benches, then down again to the creek.
Startled deer rose up timorously from their beds along the hillside,
wild turkeys ran flapping across the path; and along the bluffs the
tracks of mountain lion and bear told of others who prowled by night.
But the scarcest track of all was that of man, the conqueror, who
claims dominion over the birds and beasts. Like the lions and bears,
men traveled by night or kept off the beaten trails.

Meshackatee rode ahead on a buckskin Indian pony which seemed to totter
beneath his great weight, and, across the saddle in front of him,
he balanced a repeating rifle with a bore like a buffalo gun. Behind
followed Hall, still mounted on the blue roan which had so taken Red
Scarborough's eye; and, scouting on before them, went Meshackatee's
spotted dog, always seeking yet silent as a specter. The canyon opened
out into wide, oak-clad flats with sycamores along the banks of the
creek; and then the hills fell away to the east, giving a view of lone
pinnacles beyond. They rode further and the flats opened out into parks
where deer and wild cattle grazed; and the high cliffs to the west came
down nearer and nearer, as if to cut off their way. Then the trail
left the creek and swung over towards the cliff and at Jump-off Point
it climbed the western rim and led north across Juniper Flats. They
set off at a gallop, heading for a distant divide, and as the sun was
sinking low they topped the last ridge and the Basin lay smiling before
them.

It was a wide and grassy valley, circled about with oak-crowned hills;
and beyond it like a line the great Rim of the Mogollons stood out
blue against the reddening sky. Tall pines, like half-stript sticks,
marked the edge of the unseen forest which covered the sloping plains
beyond; and under the Rim all the caved-off, lesser rims were smothered
in a dense growth of trees. All else seemed shut in, overwhelmed and
obscured; but Maverick Basin lay set like a jewel within the curve
of the golden-brown hills. It was a cowman's paradise, well watered
with meandering streams and sheltered from north winds by the Rim;
its grass was all aripple, a wooded river-bottom flanked the east
and live-oaks made shade along its slopes. Yet here was where the
Scarboroughs had settled down to make a little hell of their own.

Hall looked at it in silence, taking in its placid beauty and the roofs
of peaceful houses among the trees, and as he followed down the slope
he sighed.

"Gitting tired?" inquired Meshackatee, "well, it ain't far, now. See
that long house, off to the west? That's the famous Rock House that the
first settlers built to stand off the bloodthirsty A-paches; and now,
by grab, it's got a bunch of Texas gunmen that could give 'em cards
and spades. It's the Scarborough headquarters, and over to the east is
the big log house of the Bassetts. It was built for Injuns too--with
loop-holes and all--but it's too doggoned close to that hill. The Rock
House stands out in the middle of the plain, where you can't shoot
it up from cover; but sure as hell, if they's ever any trouble, the
Bassetts are going to git ambushed. They're right on the bank of Turkey
Crick, too--where you see all them cottonwood trees--and a bunch of men
could slip up through that brush and ketch 'em in the door at dawn. The
other house, over north, it's the old Jensen place--they're using it
now for a store.

"That's the first real house that was built in the Basin," he went on
with garrulous pride, "and it's sure seen doings in its day. Right
there is where Jens Jensen made his start in the cow business and
give the Basin its name. Them first ones might have been mavericks,
but the kind they're gitting now have been stole from as far as New
Mexico. Old Jens was an honest old jasper, in a way--as honest as they
let 'em git in these parts--but the bunch that come in later would
rather steal a cow than have their breakfast in bed. They was so good
with a running-iron they could write their names with it, and every
one registered a brand that would burn spang over Jensen's. His iron
was JJ and the Scarboroughs put pot-hooks on it that made it look like
SS; the Bassetts jest altered the last J to JB connected and changed
the first J to suit. Sharps Bassett worked it over into an S, like
the Scarboroughs, and Winchester changed it to a W; and Bill, the
black rascal, burned as pretty a WB connected as you ever see in your
life. Oh, these boys git so good they take a pride in blotching brands
and figuring out real elaborate bums--like that feller back in Texas
that altered XIT into a five-pointed star and a cross. He was offered
ten thousand dollars to show how he done it, and now they ain't a
cotton-picker this side of Uvalde that can't burn it over in his sleep.
But that was back in Texas where the competition is strong--out here
they was still in the ABC class, where a man used his initials for the
brand. Well, they pulled off of Jens until they got halfway ashamed of
themselves, he was such a peaceable old duck; and then Judge Malcolm
comes driving into the Basin with fifteen hundred head of cows. The
judge had bought this stuff up in the San Juan country somewhere, or
traded for it someway with them Mormons; and he come right in here,
without 'By your leave' or nothing, and turned them out on the range.

"A-all right, here was where the big doings began, because the Bassetts
and the Scarboroughs claimed to control the whole Basin and wouldn't
let no settlers come in. That is, not unless they acknowledged their
authority and gave 'em a hundred or so; but the Judge--say, he was
a freeborn American citizen and knowed it was public land. It was
open to anybody and he turned his cows out on it, hiring a gunman or
two to take charge--and the whole cussed outfit tied into him. The
Scarboroughs and Bassetts was thick as thieves while they was running
off the Judge's cows; and the first thing he knowed he couldn't gather
five hundred, and not a one of 'em under two years old. Say, the
picking was so good they heard about it back in Texas; and ever since
that time, going onto two years now, these tough Texicans have been
drifting in. Are they tough? They're so bad they'd have me scared if
I hadn't seen Billy the Kid; but there was a killer that had 'em all
beat--and he come from New York City. Never said nothing either, always
smiling and polite; and yet the doggoned little shrimp had them ba-ad
Texans all buffaloed when he onlimbered and went to shooting.

"Oh, the Judge? Well, he was a lawyer, all right. When he see he
couldn't stop 'em, and a couple of his gunmen got shot, he took the
matter into court; but the whole Basin rode down there, drunk and
disorderly and loaded for bear, and swore out a warrant for _him_.
That made the court judge sore, because the county was poor and he see
it was a neighborhood row, so he dismissed all the charges against
everybody. This county is about as big as the state of Pennsylvania and
mileage fees pile up quick: and the whole doggoned outfit was nothing
but a bunch of cow-thieves, so what was the use of it, anyhow?

"Well--so far, so good--the wild bunch comes home and Malcolm he takes
the big think. He's a lawyer, like I says, and them are the boys that
know how to pull the right string. He sends for the Scarboroughs and
offers 'em a hundred head more, if they'll turn state's evidence and
railroad the Bassetts. Well, the Bassetts are Injuns--and they'd made
a little trouble when the Scarboroughs tried to run off some cows--so
Isham and Red seen their chance to git shut of them and they took the
hundred cows. They went down to Tonto and turned in their testimony,
enough to send the Bassetts plumb to hell; but they talked so much they
incriminated themselves and the judge throwed the case out of court.
But by now the Bassetts had got blood in their eyes and they come back
a charging, spent all their money on a lawyer, and had the Scarboroughs
up for perjury. That sent Tonto County broke and court adjourned, but
before they left town the judge or somebody gave the Maverick Basin
crowd a quiet tip: the county was bankrupt, it was three days' hard
hiring for an officer to come up from Tonto, and the idee was they'd
better keep out of court and settle their little differences with a
Winchester."

"Oh, no!" exclaimed Hall, "surely they didn't say that!"

"Mebbe not," shrugged Meshackatee, "but they's one thing I know--there
hasn't been an officer up here since."

Hall shook his head sadly and they rode on in silence, Meshackatee with
his eyes on the Rock House far below them and Hall with his head bowed
in thought. In his mind he was picturing the two contending factions
and the battle that seemed certain to come, and when he looked up there
was a strange light in his eyes and he gazed far away across the plain.

"But the other people," he suggested, "there are other settlers,
too--could nothing be done with them?"

"What d'ye mean?" inquired Meshackatee, and Hall threw out his hands in
a gesture of sudden appeal.

"Can't you see?" he cried. "This quarrel must be stopped before it has
gone too far!"

"Oh--them!" responded Meshackatee, tossing his head contemptuously,
"they're afraid to call their souls their own. All that lives to the
west, mostly, are friends of Isham's; and to the east and up Turkey
Crick they're for the Bassetts; but they ain't ary one of 'em would
stand up for his own rights, let alone throw a skeer into Isham.
Because Isham is the man that's behind all this devilment--he's got ten
hired gunmen, right now--and unless he's connected up with the United
States mint he'll have to start something pretty soon."

"Yes, but what about the Bassetts? How can they expect to resist him
unless they, too, hire more men?"

"They're broke," explained Meshackatee, "the lawyers got their money,
and they ain't had the nerve to steal more. And then, being Injuns,
they don't worry. They're three danged snakey _hombres_, to tell you
the truth, and I don't want no trouble with none of 'em. Sharps is
slow, but he's sure; and Winchester is quick and sure; and Bill, he's a
fighting fool. He's whiter than the rest of 'em and he's jest naturally
bad, proud of it and don't care who knows it. That boy would fight a
buzzsaw with his hands tied behind him, if you'd listen to what _he_
says. But ain't you heard the news--they've throwed in with Grimes,
the big sheepman from up over the Rim. He's a holy, fighting terror
that ain't afraid of nobody, or he wouldn't be up on that range. The
Slash-knife outfit has got cows there by the thousand, but that don't
make no difference with Grimes. Every time he meets a cowboy or a
bunch of these here rustlers he drops down off his mule and commences
to shoot and--well, anyhow, he's promised to come down. He's going to
bring his sheep and a bunch of fighting Mexicans and sheep these bad
Teehannos plumb out. Well, you wait; and if he comes he'd better come
a-shooting, because we got no use for _sheep_!"

He shut his jaws down grimly and it was easy to see that he shared the
cowman's prejudice against sheep.

"He ought to be kept out!" exclaimed Hall, after a silence, and
Meshackatee nodded approvingly.

"That's the talk!" he praised, "I knowed you had it in you. Come on,
and we'll turn the woollies back."

"No, I don't mean that," protested Hall, "what I mean is, a man has no
business to stir up trouble by deliberately invading a new range."

"W'y sure!" agreed Meshackatee heartily, "I'm with you, as big as
a wolf. We'll jest go up that way to-morrow and talk reason to Mr.
Grimes, and maybe he'll decide not to come. No, I mean it, by grab--and
say, down at the house, I'll tell 'em you're jest a new man. They're
ranicky as the devil when they ketch some outsider--and of course you
ain't a Texan--so I'll jest tell Miz Zoolah, that's Isham's wife, that
you've come up to help with the sheep."

He spurred up his lagging mount and went galloping across the plain,
but as they drew near the Rock House he reined in suddenly, yet with
his pony dancing nervously to go.

"Your name was Hall, wasn't it?" he inquired with a flourish. "All
right, I'll fix it up. And say--where you going, horse?--what's you say
that other name was? You know, that feller you was looking for?"

"I didn't say," replied Hall and, meeting his calm eyes, Meshackatee
broke into a grin.

"Oh, that's right!" he exclaimed. "My mistake--excuse _me_!" And he
jumped his dancing pony into a lope.




CHAPTER V

THE CASUIST


The Rock House of the Scarboroughs was windowless and almost doorless,
a long port-holed fort built of square-edged stone retrieved from an
Indian ruin. In prehistoric days each stone had been quarried and
carried on men's backs from the hills, but now their ancient city was
a mound of tumbled rocks and its walls did new duty for the white man.
The fort was built in frontier style, with narrow loop-holes in place
of windows and doorways just wide enough to pass--two rooms opening
south and two opening north, with solid stone partitions between.
Beneath the floor of the kitchen a well had been dug, to supply water
in case of a siege; and the huge square chimney was loopholed near the
top, making a watchtower to command the level plain.

In Indian days the old Rock House had served to protect the settlers
from Apaches; but now the Scarboroughs, like robber barons of old,
had turned it into a castle. Behind its thick walls they had grown
prosperous and arrogant, and a big bunk-house by the stable and corrals
was swarming with feudal retainers. These were Texans to a man, and
as Hall rode up they strolled over and eyed him coldly. That fatal
single-cinch on his California-rigged saddle had already aroused their
antagonism, but their first fleering remarks were cut short by Miz
Zoolah, who came bustling out of the kitchen. She was a dark, lanky
woman with pale blue eyes which seemed to dart forth venom; and after
a single glance at Hall she turned to Meshackatee who greeted her with
deceptive meekness.

"Did you pass an Injun with a message for Isham?" she demanded in a
threatening voice.

"No, ma'am," returned Meshackatee, "we didn't pass nobody. What's the
news--have the sheep come in?"

"Yes, the sheep have come in!" she burst out angrily, "and Elmo and
these trifling cowboys have let 'em. They just watched the main trail
and Grimes made another one and came in across the Reservation. He's
halfway down Canyon Crick, now!"

"Well?" inquired Meshackatee, rolling his eyes at the Texans, and Miz
Zoolah flew into a tantrum.

"They're _afraid_!" she cried, "Elmo and all the rest of 'em! They're
afraid to go out and move him. But just wait till Isham comes back and
I'll bet there'll be a scattering of sheep."

"Very likely," observed Meshackatee. "This is Mr. Hall, Mrs.
Scarborough. He's a new man we picked up down below."

"Well, if he don't turn out any better than some that we've got, you
might as well tell him to go. I declare, when this Grimes and his
Mexicans began shooting, Elmo and all of them gave him the trail."

"Shooting?" repeated Meshackatee, arching his eyebrows inquiringly, and
Mrs. Scarborough nodded her head.

"Yes--shooting!" she said, "the minute he saw them he dropped down and
emptied his Winchester. And him a dirty sheepman, with nothing but
Mexicans, and these boys all claim they're from _Texas_. I'd just like
to know what we've been paying them for if it isn't to stand up and
fight; but they turned tail and ran and I'm going to tell Isham that he
ought to fire them--all!"

"Oh, I don't know," murmured Meshackatee, glancing at the shamefaced
cowboys, "you'd jest have to hire some more. What's the chances for
something to eat?"

"You can eat with the rest of them," she answered impatiently, "and not
a minute before. Now you worthless cowboys go away from that kitchen
and quit making eyes at the cook. And if you want to hurry supper
somebody take the ax and chop up a little wood."

There was a rush for the ax and the cowboys slouched away, laughing
hectoringly at the man who had won.

"Well, git down," said Mrs. Scarborough with a grudging sigh, "that
makes fourteen men we're cooking for."

They dismounted stiffly and she drew Meshackatee aside, talking
rapidly as he inclined his curly head; and then, as Hall stood
awkwardly by, a girl hurried out the kitchen door. In one hand was
a huge bucket and she had started for the well when she met the
newcomer's startled eyes. For a moment she stood still, then the bucket
fell clattering and was clutched up with a trembling hand.

"Let me help you!" said Hall, raising his hat and advancing swiftly;
and while Meshackatee looked on he filled the bucket with practiced
hand and carried it back to the kitchen. There was a murmur of
disapproval from the gunmen by the bunkhouse as he did not emerge
immediately, and Mrs. Scarborough glanced around suspiciously; but he
returned to his horse without meeting her eyes and Meshackatee grinned
to himself.

The kitchen was forbidden ground at the ranch, hence the rush to chop
and bring in the wood; but this stranger had shown himself adept indeed
at invading the _sanctum sanctorum_. He had met Mrs. Scarborough's
niece, and filled her bucket and whisked it back into the house, in
about the time it would take a Texan to spit out his chew of tobacco.
But that dropping of the bucket--was Miss Allifair so flustered, or had
it been done with a purpose? He listened gravely to Miz Zoolah as she
asked him questions and then guessed at the answers herself, but all
the while his keen eyes were on Hall and his mind was seeking out the
cause. For there is a reason for everything, if one can piece facts
together or even jump at the facts, and Meshackatee was by nature
a casuist. But something of the furor that was going on in his mind
seemed to be communicated to the vigilant Miz Zoolah, for she stopped
in the middle of a spiteful tirade and turned her pale eyes on the
stranger.

"Who is that man?" she demanded suddenly, and then she advanced and
faced him.

"Haven't I seen you before somewhere?" she questioned sharply, and Hall
seemed to rouse from some dream.

"No, ma'am," he replied in soft, reassuring tones, "or at least, ma'am,
not to my knowledge. I am a stranger in these parts and----"

"Where'd you come from?" she put in, and he hesitated a moment before
he made an answer.

"I am sorry," he said, "but I can't answer that question. I am just
passing through and----"

"Who is this man?" she demanded of Meshackatee; and as she repeated the
question a swift look passed between them and the two men joined forces
against her.

"I don't know," returned Meshackatee, "but he's a stranger in this
country--the boys picked him up at Cold Spring. Isham told me to bring
him up here, but there's nothing against him. It was jest to protect
him from the Bassetts."

"Yes, the Bassetts!" she snapped. "He must be a weakling if he needs
any protection from _them_."

"Well, he's my prisoner, then," spoke up Meshackatee bluffly.
"Anything else you'd like to know?"

"Yes, I'd just like to know why you allowed him in that kitchen if
Isham sent him over for a prisoner. He might have stepped out that
farther door and been halfway over to the Bassetts."

"He gave me his word of honor," answered Meshackatee defiantly. "I
guess there's such a thing as a gentleman!"

"A _gentleman_!" she shrilled. "He gave you his word of _honor_! Since
when have you got these idees into your head? I'm going to report this
to Isham."

"Well, report and be blowed!" burst out Meshackatee rudely, and led his
prisoner away.

But, even in a world where honor is not dead and the word "gentleman"
is more than a name, there is such a thing as a reasonable precaution
and Meshackatee slept by his man that night. They threw down their
saddle-blankets beneath the towering cottonwood that stood just north
of the house, and he slept with his dog at his back. It was the way
they always slept, back to back on the scant blanket, and if anything
moved 'Pache would raise his head and give voice to a rumbling growl.

The night was well along when there was a stir at his back and the
vibrations of a noiseless growl. Meshackatee opened his eyes and moved
gently in answer and a strange sight met his eyes. His prisoner had
risen up without a sound and tiptoed back towards the house, and as
he stood in the starlight a white form glided out and she met him in
passionate embrace. Meshackatee moved again and his dog sank down
obediently--there was a silence, and the prisoner came back--but far
into the night the man who had turned casuist lay and speculated on the
Ultimate Cause.




CHAPTER VI

THE ULTIMATE CAUSE


It is easy to find a probable cause for any given act, but when one
seeks the Ultimate Cause--the reason behind it all--that calls for
deep thinking, and finesse. Human conduct is not so variable in many
of its phases as to call for extended scrutiny, but the problem before
Meshackatee was both so baffling and so disquieting that it left his
brains in a whirl. That a girl as modest as Allifair Randolph, a woman
who for months had received the attentions of scores of cowboys without
one answering smile, should suddenly and for no reason throw aside
all decorum and rush into the arms of a stranger--that was beyond the
bounds of reason. It was so unreasonable it was foolish, and the great
Cause must be sought for somewhere else. Then, surely, they had met
before. Yes, met and learned to love and this was the reunion of two
souls that had drifted far apart Allifair was that "certain party" for
whom Hall had been seeking, and he had found her in the kitchen of the
Scarboroughs.

Yet this comforting conclusion, plain and obvious as it was, merely
opened up new fields of thought. Who was Allifair Randolph and who
was this man Hall, and why did they make concealment of their love;
and what would he do now, since he had discovered his beloved in the
house of the man he despised? Would he cast aside his scruples against
feuds and cattle wars and join the gang to be near her, or would he
go his way and devise other means of winning the woman of his heart?
Meshackatee thought it over and then his scheming mind began to turn
the facts to his own purpose; and when the morning came he beckoned to
his prisoner and led him across the creek to the mound. Here, beneath
a gnarled oak which had grown up near the summit, drawing its strength
from the dust of ancient dead, Meshackatee took out his field glasses
and gazed long to the east before he broached the matter on his mind.

To the east lay Turkey Creek and the log fort of the Bassetts--and
Grimes and his Mexicans as well--and it was to them fully as much as to
the winning over of this stranger that his thoughts were turned that
day. He had a dual mind, one part taking cognizance of the facts and
the other busily using them to work his will; and when he spoke it was
all to fit his program, though disguised in the mock-solemnity of a
jest.

"Mr. Hall," he began, "I make it a principle never to interfere in the
private affairs of any gentleman; but I saw something last night which
pained me very much and I jest want to ask a few questions. Now in the
first place, Mr. Hall, I want you to understand that Miss Allifair
holds a high place in my regard; and I jest want to ask--as a friend,
you understand--if your intentions are perfectly honorable?"

"My intentions!" faltered Hall, and then he went white and turned his
face away. "Don't tell anybody!" he pleaded, clutching Meshackatee by
the leg, "it would ruin our happiness forever. Oh, I was mad--insane--I
should never have done it! But Meshackatee--she had thought I was dead!"

"Oh, dead, eh?" rumbled Meshackatee, squinting his calculating eyes
and regarding him from beneath his long hair, "well, that makes a
difference, of course. She'd heard about that shooting, and the
bullet-hole under your heart and----"

"That's it--they told her I was dead!"

"'They'?"

"Yes. Her folks, and Mrs. Scarborough. She was a Randolph, you know,
before her marriage; and she told Allifair I was dead."

"I--see!" observed Meshackatee, nodding his head and spitting wisely,
"and was you young folks engaged to git married?"

"That was it--that's what caused it. We were engaged to be married, but
we belonged to opposing clans. She was a Randolph, you see, and I'm a
McIvor----"

"Ah!" exclaimed Meshackatee, "I'm beginning to savvy. The
Randolph-McIvor feud--back in Kaintuck!"

"Yes, that's it," went on McIvor feverishly, "but let me explain it to
you. Our families have been at war for over twenty years, and each
year the feud becomes worse. It's cost the Randolph faction over four
hundred dead and the McIvors over three hundred that we know of. Men
are found dead in the woods, just as I was left for dead, and others
are never found. All our relatives are engaged in it, and hundreds of
outsiders who hardly know what they're fighting for. All they think of
is free whiskey and midnight raids and a chance to get revenge on some
enemy; and so it goes until the mountains are a battle-ground and men
have turned to brutes. And there's no power that can stop it, neither
the courts nor the militia, because we live far back in the hills; but
if I could marry Allifair, then the blood-feud would be ended and the
Randolphs and McIvors would be friends."

"I understand," murmured Meshackatee, and sat smiling benevolently as
the young man gazed off into space.

"We met by accident," he went on at last, "while I was scouting in
their country. But she spared my life, she did not report me, and the
next time we met we were friends. She's such a gentle creature--and I
had turned rough, from living out and fighting for years--but somehow
she learned to love me and the dream came to both of us to marry and
end the feud. I was building a cabin, far up in the hills where no one
would ever find us, when a dirty little spy discovered our meeting
place and the Randolphs became aware of our plans. They watched
us--and the next time I went to our tree there was no one there, she
was gone. They reported her dead--shot down by the McIvors, for our
womenfolks make war among themselves--but I asked all our women and
none of them had done it, though many of them would gladly have done so.

"Can you imagine such conditions--gentle women, well-educated, going
out like wild animals to strike down a woman like Allifair? I must have
gone mad, for I went back to our meeting place, and there this dirty
spy shot me. He shot me clean through the heart, or so it appeared,
but the bullet went low and after they had left me I came to life and
crept to a cave. There I lived on pure water for eleven days and as my
body became purified I had visions and dreams, such as no man ever had
before. And when I was well I crept up by night and listened at a camp
of the Randolphs. That was where I heard that Allifair still lived and
had been sent out to her aunt in Arizona.

"But what her aunt's name was, or where her husband lived, was
something I never could learn; so I left and came out here, determined
to find her if it took the rest of my life."

"Well, you've found her," observed Meshackatee, apparently unruffled by
the harrowing tale of his friend, "so what's the next thing now?"

"They'll kill her!" he groaned, "they'll actually kill her before
they'll consent to her marrying a McIvor. So if you want to kill me
too and ruin both our lives, just tell who I am to the Scarboroughs."

"Oh, no! Oh, no!" replied Meshackatee reassuringly, "that won't be
necessary at all. Of course I'm working for Isham, and when I take a
man's money, I aim to give him my best; but it won't be necessary--that
is, always provided you're willing to help _me_ out?"

"I'll do anything!" promised McIvor, "if you'll just keep our secret
and help me to meet her again. Oh, since I have seen her and learned
she still loves me I feel I could do anything--anything!"

"Hm, a meeting ain't so easy," said Meshackatee after a silence. "Miz
Zoolah sure keeps a close watch. But you leave it to me, boy, and
meanwhile stay away from her--I ain't the only man that has eyes. Them
Texas toughs are jealous--they see you go in there yesterday--so keep
plumb out of that kitchen. And the look in that gal's eyes when she see
you at the well gave the whole business away, to _me_. You're kind of
daffy now, don't notice where you're going or answer when other people
speak to you, so the best thing for you is to go away a few days and
let this excitement die down. Now I've got a little job, if you think
you can do it----"

"Oh, I can't leave her, now!" protested McIvor broken-heartedly, but
Meshackatee tapped him sharply on the knee.

"You're going to leave, see? Right now and no danged fooling. You're
going over to hunt up them sheep."

"The sheep?" repeated McIvor, and Meshackatee smiled grimly as he took
him gently by the arm.

"Take my advice," he warned, "and git away from Zoolah--she came
almighty close to recognizing you. Now about this sheepman, Grimes, he
knows these boys by sight and they can't any of 'em git near him; but
that saddle of yours will tell any one you're no Texan and I believe
you can ride plumb up to him. You're a stranger, see, and you can cuss
out the Scarboroughs and tell him all the things they done to you; and
after you've got next to him and found out all his plans--_you come
back here and tell me_. Do that, and you'll git to see Allifair."

"Well, it's treacherous," observed McIvor at last, "but I've been that,
and worse, before now. And if this man is coming in to stir up a war
perhaps I can turn him back."

"This is what will turn him back," returned Meshackatee, patting his
pistol, "and, believe me, nothing else. That _hombre_ is a fighter, he
comes on a-charging, and nothing but a bullet will stop him. But leave
that to me and this bunch of inbred Texans--and by the way, that's
Isham coming."

He pointed to the canyon down which they had come and two horsemen,
riding fast, flashed around a point and came galloping across the
plain.

"You'd better wait," suggested Meshackatee, "you're supposed to be a
prisoner, and maybe he'll have other plans."

"I'm not working for _him_!" declared McIvor, obstinately, "I'm doing
this work for you."

"Fair enough," agreed Meshackatee, "but I'm working for him. So try to
stand in on the play. Come on, we'll go down to the house."

They arrived just as Elmo, the youngest of the Scarboroughs, stepped
out from where he had been sulking. He was short and sandy, with a
slouchy wool hat and two guns hung low on his hips. Each was tied at
the bottom with a buckskin string which held the muzzles close to his
legs, so that the carved ivory handles stuck out at such an angle that
they practically touched his hands. Both holsters were cut away until
they barely held their pistols, and the whole was arranged so that
he could draw and shoot in the shortest possible time. But the boy
himself--for he was hardly a man--had on his face such a look of both
weakness and reckless deviltry that McIvor looked him over again. He
was sullen now, after his defeat by the sheepmen and the tongue-lashing
that Zoolah had given him, but he stepped out to meet his brothers with
such a purposeful swagger that Mrs. Scarborough allowed him to pass.

"Well, they've come, boys," he announced, "Dave Grimes and twenty
Mexicans, and nigh onto ten thousand sheep. They got in behind
us--come across the Reservation--and now they're headed for the Basin!"

"Let 'em come!" challenged Isham, dropping down off his horse, "that
suits me to a hickey--let 'em come! But the first damned Mexican that
puts a sheep across Turkey Crick is going to git killed, that's all!
That's my dead-line--Turkey Crick--and the minute they step across it
the fireworks is going to begin!"

"We thought we'd better wait," explained Elmo hastily, "until you and
Red got home----"

"That's right, kid," praised Isham, "you've got the right idee--leave
it to me, and they won't nobody git hurt. But if you go riding in on
'em when they're down on their knees and shooting----"

Elmo glanced at Miz Zoolah and spit a thin jet of tobacco-juice, while
the Texas gunmen smirked. But Zoolah was not the woman to let this pass
unchallenged and she stepped out and confronted her husband.

"Do you happen to know," she demanded contentiously, "that Elmo and
these cowboys ran away? Well, they did--ran away from those Mexicans
like cowards--and now look at the way they act!"

The cowboys winced but Isham was excited and he paid scant attention to
his helpmeet.

"Now come on, boys," he ordered, "ketch up your horses and git ready
and we'll go out and meet the danged Mexicans. But no shooting, savvy,
until I give the word; unless they shoot at us first."

He paced up and down while they ran to saddle their horses and Miz
Zoolah assailed his ears with complaints; but he only glanced at her
absently, slapping his boot with his quirt and staring off towards the
Bassetts.

"Where are them Sorry Blacks at?" he demanded of Meshackatee. "Have you
seen 'em around this morning? The dirty, half-Injun bastards, they may
be laying in wait for us--better send somebody over to the store."

"I'll go!" volunteered Elmo, making a run to mount his horse, but Isham
motioned him back.

"You look out, kid," he warned, "them Injuns are treacherous. They're
liable to shoot you from the bresh."

He turned to Meshackatee and as they consulted together Hall felt
Isham's eyes fixed upon him. Beneath their bleached, white lashes they
regarded him coldly, as if appraising his worth as a spy; and at last,
as Meshackatee drove his point home and nailed it, the chief of the
Scarboroughs beckoned. But McIvor stood firm, his mouth grimly set, his
eyes far away on the hills, and Meshackatee understood.

"I'll tell him," he said, and half an hour later McIvor rode forth over
towards the store.




CHAPTER VII

A SHOWDOWN


The trail to the store led across the level valley, tramped broad by
the passing of many horse-herds; and as McIvor left the Rock House and
rode out into the open, more than one watchful eye was upon him. Yet he
jogged on at a fox-trot, never turning to look back at the gathering
clan of the Scarboroughs; and as he neared the store a single horseman
left the Bassetts and rode warily over to meet him. It was the first
move in the great conflict which was sure to take place; when the
Scarboroughs and Bassetts, after years of petty bickerings, would meet
and fight it out. Time and again they had swooped down and challenged
each other, only to withdraw with loud boasts and threats; but now that
the sheep had invaded the Basin it was war, and war to the knife. For
as cattle and sheep cannot live together, but one or the other is sure
to take the range; so the Bassetts and the Scarboroughs could not live
in Maverick Basin--and the first blow would start a bloody feud.

All this McIvor sensed, for years of mountain warfare had made him
quick to read the minds of lawless men; but their battles were not his
and as he approached the shabby store he dismounted and left his rifle
on his horse. The store was a log cabin, set off to one side from the
foundations of a house which had been burned; and within its loop-holed
walls there was everything for sale, from horseshoes to cornmeal and
whiskey. The storekeeper came out smiling and wringing his hands--a
cringing little man with mouse-colored hair and a nervous, insinuating
smile--but as he wrapped up his few purchases McIvor did not fail to
notice that his eyes never left the door. There was a thud of hoofs
without, a long, tense silence, and then a shadow fell across the
doorway.

He came in sideways, a thickset, swarthy man with a sparse black beard
and mustache, and as Hall looked up he met a pair of glittering eyes
that searched him through and through.

"Good morning," he said, but the man did not answer and McIvor went on
with his buying.

"Oh, er--Sharps," stammered the storekeeper, whose name was Johnson,
"this is Mister--er----"

"Hall," replied McIvor without looking up, but the storekeeper was
not to be discouraged. With all his fawning ways he had a name as a
busybody and now he was starting to live up to it.

"Oh, yes--Hall," he cringed. "You're new in the Basin. Are you staying
over at the Scarboroughs?"

"No," returned Hall, and the Indian eyes of Sharps Bassett seemed to
stab him in the back for a liar. "I'm just going through," explained
McIvor at length, and instantly the storekeeper asked where. Then,
without waiting for the answer, he darted to the doorway, and Bassett
stepped out behind him. Hall followed them quickly, for they were
gazing to the south; and as he looked down the trail he saw the gunmen
from the Rock House riding in with the Scarboroughs at their head. They
came on at a gallop letting out shrill yips and yelps and rollicking
about in their saddles; and as they thundered up to the store Sharps
reached for his rifle and put his broad back to the wall.

"Oh, here you are!" sneered Isham as Sharps faced him stolidly. "Well,
you sorry, black bastard, I want to warn ye for the last time not to
bring them sheep into this Basin. This is a white man's country and
you've got no business here nohow; but if you bring in them Mexicans
we'll run them out first, and then we'll run _you_ out. What'd ye think
you was going to do--shoot this man in the back while he was buying a
plug of tobaccy? Well, we've got you, Mister Injun, this trip!"

Sharps grunted contemptuously and shifted his eyes and as the Texans
followed his glance they saw two other horsemen, riding rapidly in from
the east. They came on at a gallop, then reined in their fine horses
and trotted gracefully up to the store. It was Winchester Bassett and
Bill.

Bill was nothing but a boy, lighter complected than his brothers but
with the same heavy, half-Indian face; and as he rode up beside Sharps
he stuck out his chin and made a mouth at the swaggering Elmo.

"Hello there, Squirley!" he hailed insultingly, and Winchester told
him to shut up. Winchester Bassett was tall and slenderly built, with
a heavy black mustache and a lightning-like quickness of eye; but as
he reproved his younger brother he had a smile of easy tolerance, and
young Bill was by no means abashed. They both dropped to the ground and
as they lined up beside Sharps the Texans reined their horses away. It
was a challenge, a defiance to the whole Scarborough clan which had
ridden up and surrounded their chief; and as the Scarboroughs gave back
Winchester smiled again, for he saw that their bluff had been called.
They had galloped over to the store to catch Sharps by himself and
worry him as dogs do a wolf, but Sharps had stood them off and now they
had joined him--three men against fifteen, but determined. And three
men on foot, with the firm ground to shoot from, might easily come off
the victors; for the horses of the Texans, being wild and half-broken,
would jump at the very first shot.

But no shot would be fired--or not at that time--for Isham had given
the word to stand back; and as the gunmen grinned and weakened even
Sharps' snake-like eyes took on a glint that was Indian for a smile.
He was all Indian, this eldest of the fighting Bassett tribe, slow
and stolid but immovable as a wall. No matter what the odds, Sharps
Bassett would never run; and his old battered rifle had killed more
bears and lions than any other gun in the country. He stood there now
like a grizzly bear at bay; and Bill, seeing the Texans filing in for a
drink, turned his eyes to the smart-Aleck Elmo.

"Put down that gun," he challenged, as Elmo began to roll his pistol,
"and I'll come over there and whip you."

"I don't haf to!" retorted Elmo, raising his pistol with a flourish and
riding out past a tree; and as he whirled his horse he put six shots
into the tree trunk, coming by it on the gallop.

"Beat that!" he said, "and I'll show you some real shooting. I can put
up a six-spot and shoot out every pip with my horse going by on the
run."

"Don't you worry!" bantered Bill, "I kin shoot straight enough; as
you'll find out, if it comes to a showdown. I thought you was going to
do something!"

He laughed as a Texan told him gruffly to hush up, and then he returned
to Elmo.

"Put up that danged smoke-house," he called out hectoringly, "you ain't
got the guts to use it. Jest meet me halfway and I'll fight you, fist
and skull--for the drinks or for nothing at all."

He laid off his belt, with the two six-shooters hung loose in it, and
stepped out into the open, but Elmo declined to fight. Some of the
gunmen urged him on, but he had fought Bill once before and come off
second best.

"Aw, come away, Bill," jeered Winchester, "can't you see he's afraid to
fight ye? Come on, let's go back home."

"Well, you're so danged fresh," flared up Isham stepping forward, "you
come, and I'll fight you myself."

"Nope, don't want no trouble," answered Winchester quietly, "git your
horse, Bill--we'll be going home."

"You're skeered!" taunted Isham, laying off his belted pistols and
rolling up his sleeves defiantly, but Winchester only smiled.

"You might gang me," he said, but, as Isham began to whoop, Sharps
Bassett suddenly laid off his belt. Shaking the black hair from his
eyes he advanced without a word, his neck swelling like a blow-snake's
with rage.

"I'll fight ye!" he rumbled, and Isham backed away, then turned and
made a jump for his guns.

"You dirty, black scoundrel!" he yelled in a false fury, "don't you
think I seen that knife in your boot? I wouldn't dirty my hands on a
nigger like you, nohow--because that's all you are, a damned nigger!"

Sharps stood in the open, his huge fists still clenched, his eyes
turning red with savage rage; then he, too, wheeled and reached for his
guns. There was a silence, and the gunmen that Isham had hired crouched
low and waited for the break; but before a hand had moved a man stepped
swiftly forward and took his place beside the Bassetts. It was Hall
McIvor and as the Texans paused to glance at him the tenseness of the
moment was broken. A new emotion stepped in, to break the psychic wave
that was sweeping them on towards a killing.

"What are you doing--over there?" demanded Isham roughly, and Hall
fixed him with his piercing black eyes.

"I'm here to fight," he answered quietly. "This is no quarrel of mine,
but when fifteen men pitch on three I'm going to help them, right or
wrong."

"You half-Injun rascal!" burst out Isham accusingly, "I said all the
time you was here to join the Bassetts--and now, by Godfrey, look at
him!"

He turned to Meshackatee, who was looking on in wonder, and pointed a
scornful hand at their ex-prisoner; but McIvor's blood was up and, as
Isham continued to point, he leapt over and slapped him in the face.

"Take that!" he said, "and if you pretend to be a gentleman draw your
gun and we'll shoot this out!"

He stood expectant, his slim hand poised and waiting above the butt
of a well-worn pistol, but Scarborough did not go for his gun. He
hesitated and as McIvor saw the fear in his eyes he stepped back with a
thin-lipped smile.

"In my country," he said, "we settle our differences of opinion by
stepping off ten paces, then turn and shoot. I say you are a coward, a
blustering fool and no gentleman--do you accept my challenge, or not?"

"Aw, you're crazy," muttered Isham, backing off into the crowd, and
McIvor let it pass. But when the Scarboroughs were gone he glanced
swiftly at Winchester Bassett, who responded with his unruffled smile.




CHAPTER VIII

THE GOOD OLD SIMPLE PLAN


Nothing had been further from the intentions of Hall McIvor as he
rode forth from the Rock House that morning than that he should
join the Bassetts as a friend. He had been sent to join them,
yes; but treacherously, as a spy, who was to return and report to
Meshackatee. But his heart had ruled his head--he had joined against
the Scarboroughs and then slapped Isham in the face--and now that it
was over he found himself a turncoat, shaking hands with Winchester
Bassett. Yet something still told him that his heart had been right,
and that open friendship was better than treachery; and that somehow,
somewhere, he would see Allifair again, though never under the
protection of the Scarboroughs.

Yet protection he must have, if he was to remain near her at all, and
he sought it under the roof-tree of the Bassetts. They lived in a log
house set on the edge of the riverbottom, but with its single, narrow
door facing away from the creek bed and out upon the level plain.
Its timbers were square-hewn, with loop-holes in place of windows,
and the fireplace at one end was as massive as the Scarboroughs',
with holes near the top for a lookout. A barn and round corral, for
breaking horses, stood further along on the bench; and beyond and to
the south rose the high, wooded hill which Meshackatee had predicted
would be an ambush. A pack of hounds rushed out to greet them, hogs and
chickens strayed about the yard; and as Hall rode up to the gate an old
white-haired man hobbled out.

"Eh--what was the name?" he quavered anxiously, staring up at him with
his farsighted eyes. "Oh, Hall, eh? Well, git down; git down, Mr. Hall.
We ain't got much, but what we have you're shorely welcome to--our
latch-string is always hung out. What's the news, boys?" he demanded,
"did you rout them biggoty Scarboroughs? Well, good, and good again.
Them and their no-count Texas gunmen--one Bassett could whip a hundred
of 'm!"

"Well, we whipped 'em, Pap!" returned Winchester, "and this gentleman
here slapped Isham's face and called him a dirty coward!"

"He did!" exulted Old Henry, turning to take Hall by the arm, "wall
now, don't that beat all! And him a stranger, too--but he looks like a
fighting man! What did Isham say to that?"

"He didn't say nothing," laughed Winchester, "jest mounted his
_caballo_ and flew!"

Henry Bassett stopped short to join in with silent laughter and then
he led the way to the house. He was shriveled and bent, with a long,
white beard and hands that clutched and clawed it when he talked;
but his high, hawklike nose and resolute eyes told of a courage that
never had waned. Of all his boys, the swarthy Winchester was most like
him, though Bill was whiter by far. But Bill had the heavy jaw and
fat-cheeked face that came from his Digger Indian mother; and Sharps
would pass for a fullblood anywhere, except for his chilled-steel
nerve. Not a word had he said since his challenge to Isham, and his
beady black eyes still glinted with anger as he slouched along out to
the corrals. His rage, or so it seemed, now included the whole white
race, and he stared at McIvor evilly.

The interior of the Bassett fort was dark and smoky and as they moved
over towards the fireplace an Indian woman rose up and padded silently
away. She was Old Henry's wife, or woman as he called her; but none
of the men spoke to her, and when she came back her presence was
studiously ignored.

"Have a cheer! Have a cheer!" urged Henry cordially, motioning Hall to
a seat by the fire. "So you and my cubs hev whipped Isham again! Well,
well, I'd a-liked to ben there. But my eyes ain't what they was and my
legs is bothering some, so I aim to hold the fort here at home. I went
out last week, when my haounds bayed a lion, and it kinder fetched my
rheumatiz back. But them no-count Scarboroughs, I'd fight ary one of
'em with any weepon he'd name--from the p'int of a needle to the muzzle
of a shotgun--I shore do despise that Isham!"

"He offered to fight Winchester!" spoke up Bill with a grin, "but Winch
said he didn't want no trouble. And then, when Isham begin to crow,
Sharps stepped out and offered to whip him. Hand and skull, it was; but
Isham was afraid of him, so he backed off and went to calling names.
I'd've plugged him right there, but Winch wouldn't let me; and while we
was waiting for 'em to make a crooked move, this feller here comes over
and joined us. He says the Scarboroughs held him up down in Deadman
Canyon, and threatened to hang him for a horse-thief; and he don't
allow no man to treat him like that, so he challenged old Isham to a
duel."

"He did!" shrilled Old Henry. "Well, what did Isham do?"

"He jest said: 'You're crazy,' and backed away outer that, before all
four of us blowed him full of holes!"

"Well, well," beamed Henry, "you must be a Southerner, I reckon, to be
talking of fighting a duel. It ain't done much out here, they run more
to bushwacking and shooting a man in his door; but back in Tennessee,
where I was born and raised, they had duels every court-day. I've seen
two mountain men grab the ends of a handkerchief and cut and slash
away with their bowie knives till one or the other dropped dead, but
these Texans are that treacherous they'd shore shoot you in the back
before you'd stepped off five paces. A duel is for gentlemen, but I
don't count them Scarboroughs as human--and I told 'em so p'intedly
one time. They've abused me and my boys till we won't stan' it no more,
and some day they's going to be a _killing_. I'm a peaceable man, but I
can't git no jestice--leastwise I can't git it in the courts--and when
they went to hiring gunmen they fo'ced my hand and I had to throw in
with them sheepmen. Don't like sheep, I reckon, any more than you do;
but Grimes and his Mexicans are fighters. They'll shore put a torch
under them Texas bad men that'll burn 'em off the face of the earth. Me
and my cubs ain't robbed no bank, nor paymaster's wagon neither, and we
ain't got the money to hire gunmen; but after Grimes has got through
with 'em I reckon the Bassetts can clean up on what there is left."

He winked and nodded wisely and, as the boys went on out, the squaw
after a silence came timidly in and went on with cooking the dinner.
She was still strong and vigorous, though her hair was turning gray;
and from time to time, as Old Henry ran on, she glanced up at him with
grave, adoring eyes.

"Yes, they call me a squawman," he confessed confidentially, when his
wife had left them alone, "but I've had other women and they was never
a one of 'em that suited me as well as this one. I thought I'd git rid
of her when I come to this country, taking Sharps and Winchester with
me; but she located me somehow and come a thousand miles overland,
bringing Bill along on her back. That's faithfulness, I say, and I let
her stay with me--and she shore thinks the world of Old Hank."

He smiled complacently as she came back to her kitchen, the hearth and
hobs of the fireplace, and squatted down to look into the Dutch ovens;
and when she was gone he jerked his head knowingly and lowered his
voice again.

"Don't you worry," he said, "she savvies what's going on--understands
every word I say; but you can't git her to speak English, not unless
the house ketches afire or a horse gits down in the barn. She's afraid
of them Scarboroughs; she claims they're bad medicine--'all same snake
in the grass'--but this sheepman, Grimes, will shore crush their head,
though their head may bruise his heel. That's what the Scripture says,
according to Grimes--he's religious, some kind of a jack Mormon. Calls
'em 'Brother' when he's among 'em and sons of dogs when he's away from
'em, the same as all these other danged sheepmen. I never did like a
sheep, to tell you the truth; but what else is they to do? If I don't
bring in Grimes, them Scarboroughs are fixing to git me, and run me
and my boys out of the country. Ain't a man got a right to protect his
home? They crowded me to it, that's all."

The old man spent the day denouncing the meanness of the Scarboroughs
and justifying his alliance with Grimes; but when, in the evening,
Grimes himself rode in, Hall could see he was none too welcome. He was
cordially received, for that was their custom, but after the first
greetings the talk died down to nothing and the sheepman cast about
for a listener. He was a big, burly man with a Scotch turn to his
tongue, and when he talked he thrust out his head vehemently and showed
the bloodshot whites of his eyes. A month's growth of beard did not
add to his appearance, and the hair lay in a mat on his chest; and he
seemed to be mad, mad all the time, with a primal, caveman rage.

"I'll show 'em, the dirty cowards!" he burst out vindictively,
addressing his harangue to McIvor. "Did you ever see a cowman that
would stand up to a Winchester? Well, I haven't and yet I've seen lots
of them. That Slash-knife outfit now is reputed to be a bad one, and
they lay claim to the whole upper range; but here's one sheepman that
they've never moved yet, and what's more, they never will. I can ride
across there any place and they'll give me the trail, they know me as
far as they can see me through a telescope. And these herders of mine,
though they're nothing but Mexicans, are proper fighting fools--every
one. I won't have 'em otherwise; and the first man that weakens I make
him walk back to town. We're coming here to-morrow with ten thousand
sheep under a lease from Henry Bassett. That gives us a right, don't
it? We're running them on shares, and this has always been his range.
But if any of them smart gunmen, like they tried to do yesterday, ride
in and interfere with my herders; I ain't saying nothing, I'll jest
drop off my mule and shoot the matter out, right there!"

"That's your privilege," conceded McIvor, "but wouldn't it be better to
stay on the east side of Turkey Creek?"

"One side or the other--it's nothing to me! This is government land,
see? And I'm a U.S. citizen. These dead-lines don't go with me!"

McIvor nodded and fell silent, for he knew the Scotch blood, but Grimes
was pacing the floor.

"They'll draw a dead-lines, will they?" he demanded menacingly;
"they'll tell me where I'll go and not go? I'm a free agent, see? I
know what's my rights, and I don't give a dam' for the Scarboroughs!
Didn't I meet their men yesterday, up on the Canyon Crick trail? Yes,
and the whole suffering outfit rode over the top of a mountain to git
away from my gun. You couldn't see 'em for dust, they were that anxious
to escape me--if they'd had a feather in their hand they'd've flew--and
now they send word that they've made a new dead-line, only this time
it's Turkey Crick! I'll show 'em a dead-line, and I'll go out and kill
a cow every time they kill one of my sheep. They's no law here and I
know it, so we'll get back to first principles and fight it out man to
man.

"If you ever read any poetry you may remember those famous lines about
Rob Roy and the good, old simple plan:

 "'That they should take who have the power
 And they should keep who can.'

"That was the plan back in Scotland for many a long year, and it's the
plan out here to-day; and I, for one, will never speak against it, for
it has served me well so far."

"Apparently so," replied McIvor, who was beginning to turn against him.
"I suppose every man follows his own nature."

"What do you mean, my friend?" demanded the sheepman truculently.
"Don't you think I'm within my rights? Well, what do you mean then
about following my own nature--are you one of these cowmen, too?"

"No," responded Hall, "I am a stranger in these parts. But after what I
have seen of feuds and family wars I should certainly hesitate to start
one."

"Oh, you're a stranger, eh? Well, I believe you, there--because any
man that knows the Scarboroughs will tell you they'll never fight. You
don't believe me, eh? Well, I'll see you to-morrow--be back with a big
band of sheep--and if I don't pasture them sheep in the middle of that
plain I'll buy you a ten-dollar hat."

"Very well, sir," bowed Hall, "I see you are determined. But I don't
need a hat that bad."




CHAPTER IX

AMBUSH


The night was filled with the drumming of horses' feet and the rush and
challenge of the hounds. They gathered by the gate and bayed and barked
continuously, racing far out across the open plain; and when at dawn
the Bassetts looked out, the Basin was stripped bare of stock. Not a
cow or horse was left for Grimes to wreak his vengeance on if his sheep
were shot up and scattered--the stage was cleared and set for the play,
which promised to be a tragedy. The Bassetts peered out warily, using
their glasses through the portholes as they scanned the neighboring
hills for gunmen; then the old squaw ventured out, to bring in wood and
water and cook their bread and coffee on the hearth. As the sun rose
higher the oak door was thrown open, giving an unobstructed view of the
plain; and at last the Bassetts stepped out into the open, for the hour
for ambushing had passed.

There are crimes that stalk by noonday, and others that fear the light;
but the men who shoot from ambush creep up in the night-time and kill
at the first peep of day. Or, failing of their victim, they skulk off
through the brush, before they, too, are marked down for revenge. All
this the Bassetts knew, as well as that strange crotchet which keeps
murderers from shooting down women; and so they stayed close till the
hour for "tapping" had passed, sending their woman out instead. She
plodded about stoically, apparently busy with her duties, but every
possible hiding place was carefully scrutinized before she consented to
let her men-folks come out.

They stood now in the sun, rolling a smoke and looking northward for
the first of the four bands of sheep; and as the clamor of their
bleating came faintly down the wind, old Susie, the Indian woman, came
out. First she glanced at Bill and Winchester, who were talking and
laughing together, and then at sullen-faced Sharps; and then she, too,
looked away to the north where the sheep were beginning to move.

"No good!" she exclaimed, stamping her foot and turning to Henry;
and while the other looked on she harangued him in Indian, pointing
repeatedly at her sons and the sheep. But Henry Bassett was not the man
to listen to a woman when it was a question of peace or war, and after
a few words he dismissed her impatiently and joined his grinning "cubs."

"She don't like that man Grimes," he explained shamefacedly, "but it's
too late now for sech talk. All the same, boys, this sheep-war ain't
no concern of ours so we'll stay right close to the house. I'm shore
sorry now that I said what I did; because if he wins, boys, he'll
sheep us out, too. But it was that or knuckle down to them dastardly
Scarboroughs, and I shore can't stummick that!"

He maundered on, arguing it over with himself, seeking vainly to
justify his acts; and all the while the braying of the sheep grew
louder as the herds drifted down through the pass. For weeks they had
been struggling through scrub oaks and pines, and dense thickets of
manzanita and buckthorn; and when at last they burst into the open
the leaders advanced on the run. The first band was made up of big,
sturdy wethers, their fleeces torn and tattered from trailing through
the brush, but strong and active as bucks. They came on in a line
which quickly spread out like the front of an advancing flood, and as
the last of the herd came clear of the creek-bed the clangor of their
baaing ceased. They fed along slowly, the leaders lingering to eat, the
drag drifting past them to the front; and in the silence that followed
a Mexican herder stepped out and looked down across the waving plain.

The grass was knee high and still green from winter rains, and it
flowed away before them like a billowing field, for the sheep had never
been there before. Yet this silence, this emptiness, this absence of
man or beast, had its sinister side as well; and, after a long look,
the herder disappeared and came out further down the creek. He kept
under the bank, only showing among the shadows as he kept cover beneath
the towering cottonwoods; but as his sheep drifted away towards the
grassy western hills he rushed out and turned them back with his dogs.
Still the silence, the great emptiness, and as other herders came up
they stepped out boldly into the open. Each man carried a gun and had
his face to the hills, but no gun roared out its loud challenge. They
drifted on slowly, down the broadening valley yet keeping close in to
the creek, and at noon they had edged away from the menacing western
ridges and gained the open Basin at last.

But now the fat wethers had eaten their full, and as the heat came on
they took shelter in the river-bottom, drowsing peacefully in the shade
of the willows. The camp-rustlers came up with their burros and kyacks,
a fire was soon going at their camp; and as his burros, and Mexicans
took their afternoon siesta Dave Grimes ambled over to the house. He
rode up on a black mule, gaudy with martingale and fancy trimmings, and
greeted the Bassetts at the gate.

"Well," he challenged, "didn't I tell ye I could do it? They see my
men was armed--and I had others to do the flanking--and nobody fired a
shot. Now I'm out in the open, where they can't sneak up on me; and I
can fight 'em man to man!"

"They may not fight you that way," suggested Winchester amiably, but
the rest of the Bassetts said nothing. The sight of the sheep actually
cropping off the grass which they had depended upon to pasture their
horses, had brought up a sober second thought, and Sharps and Bill were
furious.

"What d'ye think you're going to do?" demanded Bill rebelliously, "bed
your sheep down right in front of the door? We'd like a little feed
where we can stake out our horses, without walking plumb over to the
Scarboroughs."

"Oh, you would, hey?" returned Grimes, but there he stopped and
swallowed his scathing retort. "Well, I'll speak to my herders," he
said at last. "We've got to be neighborly, of course. But when I git
through with 'em you can walk to the Scarboroughs' without dodging
any forty-five ninetys. I see they've gathered all their cattle and
drove 'em off west--and their gunmen are over there, too--but the
first danged man that takes a shot at my sheep will find I've got a
forty-five, too. I've seen that tried before--riding out at my herders
and jumping my sheep off some bluff--but I've got a way to stop it
that's never failed yet, I jest give 'em a taste of this!"

He patted the stock of a forty-five ninety rifle that stuck up from
under his knee and Sharps broke his day-long silence.

"You're bad, ain't ye?" he rumbled, and Grimes saw that his new
partners had already repented of their bargain.

"Yes, I'm _bad_," he said, "and I don't care who knows it. Anything
more you'd like to say?"

"Nope," answered Sharps, and regarded him morosely at which Grimes
wheeled his mule to go.

"Well, so long," he said, "can't be chatting here all day. But if
you think you're so _bravo_, why didn't you clean them Scarboroughs
yourself, without calling for help on _me_?"

He flashed his eyes at Sharps and galloped over to his camp, leaving
the Bassetts with something more to think about.

Why indeed had they brought in this barbarian, with his Mexicans and
his sheep, when with a little more nerve they could have taken on
the Scarboroughs and run them out of the country themselves? But it
was too late now to ask that question, for Grimes and his sheep were
there; and on the other hand it was too early to give way to despair,
for the battle had just begun. The Scarboroughs might be cowards but,
even then, they were cowmen; and a cowardly cowman will rise up and
fight sheep when he would never fight anything else. No, the battle
was not over, it had not yet begun; and before he had finished the
self-satisfied Mr. Grimes might find himself hollering for help. But
help he would never get, not from the Bassetts and their clan, for they
had seen his raw work and he had tipped his own hand--he was there to
sheep them all out!

They waited in sullen silence as the sheep began to move and the
herders followed after them from the bedding ground; for that was the
way these besotted sheepmen worked, they made themselves the slaves
of their sheep. And the memory of that grass, so rich and sweet, had
roused the sheep up early from their dreams; they set off in single
file, each group behind its leader, and the leaders all heading for
the plain. A single herder followed, his gun across his arm, his eyes
on the distant hills; and from a knoll near their camp the extra
herders watched him, for they knew he took his life in his hands. What
they feared they could not say, more than the treachery of the cowmen
who had disappeared so mysteriously into the hills, but they watched
him nevertheless, and as they followed his squat form suddenly he
staggered and dropped down in the grass. And then the answer came, a
single shot in the silence, and the sheep broke into a run.

There was a volley then, from the rolling plain in front of them; and
from a thin line of willows which marked the course of a dry stream the
smoke rose up in white puffs. The sheep, which had rushed one way, now
turned and rushed another; and as they went down in sudden rows the
survivors stampeded, running frantically away from the smoke. The heavy
_bang_ of cowmen's rifles, shooting ninety grains of powder, added
the final touch of panic to their flight, and as they scooted across
the plain the big, forty-five caliber bullets plowed through them
until they dropped by scores. It was the vengeance of the Scarboroughs
for the invading of their range, but the Bassetts did not rush for
their guns. They looked on in stony silence, for it was no quarrel of
theirs--and Grimes had tipped his hand too soon.




CHAPTER X

THE SHEEP-WAR


If Grimes had thought to win a bloodless victory and take over
Maverick Basin for his sheep he was brought back to earth by that
first rifle-shot, which had struck down his boldest _caporal_. And
the fusillade which followed, killing his sheep by the hundreds and
scattering them across the plain, showed the presence of an enemy as
ruthless as himself and as determined to play a bold hand. No, it was
too rich a prize to be given up lightly and the Scarboroughs were
fighting to win. For an hour, while Grimes raged about in the distance
and cursed his cowering herders, the rifle-shots continued and the
sorely harried sheep went down until there were no more to kill. It was
a slaughter of the innocents, but each sheep that went down sent a pang
through Grimes' hard heart.

The position of the Scarboroughs, behind the bank of the low creek-bed
which meandered across the plain, was impregnable from every side; and
even after dark Grimes was afraid to venture out, lest he walk into
yet another ambush. They were playing his own game--the way he had
often played it when rash cowboys had charged down on his camp--and
after gathering a few strays he was compelled to retreat, taking his
much-vaunted Mexicans with him. Out of three thousand sheep he did not
have fifty left; and his fighting _caporal_ lay dead on the plain, shot
down by a cowman's bullet.

But Grimes had made his boast that he would "show" the Scarboroughs,
and the next morning early he came riding down the creek bed at
the head of more than twenty armed Mexicans. They were ferocious
looking creatures, each armed with a rifle and a pair of forty-five
six-shooters, and as they rode past the house they charged the Bassett
dogs and put them to flight with their ropes. Then they galloped on,
laughing, to join Grimes and the rest, who had dismounted and tied
their mules in the brush.

The Bassetts watched them through loop-holes, not without muttered
curses for the bravos who had lashed their pet hounds; but when they
saw the Mexicans start up a stream-bed to the west they paused and
reserved their judgment. It was the mouth of that same wash which had
sheltered the ambushed Scarboroughs when they had shot down the herder
and his sheep, and if the Scarboroughs were still there--they waited
in tense silence, but no battle sprang up on the plain. All was quiet
and still, and at last Grimes himself walked out to the body of his
_caporal_. The Mexicans followed after him, they carried the body back;
and then for a long time not a head was seen above the cut-bank of the
wash.

At the Rock House, far away, Hall could see through his glasses other
men looking on from the mound. The Scarboroughs were at home, their
horses caught and saddled, waiting to see what the next move would be.
The sun mounted higher and the Bassetts stepped forth, the better to
watch the grim drama; and then, from the north, there came the faint
_baaa_ of sheep--Grimes was throwing another herd into the Basin.
They came on at a trot, urged along from behind by herders and racing
dogs; and as the first band left the brush another followed behind
it, and after that a third. In long, bleating columns they strung out
across the plain, heading straight for the guarded creek; and while
the Scarboroughs ran to mount the bands swung to right and left and
were held close along its bank. All three of Grimes' herds were now
safely pastured in the very heart of the Basin; and he and his men were
between them and the Scarboroughs, securely hidden behind the cut-bank
of the wash. He came out into the open and held up his gun, but nobody
answered the challenge.

As the Scarboroughs, the day before, had been impregnable to assault,
so now Grimes held the upper hand; and, while his Mexican fighters
patrolled the dry stream-bed, the sheep mowed down the grass. They
were held in compact bands, each close to the creek, but as no one
moved against them they were allowed to spread out and the clamor of
their braying ceased. All was still in the Basin--as it had been before
when the first band had gone to its fate--and as the heat came on the
sheep huddled up together and slept in each other's shade. But the
Scarboroughs had disappeared, some riding south and some west, and that
was a bad sign for sheep.

At the log fort of the Bassetts they watched in patient silence, now
scanning the hilltops for any signs of riding men, now turning again
to the sheep. These had roused up from their drowsing and drifted out
across the grasslands, anxiously guarded by three pairs of crouching
herders; but if Grimes had hoped that the Texans would charge him he
was disappointed again. They were playing a waiting game, or planning
some new ambush which would mean fresh disaster to his sheep; and as
the afternoon wore on Grimes scouted about uneasily, finally returning
to mount his black mule. He started back towards his herds, then
changed his mind suddenly and galloped up to the Bassett door.

"What--hiding in the house?" he hailed in mock surprise. "You'll get
white from not seeing the sun. Or--well, I mean no disrespect, but
where is that man Sharps, that misdoubted I would ever win my point?
Will you look out there now and see my bands of sheep, feeding along
like the beauties they are? And where are the Scarboroughs that were
going to wipe me out if I dared to assert my rights?"

"They're hiding in the hills," answered Winchester grimly, "and you'd
better git off and come in."

"Ah, weel," laughed Grimes, "I see you're no great fighters or you'd
be in the hills yourselves. A man must come out boldly if he expects
to get his rights, but we all of us follow our own nature. And that
reminds me--how'd do, Mr. Hall--I'll be back for that ten-dollar hat!"

He turned his mule to go, looking back for the answer, and a bullet
struck the ground close behind him.

"Yes you will!" called out Bill, as the mule cringed his tail and
Grimes dropped down quickly with his gun. "Git around behind the house
or they'll tap you off sure--they're shooting from the top of that
hill!"

"The damned cowards!" cursed Grimes, suddenly jumping at a close shot
and dragging his mule by the head; but as he struggled to lead it off a
third bullet came that struck the poor animal dead.

"Come in here!" yelled Winchester, throwing open the door, but Grimes
had gone out of his head.

"Stay in there if you want to!" he shouted back defiantly, and started
on a run for the brush. It was a scant hundred feet to the edge of the
river-bottom, and as they watched him through the port-holes they saw
him gliding from tree to tree, vengefully stalking the slayer of his
mule. But it was far to the hilltop and before he had more than started
there was a shot from out on the plain. It was answered by another
and then by a fusillade, and once more the sheep broke and ran. Who
was shooting, and from where, it was impossible to say; but all the
herders were gone and the Mexicans along the stream-bed were firing off
their guns at random. The only thing that moved besides the rush of
frightened sheep was Grimes, running savagely up the wash.

From the shelter of their fort the Bassetts looked after him, and
Sharps grunted scornfully to himself. But no shower of bullets followed
the sheepman in his flight, he kept on and rejoined his frightened men;
and when their frantic shooting had been stilled by his boot, the old
silence fell again. Only the _skuff-skuff_ of myriad feet as the sheep
made a rush, then listened and rushed off again, broke the stillness
which hung over the plain; but when a hiding herder sprang up to turn
them back he went down before a single, distant shot. Then the Mexican
fusillade reopened and when it had been silenced the sheep were left
to their fate. From the hills far away plunging shots fell among them,
to add to their senseless panic; and each bullet seemed to explode,
throwing up dirt and tufts of grass, making the disaster more complete.

The bulk of the herd fled back up the broad canyon and took shelter in
the brush along the creek, but there once more the explosive bullets
fell among them and drove them into the hills. As dusk came on they
were scattered in small bunches, hiding close and then rushing in full
flight; and at dawn they still hid there, for Grimes' Mexicans had
deserted him, thinking of nothing but to save their own lives. Three
more of their number had gone down before the gun of that marksman who
never missed a shot; and in the night they fled north, leaving Grimes
to gather his sheep, or leave them to the wolves if he chose.




CHAPTER XI

ALLIFAIR


There was a time, in the proud days of chivalry, when knights like
Sir Launcelot had to ride forth disguised in order to tempt others to
fight; but all this was changed when Colonel Colt and his six-shooter
reduced men to about the same size. Dave Grimes had ridden in and
challenged the Scarboroughs to fight him, to come out and battle for
their range; but they had taken a leaf from his own book of warfare
and kept under cover like Indians. Not for them the bold charge, the
midnight raid on armed camps; they gave him his head until they had
him where they wanted him and then shot his Mexicans from ambush. Four
men had been struck dead and even then the wary Scarboroughs had kept
beyond the range of his guns. They were playing safe, a hundred per
cent safe, and Grimes threw up his hands and quit.

Of the ten thousand sheep, worth five dollars apiece, that he had
driven in to eat out their range he took back a thousand or fifteen
hundred at the most, leaving the rest to the mercy of the wolves. He
was broken, beaten, but as he looked back across the Basin he shook
his grimy fist and swore vengeance. He had left their valley astench
with the bodies of sheep, and three herders lay unburied on the plain;
but as he retreated up the canyon he sent word to the Scarboroughs that
they should pay for their killings, and more.

They watched him from the ridges until he was well on his way and then
headed back towards the store, riding down the valley at a gallop and
shooting off their pistols while they whooped their derision at the
Bassetts. There were drinks, and more drinks, and wild rides across
the battlefield, while the Bassetts looked on somberly. A great peril
had been lifted, the sheep were gone, but now they were at the mercy
of this band of drunken Texans who might any time charge down on their
house. Or slip up in the night-time, like the skulkers they were, and
shoot them down at dawn! Even Bill was quiet and Old Susie muttered as
she gazed across the plain at their enemies. The Scarboroughs were so
many and they were so few--but Old Henry refused to be alarmed.

The day wore on and, as the revelry became wilder, a messenger rode
over with his hand up for peace and handed the Bassetts a note. Sharps
gazed at it blankly and passed it to Bill, who passed it along to
Winchester.

"Says here," he read: "'Take yore black squaw and go, you dirty
sons----' well, that's enough for me."

"Who give you that?" he demanded of the startled "neutral," and the
messenger wheeled his horse.

"Isham Scarborough!" he replied, and was starting to go when Winchester
beckoned him back.

"What's your rush?" he asked. "Can't you wait for the answer? Well, you
tell Isham Scarborough that I'll shoot him on sight--and that goes for
Red and Elmo. And you tell the three Scarboroughs, if they'll ride out
halfway, we'll meet 'em on horseback--with six-shooters. Can you keep
that from rattling around in your head?"

"W'y--yes!" stuttered the neutral, and went galloping back, while the
Bassetts ran for their horses.

"That sheepman was right, boys," observed Winchester soberly, as they
sat mounted and waiting to go. "If we'd had the nerve we'd've done this
long ago and never have called him in. He's gone now, thank God, and
we're back where we started from; but you know them Scarboroughs--we're
next."

"Yes, you're right, son," quavered Old Henry, "they're dead sot agin
us--they're determined to wipe us out. I've allus been peaceable but a
man must protect himself, only don't take no chances with Isham. You
head for him first, Winchester, and let Sharps take on Red, and Bill
can shore clean up on Elmo!"

"Yes, you bet I can," cursed Bill, "but the cowardly whelp is fixing to
ride back home."

"They're all going," growled Sharps, and reined his horse out the gate.
"Come on," he said, "let's rush 'em!"

"Nope," vetoed Old Henry, "you want to be keerful, boys; and remember
your old dad and mammy. Jest ride out slow and hold up your guns; and
if they don't come out they're cowards."

"No use," grumbled Winchester as the Scarboroughs galloped off, "you
couldn't high-life that outfit and make 'em fight. But come on, boys,
anyway; let's go over to the store and lay in a little grub and
tobacco."

"I'll go with you," spoke up Hall, who had been chafing for action, and
he swung up on his waiting roan.

"Well, all right," smiled Winchester, "you seem to be willing, if you
ain't drawing a gunman's pay. And anything we can do for you----"

"Don't mention it!" smiled back Hall, and they rode off together, for
already they had come to be friends.

The trail to the store was cumbered with dead sheep which already
had drawn flocks of crows, and as they rose up cawing McIvor had a
vision of a picture he had once seen of War. Here was the same grim
battlefield, only the victims were sheep; and there, riding off was
the horde of barbarians who had left such wrack in their wake. They
strung off across the Basin, and, well up in the lead, Hall could
see the buckskin pony of Meshackatee. Since he had quit the arrogant
Scarboroughs he had had his misgivings about Meshackatee, for he knew
he stood high in their counsels; and he wondered whether this slaughter
of Mexican herders and their sheep was not the result of his wiles.

He was a shrewd man, Meshackatee, and he had admitted himself that he
was doing the heavy thinking for the gang. But would he now consent
to turn these Indian tactics against Old Henry Bassett and his sons?
Hall was loath to believe it; and yet he was not sure, for Meshackatee
had a strange sense of loyalty. He called himself a hired bravo, and
then in the next breath he said that no man could buy _him_. He would
think what he pleased, only as long as he took his money he felt he
owed Isham his service. And Meshackatee had made a bargain with him,
Hall McIvor, which circumstances had soon brought to nothing; but Hall
still wondered if Meshackatee understood, for he had favored Hall with
a sly wink at parting. Was it not possible, even yet, that Meshackatee
considered him a spy, and his joining the Bassetts a mere blind; and
that perhaps already Allifair was waiting to greet him, when he should
return and bring his news? He gazed at the huge form on the distant
buckskin horse and shook his head, though sadly.

Right or wrong he had thrown in his lot with the Bassetts, and if it
came to a fight he would feel it his duty to protect them against all
aggression; and yet--the days were longer than any he had known and
the watches of the night were endless. He could see her through his
glasses when he watched the far Rock House, this woman whose heart had
remained faithful to his memory when she had given him up for dead.
Was it right, after all, for him to follow his conscience when it left
her to work like a slave? And could he not, in a pinch, turn upon the
savage Sharps and so gain his freedom once more? But no, he could never
meet Isham again without shooting it out then and there. They were born
to be enemies, to oppose each other to the end; and he had crossed his
Rubicon when he had slapped Isham in the face and called him a coward
and a fool.

There was no one at the store but the weak-eyed Mr. Johnson and a group
of staring neutrals, but the bottles were everywhere and several of the
settlers were drunker than strict neutrality called for. The Bassetts
rode up slowly, scanning every face in the slack crowd; and while the
others went in Sharps stood by outside the door, to be ready for any
treachery.

"Gimme five dollars worth of smoking tobacco," began Winchester
peremptorily, "and we want to git an order of grub."

"Why, yes--certainly," cringed Johnson, starting to get it and drawing
back, "but--er--I'm sorry, but the Scarboroughs have forbidden me----"

"_I'm_ talking to you!" rasped Winchester, and there was a moment of
silence as the meaning of his statement went home.

"But they said they'd come back," protested Johnson in desperation,
"and tear down my store if I did!"

"I'll tear it down right now!" answered Winchester, "if you don't shell
out that grub."

The store-keeper shelled out, but he showed a mean spirit and
Winchester tapped on the counter with his gun.

"Mr. Johnson," he said, "have you joined the Scarborough gang? Oh, you
ain't, eh? You're a neutral! Well, try to act the part then, or we'll
come over and clean you out. Good day--and keep your mouth shut."

They rode back heavy laden with supplies and tobacco, for the
Bassetts looked forward to a siege; but no siege came and they went
to slaughtering hogs, oblivious of the Scarboroughs' threat. It was
Winchester who took the lead, for the banter of the sheepman had stung
him to the quick; and day or night he rode forth boldly, gathering
horses or riding to his hounds. If Old Henry disapproved he did nothing
to show it, and Bill and Sharps worked on stoically; but the Indian
woman sat where she could always see the hills and Hall watched the
Rock House through his glasses.

A week went by and no storm broke upon them, the Scarboroughs had gone
west to work their cattle; and then in the night Hall heard the hounds
rush out, and a woman's voice called for help. The Bassetts sprang up
and ran to their loop-holes, for their first thought was always of
treachery; but Hall recognized the voice and rushed out through the
doorway, striking the hounds aside as he ran.

"Allifair!" he cried, gathering her close into his arms and lifting her
up from the dogs; and as the Bassetts stood staring he carried her into
the house while the hounds followed meechingly behind.




CHAPTER XII

THE MAN-KILLING BASSETTS


She stood trembling and holding close to him, her eyes on the swarthy
Bassetts and the old squaw who was stirring up the fire; but when they
had retired and left the lovers to themselves Allifair whispered swift
words into Hall's ears.

"They're coming," she warned. "I know it for a certainty, because
Meshackatee told me himself. And they're going to kill all the
Bassetts!"

He gripped her and sat still, his eyes on the weak blaze which was
lapping the black stones of the fireplace, and then he inclined his
head. The Bassett boys were near, lying stolidly on their beds, which
they had dragged back a little into the darkness, but he knew that some
of them were listening. The jealous-eyed Sharps had never ceased to
watch him since the day he had come to the house; and, seeing him now
with this niece of the Scarboroughs, his ears would be straining for
every word.

"They're strangers," she whispered, "some Slash-knife men that Isham
sent out and hired secretly. And when they ride up and catch the
Bassetts off their guard, they're to draw their guns and shoot."

He gripped her again, for she was whispering too loud--or so it seemed
to his jangled nerves--and then he sat waiting in the silence. It
pressed in upon him, as oppressive as the darkness, as fearful as the
thoughts it brought up; and the stir of their breathing, even the
beating of their hearts, took on a terrible distinctness. But her
message was not finished, and as he held her close she whispered very
softly in his ear.

"We must go," she said. "He told me to tell you. He'll be waiting with
horses--down the creek."

He nodded, and his mind slipped back into the past and then leapt
forward to the future. In a whirlwind of dancing visions he pictured
their flight down the dark canyon, and Meshackatee waiting with the
horses; and then his mind struck back and he could see the Bassetts,
and the Slash-knife men riding in. He imagined their short parley, the
secret signal, the flash of guns; and then these men who lay about him
now would be shot down and left like the sheep-herders.

"I can't leave," he whispered back. "I've got to stay and help them.
But you----"

She clutched him again and was whispering earnestly into his ear when
Sharps rose up from his bed. It was just a fold of blankets, laid down
on the dirt floor; and as he rose, Bill rose up too.

"What are you folks whispering about?" demanded Sharps, advancing in
his stocking feet from the gloom, and Winchester sat up suddenly.

"Oh, you mustn't tell!" pleaded Allifair, frantically. "I promised him
I wouldn't, you know."

"Promised who?" inquired Sharps, and as she shrank away from him Hall
laid a soothing hand on her head.

"She came," he said, "to deliver me a message--a friend has offered to
help us escape. We were engaged to be married and I came up here to
find her, but she has been held a kind of prisoner at the Rock House."

"Yes, but didn't I hear her say," challenged Sharps, still unconvinced,
"that some one was coming to kill the Bassetts?"

"You bet you did!" put in Bill, "because I heard it myself. This here
don't look good to me."

"If you gentlemen will just step back," suggested McIvor quietly, "and
let us talk this over a minute----"

"All right," spoke up Winchester, coming quickly to the front, "get
back, boys; we know he's our friend."

"Well, I don't," grumbled Sharps, but he made room, reluctantly, when
Winchester shoved him away. They gathered in a knot in the back part of
the room, arguing angrily among themselves, while Hall talked in low
tones with Allifair.

"I am in honor bound to stay," he ended gently, "so you will have to go
back--and wait."

"What--back to the Rock House?" she protested indignantly. "And leave
you here to be killed! No, Hall, I am going to stay."

"Well, that is your right," he responded, after a silence. "God knows
I'll protect you, if I can. How many did you say there were?"

"Oh, were you going to fight them? Why not leave it to----But no, I
know you too well. There are eight or ten of them, Hall."

"And since your life and mine are involved in it now----"

"You can tell them," she consented, and sighed.

The Bassetts listened grimly as he told the brief story of Isham and
his Slash-knife killers, and then Winchester held out his hand.

"Don't you worry," he said, with a smile to Allifair, "we'll take care
of you, lady--and him. All we needed was to know their little game."

He stepped out jauntily as he laid her a bed by the fire and then took
his brothers outside. What he said Hall never knew but when they came
back even Sharps had a friendly smile.

They slept till daylight--or lay in their blankets--and at dawn there
was a man at every loop-hole, searching the country for the first sight
of the gunmen. The sun was just up when they appeared In the north,
riding down on the Turkey Creek trail: but as they left the brush two
men fell behind and disappeared in the creek bed.

"One of them fellers was Red!" announced Bill, who was looking through
the glasses. "I'd know that wool hat of his anywhere. There's eight of
'em now, altogether."

"Let me look!" demanded Winchester, and after peering through the
port-hole he passed the glasses on to Sharps.

"All Teehannos," he said. "Well, boys, this means business; and we
might as well shoot to kill. I'll meet 'em at the door and when they go
for their guns--well, you know, don't wait too long."

Sharps grunted and caught up his rifle impatiently. Bill watched them
as they rode down the valley; and when they turned off and took the
trail to their house he too dropped down by a port-hole. As for Hall,
he led Allifair to Old Susie's room and leaned his carbine against the
left side of the door. This opened to the right, as most doors do, and
there was a boxing that just hid the gun.

"What's the idee?" inquired Winchester, with the old, care-free smile
which seemed to come to him in moments of danger; and Hall smiled back,
though soberly.

"I'm left-handed," he explained, "that is, with a rifle; with a pistol
I use the right hand. Well, they'll be watching my right hand; but I'll
reach in with my left and have my carbine before they know it."

"And then?" suggested Winchester, but Hall only shrugged and glanced
back significantly at Allifair. Already she had left the room in the
rear and was looking on with growing alarm--for the horses were outside
the door. There was a rush of hounds, a curse and a yelp, and then a
voice hailed the house.

"Well?" inquired Winchester, opening the door about a foot and looking
them over coldly, and the leader of the cowboys spoke roughly.

"We're lost," he said, "been riding all night. What's the chances for
something to eat?"

"I guess you've come to the wrong house," returned Winchester politely.
"That's the Scarborough place over there."

He opened the door and pointed off across the plain, but the Texans
were not to be denied. They were Texans, every one, and there was a
wild look in their eyes as they reined in their horses and sat waiting.
Winchester noted it, but his manner was calm.

"Well, all right," he said, when they protested ignorance of the
Scarboroughs, "we ain't running no restaurant but if you'll wait
outside a while----"

"Outside!" snapped the leader, quick to snatch at some offense, and his
men ranged in behind him.

"We have ladies in the house," explained Winchester, still suavely; and
Allifair appeared behind him.

"Well, tell 'em to come out of that!" ordered the boss cowboy
threateningly, "and git us something to eat!"

"Take her away," whispered Hall, brushing Winchester aside and stepping
in front of Allifair.

"Good morning, gentlemen," he said--"I hope you'll excuse us----"

"Send the women out!" snarled the cowboy, glaring at Hall in a fury.
"You'd better, if you know what's good for you."

"What do you mean?" demanded Hall; and, as Winchester came back and
stood in the door, the killer gave the signal to shoot.

"We have a way," he announced, "of getting what we want!" And he laid
his hand on his gun.

He was quick, but Hall was quicker--his hand snatched out the rifle
and he shot from the hip at the leader. Then as the cowboys drew their
pistols he plunged into the midst of them, shooting right and left with
his carbine. There was a fusillade of pistol shots, the bang of rifles
from loop-holes, and as the horses pitched and jostled three men fell
down between them and were trampled in the wild stampede. The horses
did the rest--they bolted to escape the shooting and their riders soon
gave them their heads. It was a rout, but the Bassetts had gone out of
their heads with rage and the lust for blood. They had turned berserk
in a moment and as the Texans galloped away they shot two more off of
their horses. Of the three men who were left, two took to the creek
bottom and the other dropped down behind his horse.

"Leave him to me!" ordered Winchester, stepping out into the open,
and the killer grabbed for his gun. It was on the wrong side, the one
towards the house, and as he reached under his horse's neck Winchester
shot at his head and clipped off a part of one ear. The killer jerked
back and reached over his horse's neck, only to receive another wound
in the arm.

"Get away from that horse!" shouted Winchester fiercely, and then
shot it through and through. The killer turned and fled, his broken
arm flapping, and the Bassetts let him go. They had had their fill
of killing and blood, for three men lay dead in the yard. Of the two
wounded who escaped, one was never seen again; and the other, fleeing
north, encountered a she bear with cubs, which mangled him so that he
died. Only two escaped unhurt, to return to the Slash-knife and tell of
the man-killing Bassetts.




CHAPTER XIII

BACK FROM THE DEAD


As in desert spaces the bodies of the dead draw vultures from hundreds
of miles, so the news of the battle, spread by some mysterious means,
brought the "neutrals" to the scene of the killing. They came from
distant canyons, from up under the Rim and from the west as far as
Clear Creek; and as they gazed at the dead cowboys they muttered among
themselves and glanced at the Bassetts, and Hall. There was awe and
wonder--and a new respect--in their eyes; for each man had been shot
stone dead. Two in the heart and one through the brain, and the horses
had been bucking like broncs. That was shooting--and done by the
Bassetts.

The story of Winchester's duel passed from lip to lip--how he had put
an underbit in Tucker's left ear and broken his arm when he reached
over. He it was who had shot Paine through the heart, unless the
preacher man had beat him to it; and Bill and Sharps must have got the
rest, because the wounds had all been made with a rifle. And so these
were the half-Indians that the Scarboroughs had been so scornful of and
had called the Dirty Black so-and-sos! They gazed and rode home, and
their neighbors returned just to look at the fighting Bassetts. Then
they gathered at the store, and what they said there was carried to the
crestfallen Scarboroughs.

No longer did they dare to ride over to the store and buy the drinks
for their gunmen, and the neutrals. A wave of resentment had been
roused up against them by the exposure of their treacherous plan,
and they kept close to the Rock House and waited. But they were far
from being whipped, and when Hall spoke of leaving he was warned that
they were watching the trails. So he lingered on from day to day,
hardly noticing the passage of time as he talked of the future with
Allifair. But though she smiled bravely and agreed to all his plans,
she had caught a trick from the watchful old squaw; and, whether they
strolled beneath the cottonwoods or rode out across the plain, her
eyes were always straying to the hills. Perhaps it was presentiment,
a premonition of coming bloodshed--or perhaps, having lived with the
Scarboroughs so long, she sensed what was going on--but each day she
grew more watchful, more apprehensive of danger, though she passed it
off with a smile.

As she passed through the doorway she glanced instinctively at the
bullet-holes where the Slash-knife men had shot up the house; and the
dark, bloody stains where three men had died sent a shudder through
her body as she passed. Old memories leapt up of other days when her
own kinsmen had been shot down at their doors, and when the man at
her side had come prowling back at night to shoot down even more. He
had killed her own kin, and her brothers had killed his; and now, like
a nightmare, another feud rose to thwart them, for the Scarboroughs
would shoot him on sight. For it was Hall, leaping out into the midst
of the killers, who had defeated them by spoiling their aim; and she,
by running away and revealing the plot, had added fresh fuel to their
hate. But they would not kill her--even the Scarboroughs had their
shame--all they would do would be to shoot down her lover. And so she
waited, and trembled.

For a week and more the Bassetts had kept close, sensing the mischief
in the air, but as the days wore by and the Scarboroughs did not
strike, their vigilance at last relaxed. None of the Scarboroughs had
been killed, it was not a blood-feud yet, but only some sheep-herders
on the side of the Bassetts and some cowboys employed by the
Scarboroughs. The old enmity remained and the Scarboroughs were
implacable, but the Bassetts were still for peace. They had proved
their worth as fighting men par excellence and were content to let
sleeping dogs lie. So, as all remained quiet, Winchester rode out
across the range; and the next day was Sharps' turn to go.

There had been a rain in the night and the morning was crystal clear,
all the hills stood out clean against the sky, and as the sun rose
up higher without revealing any ambush the men took their ropes and
stepped out. It was Sharps who went first, heading straight across the
flat to where his night-horse was circling its stake; and Winchester
and Bill had started after him when something called them back. Hall
ventured forth last of all, for Allifair had delayed him, and halfway
to his horse she called him again. He turned, but too late--there was a
volley from the hills and he and Sharps went down.

There was a silence, an aching moment when even the horses stood still;
and then, as Allifair sprang out to run to Hall, a strong hand hurled
her back. The door slammed behind her and as the bar fell in place she
heard Winchester's voice in the darkness.

"It's them Scarboroughs!" he cursed. "Don't you step outside the
door or they'll shoot you down like a dog. Bill, take that far
loop-hole--they're up on this first hill--and Dad, you watch the door."

He fumbled for his gun and hurried off to guard a port-hole, and Old
Henry took his post by the door. Within the darkened house there was
silence again, except for the wailing of Susie and the muttering of
the startled men. They were taken by surprise, and as they scanned the
empty landscape they imagined enemies springing up everywhere. Bill
watched the creek bed and Winchester the south hill; and Old Henry, his
voice plaintive, gave way to senile laments as he gazed at the body of
Sharps.

"He's--he's alive, boys!" he quavered, as he saw the huge bulk move;
and before they could stop him he had unbarred the door and dashed out
into the open. The assassins on the hilltop seemed to hesitate from
shame, or perhaps they were waiting to make sure; but as he passed out
the gate a heavy rifle roared and the old man tottered and fell.

"Come back here!" shouted Winchester, snatching Allifair as she fled;
and, while he was dragging her back, Old Susie eluded him and ran
screaming to bring in her husband. He had risen on his knees but as
she stooped to lift him up a second bullet, aimed deadly straight,
almost tore him from her arms. Old Henry was struck dead, but she would
not believe it; she dragged him back anyway, crying out against his
murderers, while the men on the hill-top laughed.

"That's three of 'em!" they yelled, and Winchester barred the door
again, for he feared that his mother would be next. The Scarboroughs
had come to make good their boast and kill the last of the Bassetts;
and the old Indian woman was no more to them than one of his barking
dogs. They had come to kill them all, and even the gentle Allifair
could not pass out that door and come back. They were killers, after
all, these cowardly Scarboroughs, whom he had allowed to live too
long; but killers in their own way, the sneaking, stealthy way of the
Apaches, who hunted men down like game. Three men already had fallen
before their guns; but he knew them, they would not fight in the
open. They would not rush the house, and, while Bill kept a lookout,
Winchester stood with his hand on the door.

Outside, on the plain, Hall McIvor lay limp where he had dropped at the
first fatal volley; but Sharps, groaning and grunting like a huge,
wounded bear, was clawing the earth with his hands. He did not call
out, but inched feebly towards the house, and Winchester turned away.
The men on the hill were letting Sharps live in order to trap both him
and Bill; for before they could reach Sharps the Scarboroughs would
shoot them down, and then they would finish him. It was a part of their
system, figured out to a nicety, but Winchester and Bill did not go
out. They stayed by their loop-holes, searching the hill-top for some
movement that would reveal the cunning ambush of the enemy.

The sun came out hot and Sharps sank back exhausted; his black head
heaved, and he was dead. Of all the Bassetts, the Scarboroughs had
feared him most, and now that he was gone they hooted. Winchester and
Bill, by their loop-holes inside the house, still watched the hillside,
so ominously barren of life; but not a man moved and they did not fire
a cartridge, for they would need them all, if they lived. They were
outnumbered and surrounded, and when night fell their enemies would
creep down close. They would slip up to the house, which two men could
not guard, and fire it or break down the door; and then the Bassetts,
if they lived that long, might hope to avenge their dead.

In the corner old Susie sat swaying back and forth while she mourned
over the body of her husband, and at the loop-hole by the door Allifair
gazed out through her tears at the form which had once been her lover.
He lay on his face in a shallow hole, where the hogs in rooting had
dug out a wallow in a slight depression in the ground. Her first
madness was gone now and she knew better than to go near him; for
before she could rush out and bring in his body they would riddle it
again with bullets. It was better to wait, though it wrung her heart to
do so, until night should bring its black shroud, and then she could go
forth and take him in her arms and weep out the anguish in her breast.

She closed her eyes in prayer--though for what she did not know, since
all that she lived for was lost--but as she looked out again she
thought she saw his body move, his hand draw slowly back! She stepped
to the door, which had been barred against her, and pulled it open to
see. Yes, his body had moved, but at the snouting of a huge hog which
even now was grunting in his face!

With a cry she flung the heavy door wide open and dashed out to save
his dear body. To be mangled by hogs, and within sight of those who
loved him--her anger swept her forth before she knew it. So swiftly did
she run that she had reached down and caught him up before the first
shot rang out, and, knowing their purpose, she shielded him with her
body while the bullets smashed spitefully all about her. They were
trying to frighten her, to make her drop her burden or expose him to a
last vengeful shot, but the blood of Southern feudists ran strong in
her veins and she faced the hill disdainfully. Then, as she gathered
him closer and started for the house, the storm of bullets ceased.
Winchester and Bill had marked down their men and their rifles were
clearing the hill.

She dragged him through the doorway and sank down, half-fainting--and
when she came to he was alive. Alive and smiling, though with grim
lines about his mouth and a terrible intentness in his eyes.

"My sweetheart," he murmured, stooping to kiss her once more, and then
he lifted her up. Yes, her lover who had been dead, had come back to
life, to cherish and protect her still; and asking no questions she
drew down his head and tried to kiss the anger from his eyes.




CHAPTER XIV

A MCIVOR


There is a look in the eyes of eagles which sometimes is found in
men--a bold, resolute look, changing swiftly to defiance and a hatred
that nothing can quench. It is the sign of the fighting man--not the
sly, vicious killer, but the man who will fight till he dies. Hall
McIvor wore it blazing when he reached for his rifle and strode over to
join the Bassetts.

"Played 'possum, eh?" muttered Winchester, who had lost his old smile.

"Well, I wish we could bring in Sharps."

"No use," answered Hall, "they're just waiting to get you. Shall I kill
the rest of those hogs."

"Yes, kill the last one of them!" burst out Winchester in a frenzy. "My
God, them Scarboroughs ain't human!"

"No, they're not," replied Hall, and glanced up at the hill before he
crossed the room to attend to the hogs. He surveyed them with loathing,
with a shudder of horror at the fate he had so narrowly missed; and
then, very carefully, he shot them one by one as they gathered about
the body of Sharps. They followed their own nature, even as the men
upon the hill, and so he shot them down; and so he would shoot--and
without any more remorse--the men who had ambushed Sharps. Their
bullets had gone wild or they would have shot him too and left him a
carcass for the hogs; and, but for the devotion of the woman that he
loved, he would be at their mercy still.

At the first volley of shots he had known that he was caught, and that
to run was to invite certain death; and so he had dropped down, rolling
swiftly out of sight while the smoke was still in their eyes. It was a
trick that he had learned from the same careful father who had reared
him with but one object in life--to make him a killer of men, a terror
to the Randolph clan. He it was who had taught him to shoot left-handed
with the rifle, since then he would present his right side to the enemy
and avoid a fatal bullet through the heart. But in the battle a bullet
had found his guarded heart, he had been left on the field for dead;
and now, a second time, he had been spared from death in order to live
for revenge.

They still thought he was dead, those whooping cravens on the hillside
who had seen him dragged into the house; but if there was a God above
to look down and judge men's hearts he swore to make them pay. Not
while he could lift a hand should they shoot down white-haired men and
make sport of weeping women; they had invited the wrath of Almighty
God and he would be His sure sword. His hand, which they thought dead,
should rise and smite them; he would kill them one by one----He
paused, for Allifair had laid her hand on his and was gazing deep down
into his eyes.

"Remember," she said, "you are mine now--I saved you. And we must leave
this horrible place."

He frowned and drew back, a stern refusal on his lips as he remembered
the pitiless code of the feudist--but at the look in her eyes he bowed
his head and gave her his hand in assent.

"It is the only way," she whispered, "if we are ever to end the feud
before all our kinfolks are dead. Let these men fight it out--but if
you join in with them now, I know you, you will never draw out. Let
Winchester and Bill take their revenge on the Scarboroughs, and we will
go back home. They cannot kill us then, because I shall be a McIvor and
you will have married a Randolph."

"Yes, dear," he nodded, but he would not say more and she left him to
watch over the dead.

The long day dragged on with men shouting from the hilltops, and
then the smash and thud of the big, explosive bullets announced the
beginning of a new attack. In some way the Scarboroughs had procured
bullets which blew up the instant they struck against the house, and at
each volley of shots the mortised logs crashed and jumped, while the
chinks gave off a thin smoke. But after the first volleys the shooting
died away and again a voice shouted from the hill. Hall muttered--it
was the voice of Isham.

"Hey! Send out that woman!" he called down loudly. "Last chance--we're
going to do a clean job!"

"Yes you are!" yelled back Bill, but Winchester was silent and it
remained for Hall to speak.

"You'd better go, Allifair," he said. "I'll try to join you later." And
then he whispered a few last words into her ear.

"Dare to trust 'em?" questioned Winchester as Hall opened the door, and
when Hall nodded he assented. "Well, good-by, then," he said, giving
his hand to Allifair, "I'll see that Mr. Hall gets away."

"Oh, will you?" she cried, and glanced guiltily at her lover; then
gave the haggard Winchester both her hands. But there was something
more behind, and as she gazed at him inquiringly he reached down and
picked up a blanket. "For him," he said, and, glancing out at Sharps,
he turned and strode abruptly away. Then she knew and the tears started
suddenly to her eyes as she stepped bravely out into the open.

"Go back to the Rock House!" directed Isham from his hiding-place, but
she went past the body of Sharps. Hall watched her as she bent down and
covered it up without even a glance at the hill; and as she went across
the plain he followed her through his glasses, though the bullets were
smashing against the house. As each ball struck it seemed to rend the
timbers, spitting lead viciously in through the chinks; and once more
old Susie raised her voice in a wail, for she knew that the end was
near. While the sun was in the sky Winchester could keep them at bay;
but when the shadows fell and blurred his sights, then the Scarboroughs
would come down from their hill. They would creep up to the house and
throw fire on the roof and shoot them all down as they ran; and the
body of her husband would be burned where it lay--the Scarboroughs
would destroy them all. But Winchester had taken the shovel from the
fireplace and started a hole under the wall, and as evening came on he
buckled on his two six-shooters and stepped to the mouth of his tunnel.

"Well, boys," he said, "we've got to skip out or they'll burn the old
woman's house. I'm heading south, myself, as soon as it gets dark; and
Bill, you'd better head north. Don't no one come near me, because I'm
going to run hog-wild and shoot at every bush I see move. You stay
right here, Hall, until the fireworks begin and then give the lady my
regards. If I git out of this alive I'll take care of them Scarboroughs
without any assistance from _you_."

He shook hands with them gravely and dropped down into the hole; they
heard him digging, and then he was gone. Bill wriggled out after him,
bellying off through the weeds, and Hall watched from the bottom of the
hole.

Already the evening star was glowing in the west and the dusk gathered
deeper among the trees; every shadow veiled some movement, the very
earth seemed to whisper and the wind rustled by like a snake. He
started and crouched back as he heard a shot up the creek, then three
more and a racing through the brush; but still he held back until,
down towards the south, the night suddenly burst into flame. There
were shouts and loud challenges, a running fusillade that led away
rapidly around the hill; and then, like a shadow, he glided out of his
hiding-place and disappeared in the river-bottom below. A half hour
later, riding a Scarborough horse which he had stolen from its picket
on the plain, he circled around and edged in on the Rock House, where
the dogs were baying like mad.

Along the hillside to the east the fight was still raging, breaking out
after a short silence in a sudden rattle of pistol shots, punctuated
by the bang of heavy rifles. Winchester had carried the war into the
Scarborough camp, and, knowing every man for his enemy, he had set them
all to shooting by the swiftness with which he moved. When they were
not firing at him they were firing at each other; and from the Indian
mound, where he had agreed to meet Allifair, Hall could see that they
were scattered everywhere. Fights were springing up like wild-fire,
only to die down suddenly after a veritable blaze of shooting; and
in his man-hunter's mind he saw the wisdom of Winchester's move in
going among them alone. But he had come to find Allifair and hurry her
away before the Scarboroughs returned from their siege; and, standing
beneath the oak tree, where she could just see him against the sky, he
looked across the creek at the house.

It was dark, except for a dim light in the kitchen, and against the
square doorway he could see women's forms as they hastened to and fro.
And a woman's voice, loud, scolding and insistent, made known the
presence of the vixenish Zoolah. At long intervals, as he listened, he
could hear the voice of Allifair as she attempted some faint defense;
and then Miz Zoolah would burst out afresh as she hurried out to listen
to the shooting.

"I hope he kills them all!" she railed from the doorway. "Yes, and
leaves them lay for the hogs!" She dodged into the house to renew her
loud scolding and Hall settled down to wait. From the loop-hole in her
kitchen Allifair could look out and see him, dimly outlined beneath
the branches of the tree; but she could not come out until the battle
was ended and Miz Zoolah had retired to her rest. From the bunk-house
beyond and around the lighted kitchen, the watchdogs still bayed at
the east; but no messenger came to bring news of the fighting and Mrs.
Scarborough lingered on and on. At last the shooting stopped and the
hounds challenged a galloping rider, who stayed to eat and then spurred
away; and as midnight approached the house quieted down and a form came
silently up the path.

It was Allifair, her few clothes tied up in a bundle, turning nervously
to look back at the house; and as Hall rose to meet her she ran to his
arms and burst into long-repressed tears.

"Oh, that woman!" she sobbed, "if she wasn't my own aunt----" And then
she fell to weeping. "But anyway," she went on, "Bill and Winchester
got away, and two or three men got shot. They're looking for them
everywhere, and I suppose the trails will be watched--do you think we
can get past their guards?"

"We can try," answered Hall, "that is, if you wish. But perhaps it
would be better if I came back for you later, when the excitement has
kind of died down. You could hardly stand the journey now; this day has
been too much."

"Yes, it has," she acknowledged, sinking down on the ground and
pillowing her head against his breast, "and yet--we are always putting
it off. Back home we could have married, but you had to build our cabin
first; and now--well, where could we go?"

"I don't know," answered Hall, "because I'm a stranger in this
country--I only know one trail out. And that trail will be guarded; so
perhaps, after all----"

"But you'll come back soon, won't you?" she murmured wearily. "I'm
afraid I can't go now. The strain was too much for me, when I thought
you were dead--something seemed to snap in my brain. But now listen,
dear, please don't join in this fighting. Will you always remember me
first? And think of our kinsfolk back there in Kentucky--and of all our
happiness, too. Think how happy we could be if we were married at last
and back in our own mountains again; and the Randolphs and McIvors,
after all these years----"

She stopped and sat bolt upright, a nervous tremor running through
her, for Mrs. Scarborough had risen up before them. She held a pistol
in one hand and behind her followed a dog which bristled at McIvor and
growled.

"Put up those hands!" she commanded, pointing her pistol at him
threateningly. "And so you're Hall McIvor! Well, let me tell you, Mr.
McIvor, your father killed my brother and he killed my sister's son,
too. You're nothing but a murderer and if you make the least move I'm
going to shoot you dead. And before I'll let Allifair marry a son of
Bland McIvor I'll shoot her down in her tracks!"

She towered above them, like a witch in the starlight, and as Allifair
broke down and gave way to tears, Hall lifted her gently up.

"You don't need that pistol," he said to Miz Zoolah, "because no man
that claims to be a gentleman ever raised his hand against a woman. I
never have, and I never will."

"Yes, there you go again," she burst out vindictively, "I ought to have
known it was you. Was there ever a McIvor that didn't have the same
twaddle about his 'honor,' and being a gentleman? Well, what kind of
honor is it when a grown man like your father shoots down my sister's
boy? He was just a child, hardly fourteen years old----"

"Yes, but he shot at my father twice. And a boy, Mrs. Scarborough, can
pull just as hard on a trigger as a man that's forty years old."

"Well, if that isn't a McIvor!" she burst out, laughing spitefully,
"but I'll fix you, here and now. You put that fool down and march back
to the house--I'll turn you over to Isham."

"You know he'll kill me," replied Hall, suddenly stepping away from
Allifair, and Zoolah raised her voice.

"Yes, and _I'll_ kill you!" she yelled, "you miserable murderer! Go on,
now--step off down that path!"

He hesitated, for his hot Southern blood was up, and Allifair sprang at
her aunt.

"Run!" she cried, striking the gun aside, and Hall made a jump into the
darkness. The dog, which had been watching him, rushed in and grabbed
his leg; but McIvor turned and kicked him off and as Miz Zoolah began
to shoot he plunged down the hill and was gone.




CHAPTER XV

THE CASTLE IN THE AIR


When a man flees for safety it is seldom into the unknown, for that
is always fearful. Nine times out of ten he heads for some old
stamping-ground, and generally he heads for home. Hall McIvor was lost
in a country so wild that not even a wagon-track entered it; four
trails led in and out and he took the one he knew, the one that went to
Tonto. It was night, but he had a horse that knew the way, or at least
that could follow a trail; and at the first flush of dawn he spurred
down Jump-Off Point and splashed into Turkey Creek. Then he rode
without stopping until, at Cold Spring, his horse threw up its head and
quit. Hall was back where his troubles had begun.

At this same spot, not a month before, Isham Scarborough and Red
had held him up and charged him with being a Bassett. Now the month
had passed and he _was_ a Bassett, and the Scarboroughs would be
hot on his trail; and if they caught him again the hangman's knot
in the cliff-dwelling would be something more than a grim joke. The
Scarboroughs were desperate; they had tried to kill off the Bassetts as
they would stamp out a nest of rattlesnakes; but the most dangerous
one had escaped, leaving his mark on three of them, and they would
ride like the wind to cut him off. And, next after Winchester and the
impetuous Bill, they would seek for Hall McIvor. Miz Zoolah would see
to that, now that she knew he was Allifair's lover, and Isham would
shoot him on sight. He looked around anxiously, casting about for some
hiding place, and his eyes came to rest on a cliff-dwelling.

It was stuck like a swallow's nest in a hole in the rocks, high up
against the base of the crag; and there, though he would have neither
food nor water, he would find shelter from his enemies. For that very
purpose the ancient cliff-dwellers had built it there, and every steep
trail and close-built rampart had been constructed with the idea of
defense. Yet if he left his horse below they would know he was hiding
near and hunt him down like a rabbit--he mounted again and spurred on
down the trail until once more he came to the creek. There he loosened
the horse's saddle and set him free, stepping off into the running
water.

The trail itself had struck over a long point which came down from
Baker Mountain to the west and he turned up the creek-bed, stepping
from stone to stone, until he had made his way back to Cold Spring.
Then he waded up the torrent which rushed down from the cliffs and
as he ducked under the wild grapevines his feet fell into a natural
pathway, worn deep along the sides of the chasm. It was an ancient
trail, half obliterated by cloudbursts and the rush of tumbling
waters, but as it led up higher and the chasm widened out, Hall had a
feeling that it was leading him somewhere. Not to the dwelling beneath
the crag, for that was far to the left, but to some sanctuary where he
might take shelter with Allifair. But the trail split and was lost in a
maze of huge boulders and he found himself up on the bench.

Behind him rose the cliffs, terrace above terrace of shattered
porphyry, but already his pursuers were in the canyon below--four
Texans and hard-riding Isham. He watched them from the rim as they went
whipping down the trail, then settled back and waited grimly. Down the
creek-bed they galloped, then up and over the point and down once more
into the creek; but as they saw his horse grazing they wheeled and took
cover, dropping off to reconnoiter on foot. For half an hour or more
their heads bobbed up as they crept along the bank of the stream and
then in disgust they strode down to the water and gathered about his
horse. He smiled as he saw them cutting circles for sign--they were
trying to find his tracks; but he had covered them too well and after
hunting for several hours they came back and camped at Cold Spring.

From his lookout among the crags Hall could hear their loud arguments,
and their guesses at where he had gone; he could see their food, almost
smell the can of coffee that they boiled over the mesquite coals; but
still he lingered, eating acorns to stay his hunger, until at last
they mounted and rode on. More than one had shrewdly guessed that
he was around there somewhere, but the brush was so thick as to make
pursuit hopeless and they were loath to work on foot. So they went
away and left him, agreeing to ride the trail first, and Hall began to
think about food. On the bench to which he had mounted the grass stood
knee-high and there were deer and bear tracks everywhere, but one shot
from his rifle would bring the Scarboroughs back so he prowled through
the oaks after turkey. They were there by the hundred, fat gobblers who
just escaped him and hens that ran like lightning through the brush;
but as he pursued a brood of young ones he discovered a nest of eggs
and the food question, for the moment, was solved. The eggs were still
fresh, and, after eating one raw, he hastened back to his lookout.

Already a feeling of security had come over him and as he waited for
their return he worked busily on a turkey trap, which he planned to set
at a spring. First he cut some long sticks, to make the top and sides,
and then with limber switches he wattled them together, and at evening
he took them down to the spring. It lay in the bottom of a brushy
gulch and the turkey tracks led down to it everywhere. Cutting out a
space above the spring he planted his wattled cage firmly; and then,
digging a trench to lead the turkeys up and under it, he staked off
the entrance inside. That was all it was, a fenced trench and a cage,
but if any turkey strayed into it and lifted his head he would try,
turkey-like, to find a hole between the slats instead of stooping down
to pass out at the hole. Hall concealed the trap with brush and strewed
acorns along the trench; and then, as no turkeys came, he built wings
leading up to it and hid himself in the oak trees below.

There was a loud gobble from the hillside, the anxious _quilp-quilp_
of a hen, and the great birds leapt out and came sailing down through
the air to land with a thump by the spring. For a moment they crouched
frozen as they saw the wings of the trap, but no one had ever hunted
them and they soon recovered from their alarm while still others soared
down from the heights. An old hen with her little ones came trailing up
from the chasm, and Hall watched them with bated breath; but as even
these refused to go near his trap he rose up and made a rush. The hen
dodged away, calling loudly to her brood, but in the stampede which
followed he drove three of them into the wings and up the trench into
the trap. That evening he ate meat, and when the morning came he set
out to explore his domain.

The chasm up which he had come cut its way through the crags to a
level mountain-top far beyond; and that, according to Meshackatee, was
preempted by Old Man Baker, who claimed the whole mountain for himself.
Since the Indians had killed his son, no Apache dared venture up there;
and Hall made up his mind to follow their example, for Baker had shot
every Indian on sight. There was game enough and to spare on the first
low bench; and farther up the canyon he discovered a hidden basin,
where the deer and wild turkey swarmed. But what he sought for most was
a hiding place among the cliffs, which would shelter him and his mate;
and he clambered along the bear-track which led off around the point to
the first of the dizzy cliff-dwellings.

It proved to be no more than some walls of broken rock, piled up in
a shelving hole; and house after house, as he inspected them closer,
turned out to be nothing but skeletons. Most of them had no roofs,
they were all hard to get to and entirely too far from water; and the
trails that led up to them made it absolutely certain that he would
be seen going to and fro. There was only one place which would answer
his purpose and it was like an eagle's nest above him. Within a great,
arching cave, high up in the cliff, there stood a huge dwelling, with
doors and windows sealed and a rampart across its front. It was a
medieval castle, transported from dreamland and set like a jewel in
the cliff. At the extreme southern side there was a rift in the solid
roof that gave promise of a possible descent; but the path which led
up to it, if path there ever was, had vanished with the passing of the
centuries. Perhaps it had caved off and was buried in the talus which
extended along the base of the precipice; but there his castle stood,
aloof and unapproachable, whichever way he came.

The days passed and he became a wild animal, prowling the hillside
like a mountain lion as he stalked the young turkeys or sought the
hidden way to his castle. He knew it must be there, some cave or hidden
passageway, for the rift from above had turned out a mere crack down
which a rat could hardly crawl. He sickened of the taste of eggs and
broiled turkeys, and of acorns ground up and boiled; yet the sight of
that dwelling, high up above the canyon, held him on from day to day.
It was a haven of refuge, if he could only reach it--and he knew there
must be a path to it somewhere.

From the bench below he often stood and looked up at it, trying to
imagine where the path might have passed; and at last he went back and
began to explore the chasm, for there could be no other way to the
cave. Above, below and far to the south of the dwelling the cliff rose
sheer and smooth; but the gateway to the chasm was not so far from the
castle that it could not give entrance from the side. Already he had
threaded the narrow pathway that led up the bed of the stream; but now
he climbed higher and, from the opposite side, looked across for some
suggestion of a trail. The canyon wall was steep but not too steep; in
places he almost imagined he saw a trail--a row of cat-steps here, a
stretch of natural stairs, an ascent from shelf to shelf. But of what
value was an ascent if it took him to no passageway--what he sought
was a way to the cave. He lay idly in the shade, gazing across at the
canyon wall, and as the silence came back he saw a shadow move down
the stream-bed, pause stealthily and move again. Then, etched against
the granite, a huge mountain-lion stood out, tawny red and almost
invisible until it moved.

He looked on, still idly, for not since he had come there had he
ventured to fire a shot; and the lion, which had been hiding from him,
started stealthily up the path that he had been tracing from shelf
to shelf. He padded softly up the cat-steps, took the stairs at a
bound--and disappeared in a high, narrow crack. A half hour later Hall
followed in his footsteps and at the mouth of his cave he received the
last assurance that the pathway led to the castle. A cool wind breathed
out of it, tainted with the strong musk of lions; and where could it
come from but there?

He turned back eagerly to gather pitch-pine from a piñon stump; then
entered, holding the torch like a club. There was a rustle before him,
an uneasy growl, the flash of startled eyes; but still they fled on
and he followed through the darkness until he saw a cleft of light
overhead. It merged into an orifice that let in a soft glow and the
vision of a skulking form; and then the invisible path, which had held
his feet through the darkness, took him out into blinding day. He
was standing in the court of his castle in the air and the lion was
crouching by the door.




CHAPTER XVI

THERE'S ALWAYS A WAY


Every window and door of the cliff-dwellers' castle had been sealed
against man and beast--the mountain lion was at bay and as he crouched
down to spring Hall shot him through the head. He leapt into the
air and fell kicking on his back and the man took possession of his
den. That was the way he had learned of getting what he wanted, and
the castle had been his dream. But the doors had been walled up and
plastered over with mud a thousand years before and he hesitated to
break them in. Perhaps within those walls there lay the bones of
chiefs, with their weapons close to their hands; and after the passage
of the centuries it seemed an impious thing to break in and disturb
their ancient dust. The court alone was large enough to give him room
to live and the whole world lay at his feet.

At the crack of his rifle the echoes of Deadman Canyon had awakened
from their week-long sleep; they bandied it back and forth, from cliff
to distant cliff, the news that a man was there. Hall stood at the
rampart and gazed up and down the canyon, and far away to the east;
and as he watched he saw a horseman drop down into a ravine and ride
for the Scarborough's stalking-ground. The rifle-shot had drawn him
from a dim trail miles away, so keen had been his ears, and as he edged
out on a point and crept forward to observe the spring Hall knew he
was one of the man-killers. For an hour and more he scouted about the
water, but when at last he stepped out into the open Hall saw at a
glance it was Meshackatee.

There was the same huge bulk, the same battered hat, the jumper and the
bulging chaps; and the horse which had blended into the landscape like
a deer was the buckskin pony, Croppie. Yes, the man was Meshackatee;
but what was his mission there, and why did he keep hid in the brush?
A cold hand seemed to take McIvor by the throat--perhaps he was
hunting for him! Although their relations had been friendly for the
short time they were together, since then Meshackatee had had plenty
of occasion to regret the trust he had bestowed. Instead of spying
upon the Bassetts, Hall had joined them against the Scarboroughs;
and later, when Meshackatee had sent him warning by Allifair, he had
turned the information against them. Yes, more than that, he had left
Meshackatee waiting down the creek while he stayed and did battle with
the Slash-knives.

Hall watched him from his eyrie as he studied the trail for signs and
finally retired to the cliff-dwellings, and then he went back through
the cold blackness of the tunnel to store his hiding-place with
food. What he feared most had happened, the first shot from his gun
had brought the man-hunters upon him. Perhaps they had been watching
through their high-powered glasses, or slipping down to look for
his tracks; but now they knew he was there--or at least Meshackatee
did--and there was nothing to do but to prepare for a siege. He ran
hurriedly to the turkey traps which he had set up the canyon and came
back with a pair of big birds; and then he went for acorns and filled
his one canteen with water from the ice-cold creek. By that time it
was dark and he returned to his lookout to await the next move of his
enemies.

All that evening he watched the flicker from Meshackatee's lurking
place, the loop-holed dwelling above the spring; but the fire was a
blind for in the morning Meshackatee came back, leading a pack-animal
down from the east. During the day he stayed close and Hall put in the
time by skinning the mountain lion. But as evening approached again
and none of the Scarboroughs rode in, his patience gave way before a
yearning for human society, a craving for companionship--and food. So
weary had he become of his perpetual turkey diet that he had broiled
a steak from the haunch of the panther, and found it far from bad.
But he could not live forever without coffee and salt; and, since he
must make a move some time, he decided to make it right then and put
Meshackatee's friendship to the test.

As darkness fell he crept down the gloomy chasm and waded across the
creek; and then, with a stealthiness that not even an Indian could
excel, he stalked Meshackatee's camp. He had retired within the
cliff-dwelling, trusting to the watchfulness of his dog more than
to any special vigilance of his own; and when Hall peered through
the doorway he saw him sitting by the fire, deeply engaged in some
mechanical task. In one hand he held a small bow with its string wound
round a shaft which seemed to twirl in his grasp like a drill, and in
the other he held some object that gleamed in the firelight and looked
like a .45 cartridge. The dog 'Pache lay asleep on the far side of the
fire, there was a whirring noise from the drill; and when Meshackatee
looked up Hall was standing in the doorway with a questioning look in
his eye. If Meshackatee noticed the rifle, held negligently at the hip,
he concealed his knowledge well.

"Hello there!" he hailed, and the dog sprang up barking, his hair
bristling forward with rage. "Aw, shut up, now, 'Pache!" rebuked
Meshackatee indignantly, "you're a hell of a watch-dog, I swow! Come
in, Hall; come in! Been looking for you everywhere! Shut up, you whelp,
or I'll warp ye!"

He reached for a stick and the dog retired growling, skinning his teeth
at the disturber of his dreams.

"Kinder startled him," explained Meshackatee, as Hall stepped inside,
but McIvor spoke to the point.

"You've been looking for me?" he inquired. "Well, let's come to an
understanding--are you still in the employ of the Scarboroughs?"

"Hell--no!" burst out Meshackatee with explosive emphasis, "I quit 'em
two weeks ago. Their work got too raw for _me_."

"Then we can be friends," suggested Hall, holding out his hand and
Meshackatee rose up and took it.

"You're whistling!" he said, "and I guess mebby you need one--how long
since you had a square meal?"

"Well, some time," admitted Hall, "but tell me, first of all, have you
heard any news from Allifair?"

"Ye-es," returned Meshackatee, "she's still with the Scarboroughs. I
sent an Injun in last week to look around. He said there was lots of
cowboys, and two womenfolks cooking, and the cowboys was rounding up
stock. But I heard from other sources that Miz Zoolah has written home
and told Allifair's brothers to come out."

"What--to get her?"

"Or you!" hinted Meshackatee grimly, and Hall nodded his head
regretfully.

"I was afraid of it," he added. "Cal and Ewing are hard men--we've had
several encounters already."

"Well, the word I git is that the Scarboroughs are sending everywhere
to hire all the gunmen they can. And, since they've killed Sharps and
old Henry Bassett, they've come right out into the open. Everybody
always knew they had a weakness for stray stock, but now they've
joined a gang that works in three states and steals horses from plumb
down in Texas. That judge down in Tonto that give the Maverick Basin
boys a tip to settle their differences with a Winchester--well, he
claims he never said it, but he sure played merry hell, because the
wrong outfit is coming out on top. Them ranchers down on the Verde and
clean to Geronimo are making an awful howl, and this gang of Texas
horse-thieves is driving their stock off by the hundreds and running
them up into the Basin. It's a regular hold-out, a horse-thieves'
exchange, where Arizona horses are traded into Texas and Texas broncs
swopped the other way. I been down in Tonto and the folks is all het up
over it--some talk of a Vigilance Committee, and so forth."

He paused and as Hall stared moodily into the fire Meshackatee reached
over and picked up a coffee-pot.

"I'll cook you a little grub," he volunteered briskly, and Hall came
back from his dreams.

"Of course," went on Meshackatee, having won his attention, "this
business don't mean much to _you_. All you want is your girl and----"

"Yes, but how am I to get her?" demanded McIvor fiercely.

"Well----" began Meshackatee, and then he stopped. "Of course there's
always a way."

"How do you mean?" inquired Hall, as he failed to elucidate, but
Meshackatee only mumbled in his beard.

"Drink some coffee," he said; "git some grub under your belt. A man is
a mouse when he's starved."

He heated up some bread and a kettle of beans and cut a can of fruit,
and when Hall had eaten Meshackatee took up the discussion exactly
where he had let it drop.

"There's always a way," he nodded impressively, "provided you've got
the nerve. Them Texans are ranicky, I'll admit that from the start, and
Isham has turned plumb bad. Always thought he was a blow-hard, a big
bag of wind, but the scoundrel has turned out a killer. I'm nothing but
a gunman, or that's what they call me, and I can't say I'm squeamish
a bit. When them sheepmen come in I was in the fore-front of the
battle--might have killed one or two of 'em myself. And furthermore,
when they hired Paine and them Slash-knife boys to ride in and clean up
on the Bassetts--I could stand for that stuff, too. It was rough, but
they had a fighting chance. But this downright murdering, like shooting
Old Henry and leaving Sharps out for the hogs--well, right there was
where I quit. But I didn't quit quick enough--that Isham had gone bad,
and he damned nigh got my skelp."

He rumpled his hair thoughtfully and shook his head at the fire. "You
never can tell," he said.

"Did he attempt to kill you?" asked McIvor, but Meshackatee shrugged it
away.

"Never mind," he grumbled, "that's between him and me. But lemme give
you a tip--if you meet up with Isham you go for your gun right now. But
you won't meet nobody--that ain't the way they fight; the first thing
you meet will be a forty-five explosive bullet--they're fighting from
cover entirely. I've been down to Tonto talking with the sheriff of the
county and a few other old _compadres_ of mine, and it's the consensus
of opinion that Maverick Basin is going to be damned on-healthy.
Especially for officers and such. At the same time, as I said, there's
always a way----"

"Well, what is that way?" broke in McIvor impatiently. "Are you
thinking of going back?"

"I might be," admitted Meshackatee, "but I heard a gun down here
yesterday, and I thought mebbe it might be Isham. He's the _hombre_
I'm gunning for, to tell you the truth, and so I've been watching the
trail. And in the meantime, while my time was idle on my hands, I've
been fixing up some more of these."

He picked up one of the cartridges upon which he had been working and
McIvor examined it critically. A hole had been bored into the heart of
the lead bullet and a smaller cartridge neatly imbedded.

"One of them explosive bullets," boasted Meshackatee shamelessly; "I
claim to have invented 'em, myself. A twenty-two blank, set exactly in
the middle of it, and the minute she hits something--zingo! she blows
up like a bomb. Maybe you saw how they worked when we were chowsing
them sheep? Well, the Scarboroughs are shooting them at _men_."

"I know that," nodded McIvor, "but you spoke of some plan."

"Oh, sure," replied Meshackatee, "well, what I had in mind was to go
back and try these on _them_."

"And then?"

"Well, take to the brush; out-Injun 'em if we can--I'll admit it's
kinder resky."

"I see," murmured Hall, and fell silent again while Meshackatee watched
him narrowly.

"Of course," went on Meshackatee, "there's a hell-scad of them
Texans----"

"That don't worry me a bit," put in McIvor abruptly. "I've been doing
this kind of fighting all my life. But I promised Miss Randolph I'd
keep out of this trouble and I aim to make my word good. At the same
time, if the Scarboroughs have sent for her brothers----"

"They sure have!" affirmed Meshackatee, "and I'll tell you how I know
it. One of them neutrals came out to buy 'em some cartridges and
he showed me the letter himself. It was addressed to Cal Randolph,
somewhere back in Kentucky----"

"That's all right," interrupted McIvor, "I believe you. It's only a
question of whether I can get her away before her brothers arrive.
Because of course you must see that I'm sure to lose her if I shoot Cal
or Ewing now. I've simply got to disappear the moment they arrive and
stay hid until they go home."

"Well, we can fix it to git her," spoke up Meshackatee at length, "or
at least we can make a try. But the first thing to do is to bushwack
old Isham and put the fear of God in their hearts. They're riding the
hills in bands, or so they tell me, out gunning for Winchester and
young Bill; and there's a bunch of them Bassett neutrals that'll soon
have to move if some one don't tap off Isham. But here's one _hombre_,
I'm telling you, that ain't skeered of them _all_--if I can jest git
one man for a pardner. A man has got to sleep, and that's where they
ketch you, unless you happen to have a pardner to keep watch."

"That is true," agreed Hall, "and I'd be more than pleased to join you
if it were not for my promise to Allifair. But under the circumstances,
Meshackatee----"

"What, do you mean to say," burst out Meshackatee provocatively, "that
you're going to let Isham git away with it? Didn't he try to shoot you
down the same time he killed Sharps, and leave you lay for the hogs?
Didn't he shoot at your girl when she run out to save you and all but
kill her too? I was under the impression----"

"Just a moment," broke in Hall, looking him straight in the eye, "I
believe in telling the truth. Back in Kentucky, where I come from, a
man who would attack a woman would be run out of the country over
night--and his own family would do their part--but I have promised my
intended not to join in on this feud, unless by so doing I can save
her. But before we go any further--why is it, my friend, that you are
so keen for this desperate adventure? As I said before, I believe in
telling the truth----"

"Well--_there_ then!" exclaimed Meshackatee, throwing back his
shirt and revealing a small star underneath, "I'm a deputy sheriff,
that's why. The sheriff and all his deputies was afraid to come in
here--leastwise they wouldn't none of 'em come--and I told 'em, gimme
a badge and ten dollars a day and I'd go in and git him myself. Yes,
Isham--he's the man--and I figger on shooting him on sight. When I quit
and called for my pay he told me to go to hell or he'd fill me full
of lead; and then, by grab, he made his brag before them Texans that
he'd helped do this job on my ears. Well, if he _did_ he's the very,
identical rascal I'm looking for; and it's him or me, that's all. Now,
the cards are on the table and you can join in or pull out--if you
stick you're a deputy sheriff."

"I'll stick," flashed back McIvor, and Meshackatee grabbed his hand. "I
knowed it!" he said, and laughed.




CHAPTER XVII

INDIAN TACTICS


It was a failing of McIvor's, this instant response to the call of
any friend for aid; and yet when Meshackatee laid his plans before
him he was glad he had agreed to join him. For Meshackatee above all
things was a man of action; and action, with Hall, was a necessity. All
the days he had spent prowling in the hills like an animal had been
wasted, as he looked back at them now; for Allifair's brothers would
come, and come soon, if only to kill a McIvor. They were hard men to
deal with, or had proved so to him, and there was many an old score
that might be settled even yet if they could pick up his trail again.
He had been lost before, given up for dead by his parents and the men
of both clans; but this call from their aunt, and their sister's love
affair, would bring them from wherever they lurked. And now, unless he
was willing to see her snatched away, he must strike a last blow to win
Allifair.

"No, I'll tell you," expounded Meshackatee, "they's no use doing
anything until we've throwed the hooks into Isham. He's the leader
of the gang and as long as he's there you can't git away with that
girl. He's got men on the trails, and Injun spies out everywhere, to
say nothing of them organized horse-thieves; and whichever way you
ride he's going to reach out and git you--unless, of course, you git
him. Now here's the proposition, and I'll put it to you straight, jest
exactly as it was put up to me. We're deputy sheriffs, see, drawing ten
dollars per diem to serve these here warrants on the Scarboroughs; but
I've been told unofficially that the county'll be jest as well pleased
if they're killed while resisting arrest. The idee is to git 'em to
resist. Tonto County, as I understand it, has got jest enough money to
pay for deputies, but none for expensive court proceedings. When it
comes to a showdown, the Scarborough outfit has got more money than the
county--and you know what these lawyers are like. But that ain't our
business, we're here to serve these warrants, and I'm going to start in
on Isham.

"Now there's a man, Mr. Hall, that I thought I knowed well and I always
claimed he was a coward. It jest shows how you sometimes git fooled.
When it comes to a showdown that jasper always weakened, but it was
jest because he was foxy. He knowed if he drawed the other feller would
git him, and so he never drawed. He hired gunmen to do his fighting
because gunmen was cheap and he wanted to keep out of jail; but when
them Slash-knife boys fell down he seen right there he'd have to do
his dirty work himself. That was the time when the dog-hair cropped
out on him and I seen, by grab, he was a killer. Not a gun-fighter,
mind ye--and they're dangerous enough--but one of these sneaking,
calculating kind. He fights like the A-paches, never showing a head and
always shooting from ambush; and the only way we'll git him is to go
him one better--we've got to out-Injun him, that's all!"

"I'm ready," replied Hall. "Why not start right now?" And Meshackatee
took him at his word.

They headed off east up the dim, Indian trail that Meshackatee had
followed down to water; and as the stars wheeled in their courses Hall
saw their direction change until at last they were going northwest.
They had scrambled up a wash and then on up grassy slopes which led to
the big ridge behind; and from there they had turned north, following
a trail that dipped and twisted as it skirted the east slope of Turkey
Creek. They rode and walked by turns, driving the pack-animal before
them; and as the east began to flush they took to high ground and
camped through the long, sultry day.

The summer heat was at its height, the close, oppressive heat that
presages torrential rains to come; and from the top of their butte they
could see the white thunderheads, riding majestically up above the
Rim. Below them lay the canyon with Turkey Creek at its bottom and,
still further northwest, the broad swales of Maverick Basin showed
dimly through a pass in the hills. Hall looked it all over through
Meshackatee's big glasses, when it came his turn to stand guard; and
then he looked back along the trail which they had followed, trying to
fix every landmark in his mind. For if all went well the time would
soon come when he would be fleeing through the night with Allifair; and
every butte and ridge, every turn in that dim trail, must be stamped
indelibly on his memory. He traced it out again, noting each landmark
through his glasses, and then suddenly he picked up an Indian. He had
stepped out from some scrub-oaks and was examining their tracks, where
they had passed through a sandy swale, and as he disappeared into the
brush Hall ran and wakened Meshackatee, but the Apache did not show
himself again.

"He's down in some gulch," observed Meshackatee sagely, "probably
legging it to take the news to Isham. Two white men, one on foot; and
two horses, one drove ahead; and a dog--well, that will be Meshackatee.
And the man on foot--the chances are good that Isham will guess it's
you. Well, watch along Turkey Creek and if you see any one crossing,
wake me up and we'll make a quick move."

Hall watched and as the day wore on towards evening he saw what
Meshackatee had feared. Six horsemen in single file came trotting down
the creek, half-hidden behind the tall brush; but when Meshackatee came
the enemy had vanished again and the trails were bare--too bare.

"We'll move," stated Meshackatee, "as soon as it's dark; and if you're
game, I am--we'll ride across country and try to come out at the Rock
House. Might as well head for the place we're going to, even if I don't
know the way none too well."

"All right," agreed Hall, "and if we find cover in time I'll slip down
and spy on the house."

"Bad business," grumbled Meshackatee, "don't like this a little bit.
Them cowboys are out for our hair."

They remained at the lookout until it was dark and then, packing
swiftly, struck out to the west, following cow-trails clear to the
creek. There they watered their horses and started up the other side;
but the canyon which they ascended boxed up near the summit and they
had to return to the creek. Meshackatee's plans had gone awry, putting
him in a very bad humor; but after thinking it over he moved up a side
canyon and took shelter on a bench above the stream.

Here they tied out their horses in a narrow cove which was surrounded
on three sides by wooded slopes; and then, with his dog sleeping
against his back, Meshackatee sprawled out and went to sleep. But the
failure of their plans had left McIvor uneasy--he did not approve
of this camp above the trail; and as morning approached he rose up
silently and felt his way down to the stream. This was the hour that he
dreaded, just before the break of day, and he crept along the ground
regardless of the dew which weighed down the heavy grass.

There had been noises in the night and 'Pache had growled repeatedly,
some wild cattle had jumped suddenly and fled; and as he drew near
the water he noticed that the grass had been trampled on the opposite
side of the stream. He slipped down closer, hardly stirring a twig
as he moved, and the first flush of dawn showed men's tracks in the
sand--and the dew had been knocked from the grass! He lay silent, his
heart thumping; there was a stir across the creek, a stir and the hunch
of a head. That was enough--he glided away like a rattlesnake, and
Meshackatee woke up with a jump. They were surrounded--he knew that
from the look in Hall's eyes--and, catching up his gun from the fold of
his blanket, he rolled over behind a big rock.

"Where are they at?" he whispered, and when Hall told him he grunted
and began to pile up rocks. Hall dug in also, making a loop-hole
through which to shoot and laying out his cartridges in rows; and
'Pache, sensing the enemy, crouched down anxiously between them,
growling low and sniffing the wind. A deathlike silence fell upon the
narrow canyon as they settled back to wait for the attack; but not a
bush stirred--the Scarboroughs were still hoping they would saddle up
and ride down the hill. Ride up to their very guns and then with one
volley they could snuff out their lives together. But their ambush had
been detected and now Meshackatee and Hall were searching the brushy
hillside for a target.

"No use," complained Meshackatee, "they must've heard us digging. Let's
start something, before they scatter out."

He took off his old hat and stuck it on a stick and as it bobbed above
the boulder an explosive bullet struck it, spattering the ground about
them with lead. 'Pache yelped as it struck him and cringed down beside
Meshackatee who was cursing at the hole in his hat; and then Hall saw
a movement below the smoke puff and answered with a shot that drew a
volley. The whole hillside seemed to belch forth smoke, but the bullets
for the most part went high; the Scarboroughs were below them, hidden
away among the boulders which had fallen from the rimrock above.

"They can't reach us," chuckled Meshackatee, snuggling up to his
loop-hole and shooting back at the smoke; but a crash from behind
brought them both to a right-about and raised a cheer from below. The
explosive bullets had stampeded their pack-horse and they were just
in time to see him go smashing through the brush and fall into the
creek-bed below.

"Makes no difference," grumbled Meshackatee, "don't need him now,
nohow--be lucky to git out of here afoot."

Hall made no comment but down in his heart he agreed with Meshackatee
fully--they would be lucky to get out alive. Behind them the steep
slopes were sparsely covered with timber, but not enough to protect
them in their flight; and the sound of the firing would bring the whole
Scarborough clan to make their position worse. It was a dangerous
place to be, and yet not more dangerous than others where he had
been compelled to make a stand. And he had often observed that, where
both sides were shooting from cover, it was seldom that any one was
hurt. Only one thing was necessary--they must maintain their position
until darkness should cover up their flight. He peeped out through
his loop-hole, shooting warily at stray smoke-puffs, and they settled
themselves for the siege.

But the men that they were fighting were not satisfied to wait, they
had other strings to their bow; and as Hall and Meshackatee lay behind
their rock shelter a bullet struck between them.

"Judas Priest!" exclaimed Meshackatee, as his dog ran off yelping;
and then, seeing the smoke from a point across the creek he hastily
changed his front. Hall piled up rocks before them, but Meshackatee lay
watching, and when the next bullet came he shot.

"Behind that big boulder," he said. "You watch me smoke him out of
that."

"Haven't got time," answered Hall, but Meshackatee did not smile--he
was slipping an explosive cartridge into his gun. He thrust out his
rifle and lay sighting along the barrel and at a puff from the boulder
he fired. Another bullet struck their rock-pile, and dangerously
near; but the man behind the boulder leapt up as if he were shot and
Hall saw that it was an Indian. He darted off along the hillside with
Meshackatee still shooting at him, and at the second shot he fell. But
even when he was down Meshackatee shot him again and the Indian lay a
huddle in the sun.

"I'll show you!" muttered Meshackatee, "you doggoned rat-eater. You're
the _hombre_ that's been raising all this hell. Well, see how you like
that, and mebbe the rest of them A-paches will learn to lay off of
Meshackatee."

He turned to Hall and nodded triumphantly.

"What'd I tell ye?" he said. "Did you see me smoke him out? Busted
a big explosive bullet on that rock jest behind him and burned him
up with hot lead. But I knowed, by grab, no Teehanno could bushwack
me--they've gone and hired A-paches."

"There's another one!" exclaimed Hall, as another plunging shot came
over the top of their fort; and Meshackatee grabbed for his cartridges.

"Better git out of here," he said, and was turning to scuttle away
when a rifle opened up down the creek. It was shooting fast and almost
rhythmically, and another lighter gun joined in; then there was a
tattoo of answering shots, trailing off into silence as the fighters
emptied their magazines.

"What's that?" asked Hall, and Meshackatee shook his head--he was
watching the rocky hill. Something moved among the boulders, his rifle
roared out again; and as a tall Texan broke to run they both opened
fire. He dropped his gun and ran on.

"They're all going!" exclaimed Hall, turning to shoot into the
creek-bed; and now there was no answer as with harrying shots they
followed the flight of the bush-whackers. Whoever they were they were
fleeing in a panic--the battle had been won, but by whom?




CHAPTER XVIII

"I CLAIM RED"


They waited, these two men who had dared invade the Scarborough
stronghold and, daring, had almost paid the price, and Meshackatee
raised a hail.

"Wa-a--hooo!" he called, and as his big voice woke the echoes there was
an answering yell from below. A man, invisible as a spotted fawn when
it walks in the shadow of leaves, came rustling up the canyon, and at
last he spoke from the hill.

"Wahoo yourself!" he challenged, "who the hell are you fellers, anyway?"

"I'm Meshackatee," returned that gentleman, "and here's Mr. Hall----"

"Oh, Hall, eh?" spoke up the voice. "This is Winchester Bassett. Come
down, boys, and I'll stake you to a horse."

They crept down through the shadows and met him at the creek, still
smiling but without his jaunty air. A thick growth of black beard made
his face look deathly pale, his clothes were hanging in shreds, and as
he wrung Hall's hand he had a wild look in his eyes though he tried to
conceal it with a smile.

"Well, well, Hall," he said, "I'm sure glad to see you. And you,
too, Meshackatee--how are you? But say, we'd better go, because the
Scarboroughs will be back and we don't want to git caught in this
brush. Heard you shooting down here, and Bill and me took a chance--we
winged two of 'em and captured all their horses."

"I knowed it!" exclaimed Meshackatee, "I almost knowed that that was
you. They ain't many men, I'll say, that can work a Winchester that
fast----"

"I was named after it," grinned Winchester. "How're you fixed for
ammunition?"

"Whole pack-load!" answered Meshackatee. "Thought you boys might be
short. Come on, let's go bring it down."

They caught their frightened horses and threw on the packs while
Winchester turned back to join Bill; but when they arrived they found
the Bassetts in a rock-pile, for much bush-whacking had got on their
nerves.

"Help yourselves, boys," invited Winchester, waving his hand at the
Scarborough horses which were tied among the willows by the creek, "and
for cripes' sake, make it brief."

They mounted helter-skelter, driving the spare horses before them as
they dashed across the creek and away; but when they had put a mile
between themselves and the treacherous hillside Winchester held up his
hand for a halt.

"No rush now, fellers," he said, "we'll jest see what happens. And by
the way, what's the chances for a smoke?"

"Good!" beamed Meshackatee, "got lots of to-baccy--I knowed you boys
would be short."

"Oh, you did, eh?" observed Winchester, after rolling a quick smoke,
and he cocked his head at Bill.

"Yep, brought lo-ots of tobaccy," repeated Meshackatee hospitably, as
he began to unlash his pack. "I'll git you them cartridges now."

"Damned good of you," murmured Winchester, "but what's the big idee? I
ain't curious, I jest want to know."

"Oh, didn't I tell ye?" grinned Meshackatee, "me and Hall are deputy
sheriffs!"

"The--hell!" scoffed Winchester, and Bill stopped smoking long enough
to feel for his gun.

"That's the fact," returned Meshackatee, "got warrants for the
Scarboroughs. Want you and Bill to help serve 'em."

There was a silence then as Winchester tugged at his mustache and
considered the possibilities of the case.

"Well, I'll tell you, Meshackatee," he said at last, "of course it's
all right but, after what's happened, Bill and I don't want 'em
arrested. We want to see 'em killed."

"No more'n natural," conceded Meshackatee, "but you understand there's
such a thing as the law. I can't shut my eyes to no such violations,
but--well, my orders, boys, is dead or alive. I reckon you understand."

"Uhr, that's different," replied 'Winchester, as Meshackatee winked at
him; but Bill was still in the dark.

"Yes--law!" he burst out, "a man get lots of protection from you deputy
sheriffs and such. Here them Scarboroughs have been chasing us like a
couple of wild animals for well-nigh onto a month----"

"Never mind, Bill," smiled Winchester, "don't you git the idee? We
serve these here warrants with a six-shooter."

"The Scarboroughs," put in Meshackatee, "is charged with first degree
murder, for killing your father and Sharps."

"Oh," nodded Bill, and sat in gloomy silence. "Well, gimme a star,
then," he said.

They rode on along the ridge, keeping well up above Turkey Creek and
watching for the Scarboroughs below; and, as no horsemen appeared, they
finally skirted the whole valley and came out in the hills above the
Basin. The ground here was open, with waving slopes of grass and timber
along the summits; and they made a camp among the oak trees, while they
staked out their horses and swept the plain with their field-glasses.
They had a pair apiece now, for the men who had ambushed them had left
all their glasses on their saddles; and as Meshackatee surveyed the
spoils he chuckled in his beard, for the day had not promised so well.

"Pretty slick, boys," he said, "two horses apiece now, and these
field-glasses are sure good for weak eyes. I feel it in my bones I'll
soon have a big posse--say, ain't that one of the Scarboroughs by the
house?"

"It's Red," responded Hall, "he's riding my horse. I'd know that little
roan anywhere."

"Remember that time when he tried to trade you out of him? Well, that's
Red--he's crazy about horses."

"Yes, and I'm crazy, too," said Hall, still watching him through his
glasses. "I'll bet you I get that horse back."

"How?" demanded Meshackatee, but Hall shrugged his shoulders.

"How does anybody get back a horse?" he asked.

"By cracky!" burst out Meshackatee, "that gives me an idee! Do you mean
you're going to steal 'im? Well, we'll pull a little Injun stuff, jest
to pay 'em for this morning, and I bet you we come pretty nigh gitting
_Red_!"

"Well, count me in on that," put in Winchester quietly. "It was Red
that shot the old man."

"I know this is good," said Meshackatee, "because I saw it pulled off
once myself. The A-paches danged near worked it on me. Instead of
stealing that horse, jest slip up and pull his picket-pin; and like any
horse he'll make for the hills. It ain't nature for a horse to stay
out on them flats--they always like to git up on high ground. Well, let
'im ramble till daylight and then see where he's gone to--and be there
when Red comes up."

"Let me do it!" clamored Bill, but Winchester brushed him aside.

"I'm the oldest," he said. "I claim Red."

"I'll release that horse myself," stated Hall. "If Red follows it,
that's nothing to me."

"Winchester's surest," decided Meshackatee. "But whoever takes this job
has got to do it my way."

"All right," agreed Winchester, his eyes suddenly a-gleam. "Go
ahead--what you want me to do?"

"I want you to rise up," said Meshackatee solemnly, "and say:
'Surrender, in the name of the law!'"

"He'll take that to hell with 'im," predicted Winchester grimly. "I
wish I could say it for Isham."

"That's my job," replied Meshackatee. "I claim Isham."

"You can have him," conceded Winchester, "if I don't git him first. But
what's your grievance against Isham?"

"Never mind," returned Meshackatee, "but I'm telling you right now--I
claim Isham Scarborough myself. That's what brought me back to these
parts."

"Well, we won't quarrel," smiled Winchester, and, going off by himself,
he began to pace up and down. "Come on," he said at last, "they're
watching us through their glasses. Let's saddle up and start off north.
We can come back after it's dark."

"Good idee," agreed Meshackatee, "but ain't they a cowardly bunch of
gun-toters--afraid to come out and fight the four of us!"

"That ain't the way they work it," said Winchester. "We'll give 'em a
dose of their own medicine. But honest, boys, I can't hardly wait to
git my gun on Red Scarborough."

They rode off slowly, keeping a scout before and behind to protect them
from possible surprise; and when it was dark they made their way across
Turkey Creek, taking shelter in the hills behind the store. From their
hiding place on the heights they could see the lights down at the Rock
House, and lanterns bobbing to and fro; and shortly after midnight,
armed only with his pistols, Hall McIvor set off on his quest. He
walked warily from the first, for the ambush of that morning had taught
him to fear the Apaches; but if they were skulking near he passed by
them unobserved and crept close to the silent Rock House.

For an hour he lay watching it, half-tempted to climb the Indian
mound and steal a secret interview with Allifair; but the hounds were
restless and noisy and the time had not come for him to jeopardize
her safety again. The Scarboroughs ruled the Basin with the power of
feudal barons, their retainers were on every trail; and until their
pride was broken, until they, too, had learned to fear, it was useless
to oppose their will. He crept closer through the damp grass to where
his high-headed roan, Blue, was nervously circling his stake, and when
it recognized him he worked its picket-pin loose and watched it as it
walked away. At first it started south, heading back towards its home;
but as the hounds rushed out barking it turned and circled west, still
dragging the rope and pin.

At the first peep of dawn they located Blue with their glasses,
standing stiffly at the foot of a hill; but as the sun rose and touched
him Blue woke from his trance-like sleep and moved up towards a point.
There following his horse nature he intended to stand, basking in the
sun until the chill was out of his limbs; after which he would fall to
feeding, enjoying his freedom to the full before his new master should
trail him from the plain. But already there was a man not a hundred
yards away waiting patiently with his rifle in his hands; and as Blue
raised his head and looked back towards the Rock House, Winchester saw
a lone man riding out. It was Red, riding bareback on a horse he had
picked up, following rapidly along the broad trail; and as he spied his
missing mount he cut straight across the valley, coming up the grassy
swale on the lope. Winchester crouched behind a bush and breathed on
his hands--his hour of vengeance had come.

Red rode up towards his horse, unconscious of any danger until a man
rose just below him, a man with a rifle in his hands.

"Surrender," he said, "in the name of the law!" But Red sat staring,
open-mouthed. Then he whirled his horse and Winchester shot him twice,
leaving him dead where he pitched to the ground.

"Here's your horse," he said, as he rode back to camp, and Hall took
the trembling Blue in silence.

"Good enough!" pronounced Meshackatee, and they started off north, for
the Scarboroughs were beginning to swarm.




CHAPTER XIX

APACHES


There cannot be a war without violence and bloodshed, nor can all the
losses be on one side. No matter which side is right, or which has the
strongest battalions, Death holds a level hand. The Scarboroughs had
killed Sharps and old Henry Bassett; but now the scales had turned and
Red, their finest rifle-shot, had been shot down by Winchester Bassett.
A posse of four men had ridden into their stronghold and offered to
give them battle; and then, when they had refused and held fast to
Indian tactics, Death had risen up and snatched away Red. Yet even with
the body of their brother before them the Scarboroughs declined to
fight.

No swarm of vengeful Texans came spurring on their trail as Meshackatee
led the way north, riding boldly up the trail which led like a highway
towards the Rim; and at the divide above Canyon Creek they stopped.
Here, though they were hidden in the pines, they could watch the trail
both ways; and it was time to cook coffee and rest. And if, as might
happen, any Scarborough men passed by, they could give them tit for
tat. For a month and more the Scarboroughs in their arrogance had held
up every wayfarer on this trail, and if a man did not belong to their
secret organization he was destined to proceed on foot. All this the
Bassetts knew, for the men who had given them shelter were the ones who
had suffered the most; and when, late in the afternoon, they spied a
horse-herd coming south they fairly romped to cover.

The horses, which were jaded from their long drive over the rocks,
came toiling up the zig-zag trail, and the posse let them pass; but
as the two Texans who were driving them came up with the drag they
sensed mischief and dashed back down the hill. Lead slugs and explosive
bullets struck the ground up all about them, and as they forded the
creek the Bassetts took after them while the others rounded up the
horses.

"Them's Mormon horses," declared Meshackatee, after they had stopped
them on a flat, "I know about half of them brands. We'll jest hold 'em
a while and see who shows up--may git some of these Texicans yet."

They went back to their lookout, leaving the horses to graze; and
almost immediately Bill and Winchester appeared, riding low and
spurring like mad.

"Injuns!" they yelled, as they scrambled up the point and dropped down
behind their rocks. "Apaches, as sure as hell!"

"Where at?" demanded Meshackatee. "Them A-paches ain't on the war-path,
and hain't been since the 'Pache Kid."

"Well, all right," panted Bill, "but I'll bet ye we seen twenty. And
when we run across 'em they chased us."

"There they are!" said Winchester, pointing to a string of half-naked
horsemen, "and if them ain't Apaches, I'm a liar."

"Leave 'em to me!" swaggered Meshackatee, "because that's where I
shine. We'll try 'em with a little sign-talk."

He stepped out on the point where he could be seen plainly from below
and raised his right hand in the peace sign.

"Wahoo!" he bellowed, "Wahoo Meshackatee!" But the Indians only circled
and stared at him. They were savage looking creatures, with their long
black hair bound back out of their eyes with red handkerchiefs; but
after a second look Meshackatee ripped out an oath and came striding
back to the posse.

"Aw, hell!" he exclaimed, "them ain't no Injuns. It's nothing but a
passel of white men."

"How do you know?" demanded Bill. "Jest because they don't savvy your
sign-language----"

"Aw, cripes; I know an Injun!" burst out Meshackatee indignantly. "I
can tell 'em by the way they set a horse. We'll try 'em with a little
U.S.A."

He stepped out on the point and hailed them again, and a man rode out
from the rest. He was mounted on a mule and the minute he saw him
McIvor knew it was Grimes. It was not the mule alone, it was the
thrust of his head and the handy way he carried his rifle.

"Hello there!" shouted Hall, stepping out on a rock, and Grimes stopped
his mule and looked up.

"Don't know you!" he announced, "but dam' your black hearts, we've come
to git back our horses!"

"That's Grimes--the sheepman," explained Hall over his shoulder, and
Meshackatee stepped down behind a rock.

"You talk to him," he grumbled. "I got no use for a sheepman." And
Winchester and Bill nodded assent.

"Yes, sure it's Grimes!" yelled the pseudo Indian, "but who in
damnation are you?"

"My name is Hall," answered McIvor shortly. "I met you down at the
Bassetts'!"

"Oh, that preacher guy!" observed the sheepman sarcastically. "Well,
what are _you_ doing up here?"

"I'm a deputy sheriff," retorted McIvor. "What does your business
happen to be?"

"A de-puty sheriff!" whooped Grimes. "Hey, boys; here's a deputy
sheriff!"

He laughed and the gang of make-believe Apaches came riding up to join
him.

"Seems to amuse them," remarked Hall, and Meshackatee muttered an oath
while the Bassetts looked on in grim silence.

"Bunch of Mormons," growled Winchester, "rigged out with horsetails and
handkerchiefs--kinder reminds me of the Mountain Meadow massacre."

"All the same," spoke up Meshackatee, "we might use the danged jaspers.
Git 'em to go down and clean up on the Scarboroughs!"

"Why not?" chimed in Hall. "This is no time for petty differences.
Shall I tell them we'll give back their horses?"

"Sure," replied Meshackatee, "but they've got to prove ownership.
Otherwise they'll claim the whole band. Go down and see what you can
do."

Hall swung up on his horse and rode down the trail, and as he came
up to the Mormons they reined to one side, leaving Grimes to do the
talking.

"How'd do, Mr. Hall," he began, "do you know anything about our horses?
So you're a deputy sheriff, hey?"

"Yes, I'm a deputy sheriff," answered McIvor evenly, "and I can't see
that it's in any way a joke. There are three more officers up there in
the rocks, and I'd advise you to show a little more respect."

"Oh, certainly!" mocked Grimes, "you're jest the _hombres_ we're
looking for. A big gang of horse-thieves has been raiding our ranches
and driving off our stock for a month. Not gitting any protection we
have organized to run 'em down and hang every scoundrel we can ketch;
but now, of course, all we have to do is to report our losses to _you_!"

"Yes, that's right," said Hall, "just give me a list of the animals, so
there won't be any mistake."

"Any mistake!" repeated Grimes. "Well, by grab, it seems to me you look
more like a horse-thief than we do. How's the Scarborough boys gitting
along these days? But I believe you was staying with the Bassetts?"

"Yes, I was staying with the Bassetts," replied Hall. "Anything more
you'd like to know?"

"I asked you," sneered Grimes, who seemed determined to pick a quarrel,
"how your friends, the Scarboroughs, are gitting along."

"Why, not so well," returned McIvor. "Red was killed only this morning.
It was a case of resisting arrest."

"Killed!" cried Grimes, and then he spurred forward and held out a
hairy hand. "By hooky," he exclaimed, "I sure apologize, Mr. Hall, for
any little thing I may have said. I'm sure glad to meet you, and my
friends and neighbors here will be proud to shake your hand."

He introduced the Mormon ranchmen, most of whom had laid off their
disguise, and then returned to the matter at hand.

"Are you in charge of this posse?" he asked. "Because we'd like to find
out about them horses." "No, I'm not," replied Hall, "Meshackatee is
in command, and the other two deputies are the Bassetts. You remember
them--Winchester and Bill."

"You don't say!" exclaimed Grimes, leaning over in his saddle. "Is that
the way the ground lays? Because if that's the case I can git you a
bunch of deputies that will serve without money and without price. All
we ask is a whack at the Scarboroughs."

"We can talk that over later." responded Hall, "but I'm sure we'd be
glad to have you. Now about those horses--we just held up a big band
that a couple of young Texans were driving----"

"Good!" chorused the Mormons, suddenly starting up the trail, but
McIvor motioned them back.

"And my orders," he went on, "were that each man should describe his
animals in order to avoid mistakes."

"Give 'im his way, boys; give 'im his way!" spoke up Grimes with
assumed heartiness. "He's an officer of the law after all. And
right now, Mr. Hall, I want to offer my services to arrest the last
Scarborough for horse-stealing."

Hall nodded obliviously, for all the Mormons in unison were calling
off a list of their horses, and after they had written the brands and
colors on chance papers he led the way to the herd. Meshackatee and the
Bassetts rode along to deliver the animals but when the lists had been
filled there was a general clamor for other horses, which the ranchers
claimed as their own. At first Meshackatee resisted them, demanding
receipts for the animals; but as they became more insistent he threw up
his hands and told them to take the whole herd.

"And git to hell out of here," he added under his breath--which the
Mormons proceeded to do.

It was late in the evening but, rushing the herd before them, they
started back up the trail at a gallop. Only Grimes, the sheepman,
stayed, and he stemmed every rebuff until Meshackatee made him a
deputy.




CHAPTER XX

UP HORSE-THIEF CANYON


A common cause will bring strange people together, but a common
hatred will make them like brothers. The Bassetts suspected Grimes of
fishing for sheep-rights, and he _knew_ they had run out on him in his
fight; and a month before Meshackatee had been a gunman, engaged in
fighting all three of them; but a common desire to get revenge on the
Scarboroughs made them partners, if not exactly friends. And McIvor,
who would have quit all four of them in a minute if there was any other
way of winning Allifair, plunged heart and soul into the council of war
which was to plan the downfall of Isham. For it was Isham after all who
was the head and front of the Scarboroughs, and he had a genius for
making men hate him.

"I'm for riding up to his house," declared Grimes, swaying truculently,
"and shooting it out, right there. We could slip up on 'em after dark."

"Nope, that house is a fort," vetoed Meshackatee instantly; "he could
pot the whole bunch of us through them loop-holes. And that passel of
hounds would raise such a hooraw you couldn't git nigh the place."

"And besides," interposed McIvor, "there are the women folks to think
of----"

"They didn't think of ours!" broke in Bill resentfully. "And for all
we know, Maw's dead. They went up to the store and told Johnson they'd
kill him if he sold the old lady anything."

"Well, let's begin right there," suggested McIvor pacifically. "Let's
go down to that store and hold up the store-keeper and take Mrs.
Bassett some supplies. I'm ready to start right now."

"Nope, not to-night," objected Meshackatee cannily, "they're liable to
be out somewhere looking for us."

"Well, I'll tell you," suggested Winchester, "let's go after them two
horse-thieves that Bill and I were chasing. They headed right up that
side canyon."

"That's the talk!" agreed Grimes, springing eagerly to his feet.
"Them's the boys we want to git. D'ye think you can follow their trail?"

"They's a cabin up there," explained Winchester, "kind of a hold-out
for horse-thieves, I reckon. The chances are good they'll come back to
it."

"Well, let's wait till before daylight," suggested the practical
Meshackatee, "and ketch 'em jest at dawn."

"It's a dirty damned way of fighting," grumbled Winchester morosely,
"but I'm game--they pulled it on me."

So they slept until the morning star, glowing round like a ball, gave
warning that daylight was near; and then, with Winchester ahead, they
forded the roaring creek and followed a beaten trail up the canyon.
No one or two horses had trampled that broad path--a band had been
over it, and more than one band, and they could see the Texans' tracks
leading on. At dawn they sighted a house, a small, chunky cabin built
from the biggest logs that could be moved; and chock against it was a
corral where two jaded ponies stood drooping inside the bars. It stood
in a little opening, tucked up under the north hill, and they withdrew
to lay their plans.

"We'll surround it," directed Meshackatee, "two men on each side and
one here to guard the horses; and the first man that comes out you can
all pull down on him--and if he don't halt when I order you can shoot.
But if he gits inside that cabin it'll be a long siege at best, because
she's mighty nigh bullet-proof."

They separated then, Grimes and Winchester going up one ridge and
Meshackatee and Hall up the other; and as the sun began to shine on
the bald slopes to the west they settled down to watch the house. It
had been built all too evidently for purposes of defense, though no
loop-holes appeared in the walls; but no windows appeared either and
the door was of heavy oak slabs. The Texans were safe as long as they
remained inside of it, and they seemed in no hurry to come out. A
shrewd suspicion was beginning to form in Hall's mind that in some way
their presence had been discovered, but they waited patiently until the
sun was an hour high and then a tall cowboy stumbled out. He was a
typical Texan, all boots and high hat, and he headed for the woodpile
without so much as a glance at the sinister hillsides above him.

"Put 'em up!" bellowed Meshackatee as the Texan reached for the ax,
but instead the man started to run. He did not even look up, simply
bolted for the doorway like a rabbit caught away from his hole. But the
posse had been watching, and as he started for the door their rifles
all spoke at once. The pile of chips at his feet seemed to leap into
the air as the bullets struck all around him, but he escaped by some
miracle and slammed the door behind him, at which Meshackatee ripped
out a great oath.

"Come out of that cabin!" he roared from his hiding-place, "come out,
or we'll blow you to hell!"

But the men inside the cabin were punching loop-holes through the
chinks and Meshackatee opened fire. The work on the loop-holes was
given over precipitately, for the heavy bullets bored their way through
the chinks, and when a couple of explosive bullets almost blew down the
door the Texans were ready for a parley.

"Who air you fellers, anyway?" they shouted through the doorway. "We're
all right--we ain't done nothin'!"

"We're a posse of deputy sheriffs and you're wanted for horse-stealing.
Come out!" thundered Meshackatee, "or we'll kill ye!"

"You'll kill us anyway!" answered one of the men, and they went to work
on their loop-holes.

"I'll fix 'em," announced Meshackatee, and, slipping in another
explosive bullet, he fired it through the hole in the door. There was a
smash inside and a loud yell of protest and then, very reluctantly, the
shattered door was thrown open and the Texans stepped out with hands up.

"Come up here!" ordered Meshackatee, over the top of a rock. "Is there
anybody else in there?"

"Nope, the other boys are gone," answered the trembling prisoners, who
were both barely out of their teens, and Hall quickly searched them for
concealed guns.

"All right," he said, "you can put down your hands. Come on, we'll go
back to camp."

They returned to the horses, where Bill had a fire going and a pot of
coffee on the coals, and Grimes and Winchester joined them.

"You sure ruined that cabin," observed Winchester to Meshackatee, but
Grimes strode over to the prisoners.

"Oho!" he said, "so you're the young bucks that have been raising all
this deviltry. Well, we'll just make you an example for the rest of 'em
to look at when they come over to steal our stock."

He made the grewsome motions of tightening a loop about his neck and
the Texans turned deathly pale.

"I thought you were deputies," said one of them at length, but no one
responded directly. With two prisoners on their hands they would be
handicapped at every turn, and the question before them was whether to
let Grimes hang them or allow them to go scot free.

"Well, what you got to say for yourselves?" asked Meshackatee at
length, after they had eaten a scanty breakfast. "Where'd you git that
band of horses you had yesterday?"

The younger of the boys was by now too scared to talk, but the older
one spoke up boldly.

"We were coming in from Holbrook," he said, "and some men that we met
said they'd give us ten dollars to drive these broncs down into the
Basin."

"Come from Texas?" inquired Meshackatee. "Well, couldn't you see by
them brands that half those horses was stolen? I know you could now,
son; so don't make us hang you for a liar."

"You're a liar yourself!" flashed back the boy indignantly. "Didn't you
claim you was a deputy sheriff!"

"Take the witness," shrugged Meshackatee, rolling his eyes at
Winchester. "He's too danged smart for me."

"Lookee here, kid," began Winchester with a placating smile, "you'd
better come through with the truth. Who're you working for--Isham
Scarborough?"

"Don't know him," denied the boy. "We were jest rambling through the
country when we met up with them fellers with the horses. Say, are you
deputy sheriffs? Well then, you don't _dare_ to hang me! Don't I git a
trial, or nothing?"

"You're gitting a trial, right now," returned Winchester. "And if you
git too gay we'll jest take off these tin stars and _show_ you whether
or not we can hang you. You're a tough little devil, I can see that
with one eye; but--oh, hell, let the little whelp go!"

He laughed shortly and turned away, pretending to adjust his pistol,
and McIvor nodded at Meshackatee.

"We're not fighting boys," he said, but Grimes took the opposite view.

"Now, gentlemen," he objected, rising up from where he sat, "I think
you're wrong--dead wrong. These boys may be young but they knew what
they were doing; and this stealing has got to stop, that's all! I'll
jest take off this star, so they won't be no complications, and--you
can turn them over to me."

"No, don't you do it, Mister!" cried the boy in a panic, running to
cling to Meshackatee's knees, "I--I'll never steal another horse again.
And this other boy, he's only a kid--we ran away from home together."

"Oh, I see," mumbled Meshackatee, and glanced questioningly at Grimes
who stood with his lips grimly pursed.

"Well?" he demanded, but Meshackatee shook his head.

"Nope," he said, "they's too small, Mr. Grimes. And I ran away from
home myself."

"Then I resign," snarled Grimes, beginning to unpin his star and
Meshackatee held out his hand.

"Gimme the star, then," he replied, "you're too rough-shod for us.
We didn't come out here to hang any kids--we came to git Isham
Scarborough."

Grimes paused and rolled his evil eyes on the boys, then snapped his
badge back in place.

"I'll stick," he said. "You're chicken-hearted, but I'll stick. But if
these kids turn up later with a gang of their confederates, don't say I
didn't warn ye!"

"Very well, Mr. Grimes," returned Meshackatee politely, "and being
as you're so brave we'll jest head back for the Basin and put you up
against some grown _men_."




CHAPTER XXI

THE RANDOLPHS


If it was madness for Meshackatee and his posse of four to ride back
into the stronghold of the Scarboroughs, there was a method in their
madness. The Scarboroughs would be swarming like a nest of red ants on
account of the killing of Red, they would be scouring the country and
watching every trail; but, even so, a man must eat. Maverick Basin was
the hold-out of a gang of men so desperate that they set all law at
defiance, shooting down whoever opposed them; but it had a store, full
of flour and bacon, and Meshackatee's packs were flat. First he had
shared his food with Hall, and then with the Bassetts, and finally with
Grimes and the boy horse-thieves; and when they turned back there was
nothing in the kyacks but coffee and cartridges and tobacco.

They took to the high ground, led by Winchester Bassett who had ranged
the whole country with his hounds, and at evening they emerged on
a wooded hill-top and looked out the Basin with their glasses. The
sun had hardly set when they rode out from cover and headed straight
for the darkened store. The storekeeper was a careful, not to say a
stingy, man; and he had his reasons also for preferring to sit in the
dark, since bright windows have often drawn bullets. He was hiding when
they rode up but, finding his store surrounded, he lit up and opened
the door.

"Oh, good evening," he cringed as Meshackatee loomed up before him.
"Well, well, howdy do, Meshackatee!"

"I want some grub," returned Meshackatee, "and I want it quick, without
any high signs to the Scarboroughs. So jest git out your pencil and
keep tally on what we take--you'll be paid by Tonto County."

"But the county is practically bankrupt," protested Johnson in an ague.

"So'm I," replied Meshackatee, "and I'm hungry to boot. So use your own
judgment, Mr. Johnson."

He stepped into the store-room and began to hand out the sacks of
flour, and after a glaring silence Mr. Johnson saw the point and began
sullenly to check up the requisition. For a requisition it was, such as
armies are wont to make, and deputy sheriffs in pursuit of criminals;
and soon bacon and coffee and beans came out to fill the sacks which
they were slinging on the saddles of their spare mounts.

"Now, what's the news, Mr. Johnson?" spoke up Meshackatee abruptly.
"Who's over at the Scarborough place now?"

"Why--er--Elmo," began the store-keeper, "and Miz Zoolah, of
course----"

"Where's Isham?" demanded Meshackatee, and the others stopped to
listen, but Johnson only shook his head.

"He's gone," he said, and Meshackatee drew his big six-shooter and laid
it down impressively in the lamp-light.

"Gone where?" he asked, but not even the gun could make the frightened
store-keeper tell.

"I don't know, boy, I swear it," he answered as they faced him, "but
they say he's over in New Mexico. Been gone for a week, and now that
Red is dead, young Elmo has taken things in charge."

"How many men has he got?" inquired Grimes, moving closer, and the
store-keeper backed away instinctively.

"Oh, a great many!" he exclaimed. "Sometimes as much as forty. They're
coming in all the time. This evening there were two all the way from
Kentucky----"

"What were their names?" broke in Hall, and the store-keeper winced.

"Why--er--Randolph," he said, "and, now that you speak of it, I believe
they were inquiring for you."

"Very likely," replied Hall, and slipped quietly outside, where he
could think what this meant to him. And so Allifair's brothers had
come! The feud of Tug Fork had been transplanted to Maverick Basin--the
Randolphs had come to kill him. He stood in the shadows, looking out
across the plain to where the lights of the Rock House still glowed.
It was too late now; he had lost. Cal and Ewing were there, and as
soon as they learned the country they would take up his trail like
bloodhounds. They would follow him like a deer and like a deer he must
flee, for Allifair loved her brothers. Bloody-handed as they were, and
rough and brutal, she loved Cal and Ewing for what they might have been
if the feud had not warped their whole lives. They were man-killers
now, thin-lipped and cruel-eyed, and yet he dared not oppose them. Once
more he must play the coward.

While the others lingered on, indulging in a few drinks and
cross-questioning the reluctant Mr. Johnson, he sorted out a pack-load
of the most substantial food and lashed it on his spare horse. He was
mounting to go when Winchester Bassett stepped out, followed by Bill,
carrying a big sack of food.

"W'y hello," exclaimed Winchester, "are you going to leave us? We're
going up north and lay for Isham."

"Yes, I've got to go," said Hall, "but don't tell the store-keeper. The
Randolphs have come out here to kill me."

"I had an idee they had," admitted Winchester. "Well, sorry to see you
go. But say, wait a minute and you can start off with me and Bill--that
storekeeper is a Scarborough spy."

Hall waited, still in the shadows, for the light from the store door
might reveal his presence to his enemies; and as he watched the Rock
House he saw a lantern leave the house and go bobbing out to the
barn. There was a hair-trigger atmosphere about the whole raid which
set his jangled nerves on edge; for he knew that the Scarboroughs kept
close watch over the store, even dictating who should come there for
supplies. They would be riding over soon to see who had been there, if
they were not already skulking near; and the news of his presence would
be the signal for the Randolphs to take up the trail again. For years,
back in Kentucky, they had dogged his tracks, trying to catch him for a
moment off his guard; and he, throwing great circles, had often swung
in behind them, so that they in turn were pursued. More than once he
had ambushed them, and once he had shot Cal; but they had always crept
away leaving the battle undecided, for the feud had taught the value of
stealth. The men who fought in the open had long before been killed--it
was Indian warfare now.

Bill and Winchester came out, after taking a last drink, and rode
off in silence down the road. The night was still, so that the
sounds traveled far, and the circumstances of their home-coming were
depressing. Except for a few times when, at the risk of their lives,
they had crept in to leave their mother some fresh beef, they had never
been near the house since that fatal day when Sharps and Old Henry had
been killed. Old Susie had detected movements on the top of the hill
where the Scarboroughs had once laid in wait, and Winchester and Bill
had evidence of their own to show that the house was watched. It was
the old system of the Scarboroughs, always to lie in wait and shoot
down their enemies from the brush.

The hounds came rushing out at them, changing their baying to joyous
yelps as they recognized their long-lost masters; and old Susie, for
once, forgot her Indian stoicism and wept as she clung to Bill. He
was her favorite boy, the baby she had carried when she had traveled
overland in search of her husband; and when they had put down her
supplies and were preparing to go she still clung desperately to Bill.

"You go on," he said to Winchester, "I'll stay with Maw a while. But
I'll ketch you--get the boys and start ahead."

"Well, all right," grumbled Winchester, "but you be careful, kid; them
Scarboroughs are on the prod."

They parted company at the gate, Winchester riding for the store and
Hall turning off to the east; but as he rode through the darkness
Hall halted on the trail, and at last he wheeled and turned back. The
vague uneasiness which had held him all the evening suddenly took form
and clutched at his heart. What if the Randolphs had come, not to run
him down and kill him, but to carry their sister away? He circled the
Basin and finally headed south, cutting across the open plain and
taking shelter in the wooded hills beyond; and when the day dawned he
crept out on a point where he could look down and see her from afar.
She must know he was near, for the store-keeper had told him that he
was believed to be the slayer of Red; and if that was the case how
anxiously she must be waiting for the time when he would appear on the
mound. How many times already she must have glanced out through the
loop-hole, hoping to see his waiting form beneath the tree; and now he
was slinking away, without even making trial of the Providence which
he claimed as his guide. He focussed his glasses and gazed down at the
Rock House, and at daylight Allifair appeared.

She stepped to the doorway, dressed in white like a bride though she
was only a kitchen drudge, and her eyes seemed to be turned to the
hills. Almost she seemed to see him, or to sense his distant presence,
for she raised her hand in a sign; and then she waved him away, just
as plainly as if she spoke to him, and turned sorrowfully back into
the house. Soon the smoke from the huge chimney told the story of her
industry--she was cooking while the rest of them slept. Hall watched
them as they came out, Miz Zoolah and Elmo; and at last the men whom
he never had feared--Cal Randolph and the tall, lanky Ewing. They were
typical mountaineers in their high boots and slouched hats, and yet
after all not so different from the Texans who came striding across
from the bunk-house. But he feared them now, for they had come to take
his life and his hands were tied by love. They were the brothers of
Allifair and she had beckoned him away; yet he lingered, waiting to see
their next move.

A dozen rash plans leapt up in his brain--to steal her and bear her
away, to hide her from their fury and then return to Tug Fork, to
make an end to the feud. But each time the vision of Cal and Ewing
Randolph rose up to brand them as worse than dreams; the fate which had
pursued him was still on his trail, nothing could be done while her
brothers were there. He put down his glasses and gazed out across the
Basin, seeking some end to the phantasma of his life. Even here, as
in Kentucky, it had been a nightmare of death and violence, while his
heart was sick for peace. All he wanted was peace, the same surcease
we give the dead--a forgetting, oblivion, a new life. Yet even after
one death his incognito had been discovered and the chase was on again.
Nothing would stay the dark passions of the men he had warred against,
they were ruthless as death itself.

He closed his eyes wearily to shut out the sight of this valley which
had once seemed so fair, and sleep swooped to seize him in an instant.
But while his senses swooned something came to his ears that roused
him as nothing else could--a rifle-shot, far away. He listened, half
convinced, and a volley ripped the air like the tearing of a strip of
rough cloth. It came from the hill, where the Scarboroughs had hid
before, the hill that looked down on the Bassetts'. But why did they
shoot when Sharps and Henry were both dead, and Winchester and Bill----
His heart stopped and leapt again, and he knew the answer. Bill Bassett
had stayed too long.




CHAPTER XXII

THE FLIGHT


There never was a feud, nor yet a war, which did not revert to
barbarism; for reprisal invites reprisal, and hot blood breeds new
excesses until it ends in a mad swirl of killing. And always the human
reason, ever the servant to our passions, finds a way to justify the
slaughter. For the object of warfare, of course, is to kill; and why
stop short of the absolute? Why leave boys to grow to manhood, or women
to breed more boys, or old men to nurse the spark of future wars; why
not kill them all, as speedily as possible, and with the least possible
danger to ourselves? There we have the justification not only of war,
but of feuds and murder from ambush; but the murders come first and
reason follows tardily to lull the protests of conscience.

Hall McIvor had killed from ambush, and had been shot down in turn;
but the thought of Bill's death, conjured up by the rifle shots, left
him sick at the savagery of it all. By a process of reasoning he had
brought himself to join this war, in order to end yet another war;
but until the last Scarborough, or the last Bassett, was dead he
knew there would be no end. And was it farfetched to kill off the
Scarboroughs in order to save the McIvors and Randolphs? He lay hid on
his high point like a lion that hears the dogs, undecided whether to
stand fast or flee. If he fled they would pursue him--but did he not
have a covert? And if he stayed they would send him after Bill. It was
a fight to the finish, and yet no fight of his if only he could take
Allifair and escape.

But this was not the time to put their fortunes to the touch, he must
wait till her brothers were gone. The war was on in Kentucky and they
could not be spared long--but when they went they would take Allifair
with them! Back to the battle-ground along the Big Sandy, ten times as
blood-soaked as here; and there they would guard her like a criminal.
For that was the worst crime they knew, to wish to marry a McIvor. No,
the time to rescue Allifair was now. But first he must return to his
castle in the cliff and prepare it for her coming.

He rode cautiously for two nights, hiding on flat mountain tops by
day, and found a way at last to lead his horse up the chasm, which was
roaring now with water. The summer rains had come, turning the ravines
into torrents and Turkey Creek into a river; and whatever tracks he
made were soon washed away, leaving him lost to all the world. He
hobbled his horses on the flat below him, where he could guard them
from his cave above; and, working feverishly, he bore his provisions
up the trail and made camp that night by his castle. The court was
broad enough, and the smoke from his fire sucked back through the high,
gloomy passageway; he made a couch of his lion-skin, flung down in the
open, leaving the mud-sealed door unbroken.

Perhaps the imprint in the mud of a hand like a woman's held him back
from violating the sanctuary; but in the morning he breached the door,
for he, too, had a woman and the dead must give way to the living. The
mate of his mountain-lion was still prowling about, and must Allifair
lack shelter and retreat from wild animals in order that the dead
should sleep undisturbed? He smashed his way in ruthlessly and entered
the burial chamber, which was low and dark as a tomb. It had been a
dwelling once--there was soot on the rafters and a fireplace over in
the corner--but now it was smothered beneath the dust of countless
centuries, as fine and impalpable as flour. It rose up at every step,
almost choking him with its saltiness and its odor of things long dead;
and the sarcophagus against the wall was blanketed over as if with a
fall of snow.

At one end of the burial mound he found an _olla_ full of corn left to
nourish the departing spirit on its journey; and at the other a second
_olla_ with only a watermark to show where the spirits had drunk; but
the thing which impressed him most was a huge bulk against the cliff,
an _olla_ nearly as high as a man. It too was blanketed in dust and its
broad top was sealed, as if to protect some great treasure; but the
treasures of the cliffdwellers could wait, what he wanted was their
room, to shelter his lady from the mountain lions. He tied together
a bundle of switches and began to sweep out the dust, dashing out
from time to time to get air; and as he was brushing down the walls
he discovered a blackened hole in the corner above the fire. This,
too, was sealed with mud, but when he punched it clear the clouds of
stinging dust went swirling up and out, leaving the chamber of the
cliff-dwellers clear.

So it had been long centuries before, when these dead had still lived
and cooked their corn on the flat stones below; for the draft through
the low doorway sucked up past the fireplace and went out at the
smoke-vent above. Hall set to work again, clearing away the mound with
its crumbling skeleton, its prayer-sticks and arrows and clubs; but
when he came to the great _olla_ he found it sunk into the floor and
as immovable as the cliff itself. He tried to pierce the seal, but it
was another _olla_, set down over the greater one below; and finally,
seizing a club, he smashed in the top, only to start back at the sound
of a splash. So this was the treasure which the cliff-dwellers had
concealed, and yet what treasure was greater? He leaned over the broad
rim and tasted the water doubtfully--it was sweet as if it flowed
from a spring! But certainly, if it had been stored for centuries and
centuries, it would be flat and tainted by the pottery; he splashed it
over the rim, wetting down the parched dirt floor, but the water in
the basin did not lower. It was a spring walled up and cupped in the
_ollas_, a dimpling fount for Allifair.

Hall wet down the floor and swept it out again, letting it air until
the room was sweet and clean; and then in mad haste he set to work
to bring in wood and make down a bed of dry grass. He stored his
provisions against the wall, and threw down the lion skin by the fire;
and, closing the doorway, ran down to catch his horses, for the time
for action had come. Here was their dwelling place at last, all set
and waiting, lacking only the smile of Allifair to give it the glow of
home; and as he spurred back over the trail, dragging the led-horse
behind him, he envisioned her sitting by the fireplace. Though the
night was dark and the trails sluiced out by rain, when the day dawned
he was hidden in the hills where he could look down and watch for
Allifair.

She appeared with the dawn, still clad in white, and stood poised
against the blackness of the doorway; but this time she did not wave,
just stood gazing at the hills until abruptly she turned and went in.
Hall was hidden in a thicket of bristling manzanita on the brow of a
pineclad ridge; and his horses, staked and hobbled, were concealed in
a hollow, where he could keep them under his eye. He slept, for no man
could creep up to his hiding place without snapping a thousand rough
twigs; and when he awoke it was raining again and the thunder was
rolling along the hills. Taking shelter beneath a tree he threw his
slicker over his shoulders and watched the swift rush of the clouds;
the lightning that flashed and stabbed, making the earth tremble at its
shock, until at last the great pageant rolled past. The sun came out
warm, gleaming like silver from the thunder-heads, and down at the Rock
House men mounted dancing ponies and went scampering away up the trail.

Hall counted them as they went, eleven cowboys in all, and as he spied
a great horse-herd trotting in from the north he guessed the cause of
their haste. This was another of those bands of Mormon horses, taken
by force from the ranchers above the Rim; and unless he was mistaken
the Avenging Angels from Mountain Meadow would not be far behind.
They would come riding as before, disguised as raiding Apaches with
horse-tails and handkerchiefs on their heads; and every man at the Rock
House would be needed that night to hold the herd against them. There
might even be a fight, for the Mormons were determined--and while they
were drawn away he could ride to the Rock House and steal Allifair in
spite of them!

The sun went down behind a bank of angry clouds, every stream-bed in
the Basin was awash; and the rumble of the distant waters told of
greater floods to be crossed if they endeavored to escape across Turkey
Creek. But no sooner was it night than he rode boldly down the ridge,
leaving his horses just behind the Indian mound. Men were dashing to
and fro but something bade him be venturesome and he stood out boldly
against the sky; then he crouched back and waited, for the dogs had
begun to bark, and at last she came running up the path. They did not
stop, even for a lover's kiss, but hurried away down the hill; and
hardly had they left the Rock House behind them than they heard the hue
and cry. It started at the house with a succession of six pistol shots
and Hall swung from the trail to let the chase go by, for he heard them
coming after him.

They had started down the main trail to Jump-off hill, but now he
turned east and circled back to the north, with Allifair close behind
him. She, too, had brought a slicker, to protect her from the rain, and
beneath her man's hat she looked no different from the cowboys who were
scouring the trails in search of them. They rode at a trot as if going
to the horse-herd and a galloping Texan, riding back to the house, held
up his hand as he went splashing by. But that way was too dangerous and
Hall turned to the east, taking the trail that led to the Bassetts'.

A black cloud that blotted the east twinkled with flares of heat
lightning, the stars seemed to swim through a mist, and as the Bassett
dogs rushed out they veered sharply away, taking the trail that led
down to Turkey Creek. But there they stopped short for the water, in
the pale starlight, seemed to be rushing with resistless force. It rose
up in huge waves, smooth and slick as a ground swell but with logs
and writhing branches in its grip; and where it crossed the riffles it
roared with shuddering thunder and threw up a white comb of foam.

"Can we cross it?" she asked at last, and he shrugged his shoulders.

"Do you dare to try?" he countered.

"I'll follow you anywhere!" she answered, and took off her slicker; but
he sat on his horse, irresolute.

The very rocks at the bottom of the stream seemed to be grinding and
rumbling beneath the flood; and yet in his time he had crossed worse
torrents than this, though once he had nearly been drowned.

"Can you swim?" he asked, and when she shook her head he turned and
looked back across the plain. With the creek roaring in front of them
not a hoof-beat could be heard, but he pictured it swarming with
horsemen. They would be spurring to the south, knowing that that was
where he would flee, but others would be coming to the east; and sooner
or later he would have to make a fight, for Miz Zoolah would never
give up. She would send out every man, if they had to abandon the
horse-herd, to scour the country for Allifair; and, compared to what
would follow if he had to give them battle, the creek did not seem so
terrible. Its roar was no more than the rush of water past rough snags,
the passing of sand-waves through the crests; and if worst came to
worst he might reach her and save her if their horses went down among
the rocks.

"Keep your horse's head upstream," he said at last, "and rein him in if
he falls; but if he goes down in spite of you try to catch him by the
tail, and in that way he may drag you ashore."

He leaned over and kissed her; then, with a last touch of the hand,
he edged his horse into the stream. The water was deep, for it was
just above a riffle where the flood went pouring over a bar, and as
his horse stepped into a hole it plunged and half fell, then rose up
and tried to turn back. But Hall only reined him lower, just above
the roaring thunder and the splash and spume of the bar; and close
behind Allifair's mount followed after him, feeling its way along the
treacherous bottom. Hall's horse went down again and came up swimming,
only to find himself across the main channel; and, seeing Hall land on
the other side, Allifair plunged in after him, coming out in a shower
of flying mud. A huge, branching tree bobbed solemnly down the current,
swinging about as if to brush them from their foothold; but now the
horses were struggling, as eager to get across as before they had been
loth to go in. They progressed in great leaps, in swift scramblings and
terrifying lunges; and finally, all atremble, they waded out through
the shallows and stood limp on the opposite side. The tree swept on
past, logs and driftwood bobbed and curtsied, the sand-waves roared
terribly through the crests; but now it all seemed good for it raised
a barrier behind them that the hardiest would hesitate to cross. Hall
reined his horse into the washed-out, rocky trail and they began the
long ride to Cold Spring.




CHAPTER XXIII

THE EAGLES' NEST


In ancient days, before taking any action, men stopped to consult the
oracle or looked for omens in the flight of birds; but now, with equal
results, we make our own augeries and follow what we call a psychic
hunch. If we feel lucky we play, and if we feel unlucky we quit; and no
system has been devised that will bring better results, for all that
the fortune-tellers say. Hall had felt a strong hunch the moment he
smashed in the sealed _olla_ and found it a fountain of water; it had
seemed an intervention, an interposition of that Providence which he
believed had raised him from the dead. The hand which he could not see
seemed to be leading him again, where before all had been darkness and
doubt; to be smoothing out his way and solving the difficulties which
before had seemed insuperable. And if it could give him water and a
shelter for his beloved, then surely it could guide his footsteps and
so order his goings and comings that he would succeed at last in his
quest.

All that night as he rode on, with Allifair close behind, he was
conscious of a hand that led him on; and at daylight, when he rode down
to the crossing at Cold Spring, he did not hesitate to plunge into
the flood. Their horses were weak and the creek was still high, but
they fought their way through anyhow and led their mounts up the chasm
without a slip or a fall. It was a miracle of good luck and as they
took shelter in the cave the rain-clouds lowered as if to cover them.
The lightning began to play a weird devil's dance along the summit of
the eastern ridge, the thunder smote their crags and called for rain;
and as they stood in the court of their castle-in-the-air, they saw
their pursuers ride into the canyon below.

They were weary and bedraggled but still leaning beside their
saddle-horns to trace the line of horse-tracks through the mud; a
band of four horsemen, shrouded to the chin in sluicing slickers but
following grimly on their trail. Who they were they could not tell
in the blinding rain, but as they gazed over their rampart they saw
one essay the crossing and go down as if he had stepped into a well.
The others shook out their ropes and rode to his rescue, dragging
horse and man to the shore; and then in disgust they rode up to the
low cliff-dwellings and took shelter from the fury of the storm. Hall
glanced down at Allifair who stood clutching his hand and they turned
back and entered their new home.

She had held out bravely but now she sank down, bereft of the last of
her strength; and after he had made a fire Hall spread her bed beside
it, for she was drenched and chilled to the bone. He boiled coffee
over the fireplace and held a cupful to her lips, and after she had
drunk she opened her eyes and lay gazing at the strange, tomblike
dwelling. No light came in except through the low doorway, the fire
cast strange shadows among the rafters; and yet somehow she felt a
sweet contentment steal over her as she watched her lover by the fire.
He was there, he would provide for her, and no one would ever find
them--they were hidden away like twin eagles.

She fell into a deep sleep and when she awoke he was standing above
her, smiling. Food was simmering on the fire but there was rain on his
hat and he had brought in the breath of outdoors.

"They are looking for us," he said, and smiled again. "But they'll
never find us--here."

"No, not here," she answered, and sat up quickly for he had laid a
young turkey by the fire.

"Oh, did you shoot it?" she cried, and he stooped down and kissed her,
then lifted her quickly to her feet.

"No, sweetheart," he laughed, "I didn't dare to shoot, but I drove it
into my trap. And while you were asleep I took our horses up the chasm
and hid them in a little lost valley. Now all we have to do is to keep
out of sight and let the chase go by."

He drew her closer to him and she leaned against his breast, smiling
softly as he told her of his love; and then they sat down to their
first meal together while the storm swept by outside. Nothing mattered
to them now, they were sheltered and warmed and fed and their dream
had at last come true; and far into the night, though sleep made them
nod, they sat up and talked of the past. Hall spoke of the time when
he had seen her first, when he had crept to the Randolph's very door;
and how she had saved him from Ewing and Cal when a word would have
meant his death. And from there they drifted on through the maze of
their wanderings; since she, like a culprit, had been sent to Arizona
and he had followed on her trail. It was a tale of true love, in which
neither had ever wavered; until now in the chamber of some ancient
cliff-dweller they sat nodding by their fire.

They slept then at last and in the morning the bright sunshine shot a
shaft of golden light through the door. All the great world without
was awake and on the move but nature had demanded its toll--and when
Hall roused up their broad cave was in the shadow and the sun had
passed over the crags. He stepped softly to the rampart and looked down
into the canyon, where the creek was still roaring in flood; and up
and down its course, for he could view it for miles, he saw trailers,
out cutting for sign. There was a fire in the fireplace when he came
back from his watch, but after they had eaten he covered it with ashes
lest the odor of the smoke betray them. They settled down in the broad
court, watching their pursuers from the protecting darkness and talking
tranquilly as the search went on; and when evening came on they leaned
over the low wall and gazed down at the camp by Cold Spring.

More men had come in, until now there were ten of them, and the flame
of their camp-fire illuminated the windows of the lower cliff-dwelling
until they glowed like the port-holes of a fort. Even their voices
could be heard above the rush of the flood, which had subsided to a
tumbling stream. But seeing their pursuers below only added to their
contentment and they found time to look up at the stars. It was a soft
and balmy night and no lions were abroad to waken the echoes with their
yells; all their world seemed at peace and yet now there fell a silence
in which each followed out his own thoughts. The past was not enough,
nor yet the tranquil present; but each must quest on into the future.

"When these men have all gone," spoke up Allifair at last, "and my
brothers have given up the search; shall we--I mean--well, what do you
plan to do then?"

"What is there to do?" answered Hall, "except to work out our destiny?
But how we can be married is more than I know--are you brave enough to
stay here alone?"

"Alone!" she repeated with a catch in her voice; and then she reached
for his hand. "No, Hall," she said, "we are too happy, you must not
leave me. But I am brave enough to go with you--anywhere!"

"Ours is always the hardest way," he said at last. "Have you thought
what is going to become of us? Every day that I stay here I shall eat
up by so much the food that should be kept to feed you; and when that
is gone can you live on turkeys and acorns, as I was compelled to do
for days?"

"I can do what you can do," she answered resolutely. "But why do you
have to go? Why can't we stay here together until the search for us is
over----"

"Because," he broke in gently, "we are living in the world--and you
know what people will say."

"Yes, I know," she sighed, "but why can't we be married? Why can't we
ride into Tonto as soon as they leave and be married and start back
home?"

"Because the trails will be watched--and your brothers will kill me if
they ever find us together."

"Not if we're married!" she protested, but he took her in his arms and
his silence questioned even that.

"They are hard men," he said, "and they came out here to kill me--but
behind it all is your aunt. She told you in my presence that she would
rather shoot you down than see you married to a McIvor; and I believe,
Allifair, she would do it. But here you will be safe, and when I have
finished with Isham----"

"Oh, Hall!" she reproached, "can't you learn to forgive? Does all that
I have suffered count for nothing? I read killing in your eyes, that
day that Sharps was shot--but I'll never forgive you if you do! You
are determined to kill Isham, I know by your silence; but think what
it means to me. He is my uncle after all, because he married Aunt
Zoolah, and the McIvors have killed enough of my kin. But it isn't that
alone--I want you to stop killing, and the only time to stop is now!"

"God knows," began Hall, and then he paused and sighed. "I am weary
of this killing," he said. "God only knows how sick of it I am, but
a man must keep his self-respect. I would give my right hand if the
circumstances could be different, but it's either him or me. I can
forgive him for myself, but for what he has done to others--well, we
won't talk about it, dear, any more."

"Yes we will!" she answered back, "because I won't marry a
murderer--and that's what you are at heart. Not that I blame you for
it, Hall, for I know how you were brought up--all I ask is that now you
should stop. Is that too much to ask?"

"No! not too much at all," he replied at length, "provided your uncle
will stop. I fled like a coward when I heard your brothers had come,
because I would rather be killed than kill them; but I ask you, is
it right that I should promise to spare Isham when he is hunting me
everywhere like an animal? Who is paying those men who are camped down
below us? I tell you they have chased me far enough."

His voice was tense with passion and he drew his hand away, but she
reached out and caught it back.

"Hall, dear," she pleaded, "don't you know what I mean? I'm afraid that
Isham will kill you."

He laughed softly as she kissed him and crept back into his arms, where
she shuddered and laid her head on his breast.

"No," he said, "he will never kill me. I've got too much to live for
now."




CHAPTER XXIV

NO TRAIL


The chase, which had been flung far, swung back towards Deadman
Canyon, where the trail of the fugitives had disappeared; and with the
others came the Randolphs and Isham Scarborough, riding up the creek
from Tonto. Apache trailers came drifting in, drawn like vultures by
the crowd; and soon, under their guidance, the search party crossed
the creek and came out on the bench below the castle. Hall and
Allifair could hear their shouts as they found the marks of his first
turkey-trap, in the underbrush above the little spring; and then the
chase led on to the cliff-dwellings below them, where Hall had made
camp the first time. But the signs were all old and they came back to
the spring, where they could look up and see the lost castle. Every
word that they said could be heard now perfectly and Allifair trembled
as she listened.

"Well, the house is there, ain't it?" argued Isham, trying to bully the
Apache trailers. "How'd they git up to it? Well, _busca_ the trail!"

"No! No tlail!" responded the Apaches, and that was the last heard of
them, for the cowboys had taken sides on the matter. Some swore that
the trail came down from the top, and that they could see a kind of
bear-track down the cleft; and the others were just as positive that it
had ascended the cliff but had been lost by a cave-off of the rock.

"No! No tlail!" repeated the Apaches when the uproar had subsided, and
Isham Scarborough came back at them angrily.

"You're scairt, you black rascals!" he shouted. "Hey, Charley--you take
me up that mountain? Well, there now--you see? These danged Injuns are
buffaloed--they're afraid Old Man Baker will kill 'em!"

"No! No 'flaid!" grunted the Indians, but they would not go up the
chasm, for no Apache ever set foot on Baker Mountain.

"Hey, I'll tell you!" hollered Isham, his voice rising above the babel
like the roar of a mountain bull, "I'll tell you where they've gone! Up
Devil's Chasm and plumb over the summit--they couldn't get nowhere's
else! Didn't we trail 'em to the crick, and ain't we rode clean to
Tonto, cutting circles to pick up their tracks? Well, they crossed then
I'm telling ye, even if you fellers couldn't, and by this time they're
clean to Geronimo!"

"Well, let's go to Geronimo, then," spoke up Cal Randolph's even voice,
"what's the use of trying to climb this mountain?"

"They may be hid up there," cried Isham. "But cripes, boys, we know one
thing--they never went down that crick. And if they didn't go there
where else could they go, except----"

He paused as a voice began shouting his name, and Hall peeped over the
rampart. A man had ridden down to their camp across the creek and was
waving his hat and hallooing.

"What d'ye want?" demanded Isham, walking to the edge of the bench and
looking across at the runner, "what's the matter with you, anyhow?"

"Your wife says to come home!" shouted the messenger. "They's been a
big raid--all your horses are run off! And three of the boys was found
hung!"

"Hung!" echoed Isham, and every man in the party jumped up and ran to
the rim.

"What's that?" they clamored, and Hall and Allifair rose up to catch
the startling news.

"W'y, they was night-riders," explained the runner. "They wore masks
and dressed like Injuns! Yes, come in at night and caught three boys
standing guard! We found them hung to a tree! And they run off all your
horses!"

"Hell's fire!" exclaimed Isham, and stood staring across the canyon
while his men gathered together in groups.

"That was that sheepman, Grimes," whispered Hall to Allifair. "He's
organized all those Mormons above the Rim."

"Oh, will he come down here?" asked Allifair aghast. "Because Ewing and
Cal----"

"Maybe they'll leave, now," suggested Hall, and they listened again,
for Isham was beginning to shout.

"Which way'd they go?" he inquired, and when the man answered north he
burst into a fit of cursing.

"It's them dadburned Mormon ranchers!" he exclaimed, and started back
for his horse.

"Well, let's go, boys," he said, when they had gathered by the spring,
"we can tend to McIvor afterward. But if any one wants to stay here
I'll give one thousand dollars to the man that brings me his hair. He's
the dirty, doggoned rascal that stirred up all this ruckus, but I can't
stop to monkey with him now. Come on, Cal; ain't you coming with me?"

"No!" answered Cal's voice and then, after a silence, "we didn't come
out here to help you steal horses."

"Oh, you didn't, eh?" railed Isham, his voice tense with excitement,
"well, since when have you got to be so good? Jest the minute they's
any trouble----"

"We come out here to get our sister!" broke in Ewing's high voice. "And
we're going to hunt till we find her."

"Well, hunt and be damned to ye!" burst out Isham in a fury, and went
spurring off down the trail. His cowboys followed after him, talking
low among themselves, and Hall and Allifair crouched down and listened.

"Well?" spoke up the voice which they recognized as Cal's; but Ewing
did not reply. "Let's ask these Indians," went on Cal, "maybe they know
of some trail. Hey!" he called, "come over here!"

"What you want?" demanded the Indian in arrogant tones, and Cal asked
about the trail up the chasm. "No good!" replied the Apache. "Go
hup--steep! Go hup mo'--mo' steep! Bimby too steep--fall down. Me no
likum. Go home."

"Where you think this man go?" spoke up Ewing. "You find him, we give
you two hundred dollars."

There was a gutteral conversation in Apache then, and Allifair began
to cry softly, but Hall was listening over the wall. If the Apaches
took up his trail they would undoubtedly find his horses; and his
turkey traps and saddles, too. They might even find the entrance to
their cave, with results which he did not care to contemplate; for he
could not kill the Randolphs and they were sworn to kill him--but fate
turned the shaft away. The Indians were afraid of Old Man Baker and his
mountain and they revised their opinions to suit.

"Go hon--down wate'," answered the spokesman at last "Fall in--maybeso
both dlown. How much you give--findum body?"

"Nothing!" burst out Cal, "go on away, you dirty devil. By God, Ewing;
I believe he's right."

"Well, I told ye!" accused Ewing, his voice high and complaining, "I
told you we hadn't ought to come! But you had to have your way, and now
who's going to face Dad----"

"Aw, hush up!" returned Cal impatiently.

"You--give--coffee?" asked the Indian with painful distinctness, and
Cal flew into a fury.

"No--damn ye!" he cursed. "Git away, before I kill ye. Come on, Ewing;
let's quit and go home."

There was a silence then, broken by sonorous Apache as the Indians
talked on gravely among themselves; and finally, across the creek, Hall
saw the Texans riding north and the Randolphs heading for Tonto. Then
he stooped and gathered up Allifair, who had given herself over to
weeping, and carried her into the house.

"I can't help it!" she sobbed, "they're all so rough and brutal; and
they curse and--oh, I just hate them! And to think of Cal and Ewing
offering two hundred dollars----"

"And they'd have found us, too," nodded Hall. "But God looks after
His own. I believe He is saving us, to work His will elsewhere--I'll
never doubt it again. When I came here to look for you I was sure of
my mission. I knew He was leading me to you; and I knew that somehow
we should manage to escape, and be united, and unite our own people.
But afterwards, when I was hiding like a rabbit among the rocks and the
Scarboroughs were prospering so wonderfully--well, I couldn't believe
it, it didn't seem possible, it hardly seems possible now. But hatred
raises up hatred until it destroys itself; and now this sheepman,
Grimes, whose herders they killed, has descended like a destroying
angel upon them. It will all work out now, and when I come back----"

"Are you going?" she asked suddenly, sitting bolt upright. "Oh, Hall,
I want you--here with me! I'll live on acorns, I'll do anything--won't
you stay?"

"I'll be back soon," he said, and turned away.




CHAPTER XXV

LIVE BAIT


There was a day of anxious waiting when they sat and watched the
trails and then, in the twilight, Hall led Allifair up the chasm and
showed her how to bait and set his traps. He helped her gather acorns,
carried in a last load of wood and, late in the evening, they parted.
She was brave again now, though she still hoped he would relent; but
the traditions of a lifetime were behind his resolve and he left her
without a tremor. Even his last kiss seemed cold, as if his mind had
leapt ahead and was held by the grim task before him; and his voice,
when he spoke, had the sternness of an ascetic who has banished all
weakness from his life.

"I must go," he said, "and fight this out with Isham, and they will
hunt me through the hills like a wild animal. And your part is to stay,
like a wild animal, too, hidden away where no one can find you. But
this is our last trial, and when I come back I hope it will be with
honor."

He left her then suddenly, before she could answer, and glided away
into the darkness; and Allifair clutched the pistol, which he had given
her for her safety, and returned to the eagles' nest alone. She was
like an eagle now that has lost its chosen mate, and its power to fly
as well; and if he did not come back she would be more than lost, for
the world would be empty without him. Yet what he said was true--it was
her part to wait; the rest was in the hands of God.

As for Hall he rode forth cautiously, scouting around above the
Basin; until at last it came over him that the Scarboroughs had taken
cover--they were shut up within the Rock House. Around the bunk-house
and corrals the Texas gunmen swarmed like flies; but they did not ride
abroad, not even to the store--except when some one had called. Then
they rode over in threes and fours, probably to get the latest news
as it was retailed by the inquisitive store-keeper. After that he
moved more freely and on the fourth day he sighted Meshackatee riding
south at the head of a posse. But this was no posse of three or four
fugitives, scouting anxiously around through the hills; it numbered
ten fighting men, and they rode down by the main trail from the north.
Winchester Bassett was still with him and Grimes, the sheepman; the
others were strangers to Hall.

"Hello!" hailed Meshackatee, when Hall showed himself above them. "Come
down and tell us what you know."

They halted on the trail and after Hall had shaken hands Meshackatee
drew him aside.

"Where you been?" he said. "Still gunning for Isham? Well, we've got
him holed up like a fox. Grimes came down here last week with a
bunch of Latter Day Saints; and we busted him, by grab, over night.
Or at least, Grimes did--I wasn't in on the deal--not officially. It
was a dirty job, anyway--they hung that little kid that we caught up
Horse-thief Canyon. No, not the one that cried--that nervy little
devil that stood up and told us where to go to. He was too damned
nervy--that's the trouble."

"And are you going back?" demanded Hall, "to repeat the performance?
Because if you are----"

"Oh, no, no!" protested Meshackatee, "that was too durned raw for me.
And besides, I'm an officer of the law. This is a regularly appointed
posse of deputy sheriffs, and we're going to serve a warrant on Isham."

"You'll never do it!" declared Hall. "I've been watching him for
two days and he never goes away from the Rock House. And he's got
twenty-two men, not counting himself and Elmo--that bunch could stand
off an army."

"Yes, they could so," admitted Meshackatee, "they's no use denying
it. But Grimes and his men are so crazy to git at him that Winchester
and me have give up. They're going to storm that house, if it's the
last act of their lives--unless we can tole Isham out! Say, there's an
idee," he said, stopping to scratch his bearded chin, "I'll tell you
how I believe we can work it. We can let you go in first; and, unless
I'm greatly mistaken, he'll take after you like a bat out of hell."

"No he won't!" returned Hall. "I know him too well. And besides, I've
got a plan of my own. I don't want him to know I'm alive."

"No, but listen," insisted Meshackatee, "what do you care what he
knows, as long as we git 'im between the eyes? We'll lay the ambush
first and you lead him into it--we don't care, we'll take on the whole
bunch of 'em!"

"Well," began Hall, and Meshackatee grabbed him by the shoulder.

"That's the talk!" he said. "Come on!"

"No, I don't agree to that," answered Hall, shaking him off. "But I
tell you what I might do."

"Well, go ahead!" cried Meshackatee, dragging him back to the posse.
"Hey, boys, here's a man we can rely on. Go ahead, Hall, and tell us
your scheme."

"I've noticed," explained Hall as the posse gathered about him, "that
all the Scarborough men keep close to the house. They're afraid to go
out into the hills. But every time some neutral rides up to the store
they go over there, sooner or later, to get the news. Now, if you
gentleman will conceal yourself inside the foundation of that burned
house----"

"Hooray!" cheered Meshackatee, giving him a slap on the back, "I told
you he'd think up some scheme. And in the morning you can show up in
the open."

"I'll do more than that," answered Hall, "I'll ride in from the
south--alone. They'd be sure to scent a trap if they saw me there
already; but if I came in just at dawn, and rode away with some
provisions, I feel sure that some of them would follow. There's a
thousand dollars reward on my head."

"Aha!" cackled Grimes, who had been wagging his head in approval, "so
that's how bad they want ye!"

"Yes," nodded Hall, "but that's the very reason why we'll never lure
Isham himself. He'll hold back and let his gunmen do the riding."

"Well, we'll see," asserted Grimes, "and if Isham don't come out we'll
damned sure go in there and git him. D'ye remember what I told you when
he killed my boss herder? Well, I've got three of his cowboys already.
And I ain't started, man, don't you never forgit that--nor these
fellers here ain't started. Them Texans of his rode up to their ranches
and took the work-horses off of their plows. D'ye think they'll stand
for that? Not while there's a man above the Rim that can shoot!"

"Well, come on," broke in Meshackatee, "we'd better git out of here
before some neutral comes by and tips our hand. And to make it look
convincing, in case any one is watching, we'll turn around and ride
back north."

He led the way up the canyon and they camped in a pocket where they
could waylay every man that passed by; but the times were troublous
and not a soul came or went, to add to the Mormons' grim toll. They
were frankly out for blood and Hall made no protest, even when Grimes
taunted him about the boy they had hung. He was a boy, that was true,
but he had not heeded their warning; and they had caught him redhanded
again. Hall kept away from the posse, talking gravely with Winchester
who was now the last of the Bassetts; and that evening after dark they
took the trail to Maverick Basin, surrounding the store an hour past
midnight.

They found Johnson hiding in bed, trembling and begging for mercy,
for he remembered the fate of the night-guard; and long before dawn
they had schooled him in the part which he must act in the grim play
to come. When Hall rode up, Johnson was to step out and meet him and
stand talking so the Scarboroughs could see them; and then he was to
retreat and come out with provisions, which were to be tied on the back
of Hall's saddle. That was all, except at the end Johnson was to give
the watching Scarboroughs a signal--and if the signal did not work,
if the Scarboroughs refrained from coming, then the store-keeper was
to be hung as a traitor. And the posse meant it, too, as Johnson soon
divined; and besides, he had seen the three cowboys.

Hall rode away north with the men who were to guard the horses, and
as the false dawn appeared he took to the brush, coming out past the
Bassett place at daylight. The hounds, as he had expected, suddenly
rushed out at him baying; and as he spurred rapidly away they set up
such a barking that the Scarborough dogs took up the cry. In the
distance he could see them running out from the Rock House and as the
uproar continued the kitchen door swung open and a woman stepped boldly
out. It was Miz Zoolah, and she would know him by his horse--the stage
was set for the play.

He rode up to the store, without glancing at the stone foundation
which sheltered Winchester Bassett and three Mormons, and Johnson came
tottering out the door. His face was ghastly white and his watery eyes
were swimming; but Meshackatee from inside the door was coaching him
like a prompter and he stumbled through his part.

"Why, howdy do, Mr. Hall," he fawned. "Git down, git down!" And Hall
replied in kind. They held a short conversation, then Hall ordered his
provisions and sat watching the Rock House while he waited. There was
movement there now and well he knew the glasses that were focussed
on his form; but he took the matter coolly, tying the provisions on
behind, and motioned Johnson to go back to the store. Then he rode off
to the north, leaving the leaven to do its work, yet half hoping that
Isham would be spared. For when Isham met his fate Hall wanted to be
present--he wanted to launch his black soul into hell; but now he was
only the bait of the trap--live bait, to lure the fox from his den.

From his hiding-place inside the store Meshackatee watched through his
glasses as the outlaws in the Rock House began to swarm; and when they
went for their horses he relayed the news to Winchester, who was in
command of the men behind the wall. Grimes remained in the store, to
back up Meshackatee when he called upon the Scarboroughs to surrender;
and four men were with the horses, which were hidden behind a hill out
of sight from possible raiders. They had learned their parts well, not
a man moved or spoke more than to give orders to the terror-stricken
Johnson; and as he tottered wretchedly about, chopping wood and drawing
water, they waited like cats by a hole.

An hour passed and Johnson came inside, for Meshackatee distrusted
him still; and as the Scarboroughs milled about without making any
start, Grimes took up a grim watch over the store-keeper. He had been
seen to make his signals, which he claimed meant all was well; but the
Scarboroughs, instead of coming, were gathered in a bunch, apparently
engaged in hot argument. Perhaps after all the store-keeper was nervier
than he looked, he might even have signaled them a warning; and in that
case the posse would find themselves besieged and left in a perilous
state. For the first thing that would happen would be the loss of their
horses, and along with the horses four men; and to be set afoot in a
strange and hostile country was disaster enough in itself. But if these
things should happen Grimes already had the rope which was to hang the
treacherous store-keeper.

There was a turmoil at the Rock House, men mounted and stepped down
again; and finally, after starting in a body for the store, all but
two of the gunmen turned back. These came on at a gallop, spurring and
swinging their quirts, and as they thundered up the trail Meshackatee
focussed his glasses and spoke through the doorway to Winchester.

"Here comes Elmo," he said, "and some other crazy fool. Kill the both
of them if they go for their guns. But remember--we're deputies! And
don't nobody shoot till I say: 'Surrender, in the name of the law!'"

He put up his glasses and turned to the storekeeper, who stood like a
man in a dream.

"Step out, Mr. Johnson," he ordered coldly. "Can't you see them two
customers coming?"

"But--but you're going to kill them!" protested Johnson in a frenzy.

"Git out there!" cursed Grimes, grabbing him roughly by the neck, "and
you stand up to it, or I'll shoot you in the back!"

Johnson drew a great breath and stepped out the door just as the
horsemen came galloping up. In the lead came Elmo, setting his horse up
to make a show; but the man who was behind him reined his horse in more
warily, glancing quickly about as he stopped. Meshackatee peeped out
through a loop-hole, nodded his head at Grimes, and stepped to the side
of the doorway.

"Who's in there?" demanded Elmo, hearing the quick stir of feet, and
Meshackatee threw up his gun.

"Surrender!" he shouted, "in the name of the----"

_Bang!_ went Grimes' rifle and Elmo lopped forward, shot dead by the
heavy .45. The man behind made a grab for his carbine, then whirled his
horse to flee; but before he could start there was a volley from the
foundation and he pitched off, still clutching at his gun. The horse
raced away, pitching and kicking at the saddlegun, which hung flopping,
half-drawn from the scabbard; and this was the messenger of defeat for
the Scarboroughs--another empty saddle coming home. They who lived by
the sword had perished by the sword--the ambushers had run into an
ambush. And in this last disaster Isham Scarborough read his doom. When
the morning came again he was gone.




CHAPTER XXVI

THE MAN-TRAP


The Scarborough gang disappeared over night, disappeared and was lost
track of completely, and its dissolution was as complete as that
of a bubble which suddenly explodes and is gone. The outlaws and
horse-thieves who had so terrorized the country, carrying their trade
as far as Wyoming and Texas, took to the hills and were gone, leaving
the stock they had stolen to be rounded up and restored by Meshackatee.
In the corrals by the Rock House horses and cattle awaited their
owners; and the Rock House itself, once the holdout of the gang, became
the abode of Tonto County deputies. But Isham himself, the wolf who had
turned fox, was lost and could not be found.

He had started west, taking the trail to the Geronimo, and somewhere
on the way he had disappeared. For hundreds of miles along the base of
the Rim, and for thousands of square miles along its top, there was a
forest of pines as unbroken as the first wilderness, as untracked as
the Arctic regions. Once out of the trail a man was lost to all pursuit
but, knowing his directions, he was free to ride on as he pleased until
he came to the edge of the forest. Into this covert of trees and
brush Isham had slipped like a weasel, leaving his wife to ride on to
Geronimo; but McIvor cut his trail at last, and, after a month of hard
riding, he too rode into Geronimo. For the wolf, now turned fox, had
doubled on his tracks and taken shelter within the shadow of the law.

There had been a time when Isham had scoffed at the law, but that was
in Tonto County. Geronimo County was different, and there was also a
sharp rivalry between the mountain and valley counties. Geronimo was
down in the valley, a land of heat and broad canals and alfalfa fields
stretching away for miles, and its people were peaceably inclined; but
the mountainous Tonto had achieved an unenviable reputation as the
home of horse-thieves and outlaws. The Geronimo papers had made the
most of his outlawry but Isham had reckoned well when he depended upon
local jealousy to protect him from the hand of the law. No Tonto County
deputy could arrest him in Geronimo, and he knew that no Geronimo
deputy would. And to add to his security it soon became evident that
Tonto was glad to get rid of him. The county was bankrupt already from
trying to convict him and it was content to let sleeping dogs lie.

This much McIvor learned before he had been in town an hour--and
then he experienced a shock. A tall man that he knew sauntered into
the saloon and regarded him out of the tail of his eye--it was Burge
Masters, one of the Scarborough gunmen. He took a drink and sauntered
out, and as Hall sat at a card table another tall Texan walked in.

"Say," he said, coming over to where Hall sat, "haven't I seen you
before around here somewhere?"

"Why, not that I know of," responded Hall, and looked him
over carefully. He belonged to a breed that he knew all too
well--heavy-jawed, with high cheek-bones and narrowed eyes--he was
a gunman, straight from Texas. But what was he doing here in this
peaceful farming community? The answer was in his eyes. He was there
for a purpose and that purpose, for some reason, was not unconnected
with him, Hall.

"That your horse out there?" inquired the Texan abruptly, "blue roan
with a slit in one ear? Well, I'll have you to know you _stole_ 'im!"

He struck the table and Hall glanced up at him quickly, but he did not
make a move.

"You are mistaken, my friend," he answered at last, and the Texan
turned away. Hall stepped out the door after him, just in time to see
three Texans making a critical examination of his roan. And then it
flashed over him, the old Scarborough trick which Isham had attempted
at Cold Spring. They were trying to prove him a horse-thief. He stood
and watched them, stamping their faces on his memory, and at last they
slouched away. But he had the answer now--they were still Scarborough
gunmen, and they knew he had come with a purpose. What that purpose
was he would admit to no man; but they knew, and Isham would know. He
was there to kill the last of the Scarboroughs.

Even if he were not superstitious the appearance of Hall McIvor would
send the chill of fear over Isham; for the blue roan which he rode had
lured Red to his death, and then horse and man had lured Elmo. It was
like the shadow of a raven, the heavy winging of Death itself, to see
that drooping roan at the horse-rack, and as McIvor watched the street
he was conscious of tense faces that seemed to divine his mission.
Perhaps it was his clothes, torn by riding through the brush, or the
stern set look in his eyes; but he could tell by their looks that these
strangers knew all about him, although now they studiously ignored
him. Even the Texans kept away from him, retreating to the saloon
across the street; but he knew what was in their hearts. There was a
thousand-dollar reward on his head.

Not for nothing had Burge Masters' friend slapped the table insultingly
and accused him of being a horse-thief; they were out for the reward
and if he refused to fight there were other ways of embroiling him.
Hall sensed mischief in the air and yet he was puzzled--they seemed to
be prepared for his coming. Where before there had been one Texan now
there were eight or ten, all armed and watching him closely; and as
he mounted his tired horse and rode him down to the corral he saw two
of them swing up and start after him. Then he knew it--he had ridden
into a trap. Isham had assembled his gunmen and made all things ready,
and then let his presence be known; and McIvor, following blindly, had
ridden into an ambush, right there in that peaceful, farming town. If
he fled, they would follow him; and if he stayed--well, then it would
be ten to one.

He rode down to the feed corral and looked it over closely, then
summoned the proprietor from his office.

"Put this horse in a box stall," he directed, "and don't let any person
go near him. I want to leave him saddled--and I'll hold you personally
responsible if he isn't right here when I want him."

"All right, pardner," answered the livery-stable keeper, "I suppose the
horse is yours?"

"Yes, and here's the bill of sale."

Hall took out the bill of sale which he had carefully preserved and
showed it to the worldly-wise proprietor, who nodded and passed it back.

"Kee-reck," he remarked. "'Be sure you're right,' sez I, 'and then go
ahead.' Your horse will be here when you call for him."

The Texans had disappeared when Hall returned to the main street, but
he sat with his back to the wall. It was a habit he had acquired in
just such towns as this, when the clans had gathered for court-day.
But here all was different, the air was furnace-hot and strange
birds fluttered about through the palms; there was the smell of
desert greasewood, the rank tang of arrow-weed and the fragrance of
sun-ripened hay. Heavy wagons dragged past, loaded with wheat for the
flour mill which stood at the edge of the river-bottom; long-haired
Indians strode by, their bare feet whispering along the sidewalk, and
Mexicans sat smoking on their heels. There were ranchers in sweaty
shirts and faded-out overalls, and the usual collection of bums; but
the Texans were gone and as evening came on Hall retired to his room
above the saloon.

Here was a new problem, new conditions, a conspiracy on foot to draw
him into a quarrel; and he wondered rather wearily if it would not be
better to withdraw and come in again. Isham Scarborough had rented a
ranch several miles out of town and was reported to be harvesting his
wheat; he was forewarned now and if Hall rode to his ranch he would
expose his hand to no purpose. And then the hired gunmen, who even now
were dogging his footsteps, would find the opportunity they sought. He
would be shot down from ambush, somewhere along the road, and Isham
would escape unscathed. Every circumstance was against him, but now
he could not flee, for they would hunt him down like a rabbit. All he
could do was to stand pat and wait.

In towns like Geronimo there is but one place to wait and Hall found
himself back in the saloon. The Keno was the largest by far in the city
and there he would find company and friends. It was a protection, in a
way, to mingle with the crowd that gathered to gamble and drink; and if
the Texans came to gang him these men of the valley would see that he
had fair play. So as the evening came on, making the darkened streets
dangerous, he drifted back into the Keno; and to pass away the time he
ventured small sums at roulette, always keeping one eye on the door.
And then they came in, not eight or ten of them, but fifteen or twenty
armed Texans; and a hush settled over the room.

The skitter of the roulette balls sounded with painful distinctness;
and drunken men, wrangling in an uproar, heard their voices break
through and rise high in the sudden silence. Texans were rare in
Geronimo, they almost never came there, and especially in the heat of
summer; and these swashbucklers from Tonto were known for what they
were, though their purpose that night was still a mystery. All the
Arizonans knew was that they were out to make trouble--Hall knew they
had come to get him. They called for the drinks and then scattered
through the room, some watching the crap-games, others losing a dollar
at roulette, but gradually closing in. A hand, coming from nowhere,
reached out to steal his pistol; another man jostled him from behind,
but as the gang surged towards him Hall slipped between two tables and
stood with his back to the wall.

There was a pause, in which crap dealers slid down softly beneath their
tables and the rest of the assembly stood frozen, and then Hall spoke
to the nearest of the gang.

"What can I do for you, my friend?" he asked with deceptive quietness,
and the nerve of the Texan broke.

"Have a drink!" he guffawed, turning and heading for the bar; but Burge
Masters stepped out in his place.

"We want you," he said, "and you might as well come quietly. If you
don't----"

"I won't come," stated Hall.

There was another pause, and the crowd by the door suddenly ducked
and charged out into the street; then, after an interval, another
crowd surged in, and in the lead strode Wahoo Meshackatee. He had a
gun in each hand and when he saw the Texans he started, then glanced
inquiringly at McIvor.

"Well, hello!" he exclaimed, "what's going on here, anyhow? Have I
broke in on a little family party?"

Burge Masters turned his head but he did not speak and his men began to
shuffle away.

"Oh, nothing much," he mumbled, and Meshackatee beckoned to Hall, then
held up his hand to the bar-keeper.

"Have a drink, boys," he said. "Your faces seem familiar. Long time
since I've seen a live Texan."

They looked at him and winced, for they knew what he meant, and
suddenly all the fight went out them.

"Well," grumbled Masters, and they drank in stony silence then turned
and filed out of the door.




CHAPTER XXVII

WINCHESTER TAKES THE LONG CHANCE


"What you doing down here?" demanded Meshackatee of Hall as soon as he
could draw him aside. "And what was that--a Horse-thieves' Reunion?"

"Those are Scarborough gunmen," answered Hall behind his hand. "We're
lucky to get off alive."

"_You're_ lucky," corrected Meshackatee. "But say, have you seen
Winchester? The rascal is down here, somewhere."

"Let's find him!" exclaimed Hall, and started for the door, but
Meshackatee drew him back.

"Keep inside," he advised. "Them Teehannos will pot you if you
show yourself in the door. Leave 'im alone--I ain't worried about
Winchester."

"But this town is dangerous," protested McIvor. "We three ought to get
together. I believe there's a reward--and a big one too--on the head of
every one of us."

"Come over here in the corner," beckoned Meshackatee, and they took
seats at a table in the rear. "Now listen," he said, "we stay here all
night. You're dead right--the damned burg is dangerous. These officers
in town, the city marshal and such, have crept plumb under the house.
It's Texas Day--or was. But here's the hell of it--I've got it straight
enough they're jest waiting for one of us to leave. We're safe, here
in town, but the minute we leave--well, I'm thinking about writing my
will."

"I can't understand it," said McIvor at last, "and yet, in a way, I
can. Miz Zoolah came ahead and hired all these gunmen and then Isham
broke cover and joined her. He's got a ranch out here somewhere----"

"That's where Winchester is," whispered Meshackatee. "They don't know
he's come down. He's out looking over the ground."

"Just where is this ranch?" asked Hall after a pause, and when
Meshackatee told him he fell silent. The night dragged on slowly and
the games of chance closed, they watched and slept by turns; but as
the morning drew near Hall rose up quietly and slipped out by the back
way to the corral. In the box stall he found his horse and led him
quickly to the street, then mounted and rode off through the darkness.
Something told him to go back, to turn and ride for the hills, to
seek out Allifair and never come back; but something else urged him
on, something warned him to strike now, before his enemies could kill
him by treachery. In the river-bottom silt his horse's feet were
muffled, he threaded the ghostly roadways in silence; and at the fourth
cross-road south he turned to the west, taking shelter beneath the
blackness of tall cottonwoods.

It was the darkness before the dawn when he sighted the place and knew
it by the baying of hounds and, finding some waste land nearby covered
with mesquite trees and high weeds, he took cover and waited for the
light. But now that he was still his heart grew sick and he almost
repented of his purpose. A little more patience, a few more days of
grace, and Meshackatee or Winchester might kill Isham. But no, that was
wrong, for even in one day Isham's gunmen might shoot down all three of
them. The time to strike was now, before they had recovered from their
surprise and had a chance to lay other plans; and the man to strike was
Isham, the head and front of the gang, the man whose cunning and hate
urged them on. Three times already Hall had set out to kill him and
each time had been diverted from his purpose. This time he would die if
he failed.

As the sun came up he crept to the edge of the wild land and searched
the Scarborough ranch with his glasses; and already they were astir,
loading some wheat sacks on a hay-wagon, rearranging them, making a
trench down the middle. He lay watching them curiously, trying to
divine their zealous interest in the loading of that grist for the
mill; but when the horses were hitched up he was suddenly enlightened,
for Isham climbed up on the load. It was a traveling fort, a barricade
on wheels; and as he settled down and took the reins they handed him
up his guns and opened the gate to the road. Men that Hall had not
seen now appeared from their ambush, hurrying to catch up their mounts
and follow; and while they were saddling Isham drove out the gate and
turned his team towards town.

Hall drew back from his lookout and ran to his horse, then hurried to
a place by the road; but as the wagon came toward him he could see
nothing but Isham's feet--he was concealed behind a wall of solid
wheat. He hesitated, for there were loop-holes between the piled-up
sacks and Isham would have him at his mercy; and yet, if he allowed
this chance to slip by----. He crouched back, confused and distrait.
But while he weighed the chances against him there was a stir across
the road, a rush and a breaking of brush; and from the cover of the
mesquite thicket a horseman burst out and went charging down on the
wagon. Isham rose up to scramble back, but the horseman was upon him,
he fired twice, never slackening his pace; and then, without a pause he
reined back into the brush and went plunging away through the trees.
Hall drew back trembling--it was Winchester Bassett, and who ever knew
Winchester to miss?

At the shooting the heavy farm-team shied and cramped the wheels, but
now with reins dangling they went galloping up the road, spilling
off grain-sacks in their terrified flight. There was a yell from the
ranch-house, the patter of pursuing hoof-beats; and as the Texans
dashed past, Hall ran for his horse and was lost in the thicket of
mesquites. Isham Scarborough was dead and Winchester had killed him,
but there was still the law to be reckoned with. There would be a
search for the murderer, a hue-and-cry through the wastelands, perhaps
later a marking down of tracks; and while Winchester had fired the
shots it would go hard with Hall if he were caught near the scene of
the crime. Winchester had counted his life as nothing, charging out
like a whirlwind and winning by his very audacity; but now he would
flee as swiftly as he had come, leaving nothing but his horse-tracks
by the road. Hall spurred through the thickets and came out on a
section-line, but as he was about to take flight he paused.

Back in the corner of the Keno, watched over only by his dog, the
big-hearted Meshackatee was sleeping across the table, unsuspecting of
the storm about to burst. In their rage at Isham's death the Texans
might shoot him down, or have the officers take him in charge; and the
devilish spite of Miz Zoolah was still to be reckoned with--she, too,
might hire him killed for revenge. Hall turned his horse towards town
and went galloping up a side street just as the first Texans, riding
alongside the wagon, came shouting the news up the street. There was
a rush of curious people and the saloon was deserted when Hall burst
in through the back door. Even the bar-keepers were gone, and if
Meshackatee had gone with them----Hall stepped to the swinging doors.

The wagon had stopped in the middle of the street and the people were
swarming around it; and up on the broad platform, now cleared of its
wheat, Miz Zoolah was standing above Isham.

"He's dead!" she announced, as men scrambled to lift the body, "leave
'im alone, I tell ye; he's dead. But I know who killed him, and if
there's an ounce of manhood in any of you, you'll ride till you ketch
Hall McIvor. He's riding a blue roan and----"

Hall ducked through the door and made a run out the back way, but as he
mounted he took a second thought. He had not killed Isham Scarborough,
and it could not be proved--there was no one to stand witness against
him; but if he fled for the hills and was pursued and brought back the
fact would be used against him. And if the Texans led the posse, as
they undoubtedly would, it would end in a fight to the death. He reined
his horse back and rode straight to the court-house, where he gave
himself up to the sheriff.




CHAPTER XXVIII

THE HONOR OF THE McIVORS


Isham Scarborough was dead but the Scarborough gang still lived, and
soon what had long been suspected was proven--Miz Zoolah had been its
brains. Isham had put up the bluff, the loud talk and the rough work,
but she had done the thinking which had directed his coarse violence
along the ways of destruction and death. And, since she was its head,
the gang still lived on, to carry out her will to the end. She it was
who had laid the man-trap at Geronimo, to net the last of her husband's
enemies; and though Hall was in jail and so safe from open violence,
even there he felt the breath of her hatred. She appeared at his cell
door, to positively identify him before she swore out a warrant against
him; and the look in her pale eyes was as baleful as a rattlesnake's
when it raises its head to strike.

"That's the man," she said, "I'd swear to him anywhere. He's the man
that killed my husband."

And before the Justice of the Peace, when he was arraigned for
examination, she accused him with passionate hate.

"He's a McIvor!" she cried, "his father killed my brother and my elder
sister's son! And now he's killed my husband--he shot him from ambush,
but I reached him before he died. He had fallen from the wagon and when
I raised his head he whispered:

"'Hall killed me--Hall McIvor!' And then he fell back, dead!"

That was all her testimony, the only thing that held him and the one
thing that could not be shaken; and he was bound over to the Grand
Jury, which held him for trial at the pending session of court. But
_had_ Isham spoken these words before he died? In the dreary days that
followed Hall debated it, pro and con; but he knew and she knew that,
as long as she swore to it, it might as well be the fact. For Isham was
dead, there were no other witnesses; and it was a question of veracity
between Miz Zoolah and himself, with the odds in favor of the woman. He
was shut up in a cell, without a single friend to consult with or to
carry a message to Allifair; but she was at large, with a band of Texas
gunmen to see that his friends did not come.

Meshackatee could help him, but Hall knew in his heart that Meshackatee
dared not come; the man-trap was still set and he would not escape
again as he had when he first came to town. And Allifair could help,
for she had heard Isham's threats and his offer of a reward for his
death; but the moment she appeared her aunt would seize upon her and
make her a virtual prisoner. Winchester Bassett could help most, if he
happened to be so minded; but he had escaped to the hills, riding a
relay of swift horses, and established a perfect alibi. On the very
day of the killing he had been seen in Maverick Basin, a hundred and
twenty miles away. So the whole matter stood and Hall waited in silence
until the day of his trial came at last.

A thousand times, as he lay sweltering in the heat, breathing the dead,
sickly air of his prison, he thought of Allifair, hidden away in their
eagles' nest and watching the empty trail. How many times as the two
long months dragged by must she have thought he was wounded or killed;
and yet there was no one but Meshackatee that he would trust with a
message, for Miz Zoolah was still on the watch. Somewhere, she knew,
Hall had hidden away Allifair, and she had her spies even in the jail;
and rather than expose her to the wrath of the Randolphs, Hall left
Allifair to wait on alone. How she would live he could only guess, for
her supplies would be exhausted; but he imagined her at dawn gathering
grass-seeds and piñon-nuts or bringing back turkeys from her traps. He
imagined her roasting acorns to grind them up for coffee and ranging
like a quail to find berries, even gnawing the bark of trees or cooking
mescal heads to break the dead monotony of her diet. Yet even that
was better he said in his heart than to fall into the clutches of Miz
Zoolah.

He went to his trial like a man in a dream following the sheriff up
the narrow winding stairs; but when he entered the crowded courtroom
with its bank of auditors standing behind he swept the sea of faces
with keen eyes. Here were the men that were to try him, the men of
Geronimo; for what they thought would be reflected by the jury which
would be called to sit on his case. The jury would cast the ballot
but The People would decide for thought is as fluid as air. It passes
from man to man despite the menace of bailiffs and the charges of the
court commanding silence; and the opinion of the majority finds its
expression at last when the foreman says: "Guilty" or "Not Guilty."

Hall plead "Not Guilty," and he plead according to fact, for his hand
was innocent of the crime; yet so intimate is the connection between
what we think and what we are that somehow he felt himself the killer.
He had come to Geronimo to kill Isham or be killed; he had ridden
to his ranch to waylay him; and only the intervention of Winchester
Bassett had kept him from accomplishing his purpose. Not that he held
himself to blame, for the teachings of a lifetime made him consider
such an act as praiseworthy; but the look in his eyes was that of a
man-killer who seeks no excuse for his crime. And the men of Geronimo,
being a hardy band of citizens, looked on in grim approval. According
to their code he had committed no crime--he had fought a fair fight and
won.

Being questioned he admitted that on the morning of the killing he had
been present at the scene of the crime, he acknowledged his connection
with the Maverick Basin War and his grudge against the deceased;
but he denied most vigorously that he had fired the shots that had
resulted in the death of Isham. All this he did voluntarily, in the
form of a statement, and then he sat down and waited. There was a stir
in the crowd and Mrs. Scarborough stepped forward, swathed in black to
emphasize her widowhood; but when she began to talk she threw back the
long veil and her eyes became set with hate. Question after question
was asked and answered, the time and place were fully established; and
then the District Attorney asked the one crucial question:

"And what did your husband say?"

"He said," she said passionately: "'Hall killed me--Hall McIvor!'"

And then she turned and looked at him.

"That is all," nodded the District Attorney, and rested his case, at
which there was another stir in the crowd. Hall turned with the rest,
and when he saw Meshackatee's huge head, his broad shoulders and
curling black beard, he smiled for the first time that day.

"I call that man for my witness," he said to the Judge, but there was
another surprise in store for him. Following close behind Meshackatee
and concealed by his great bulk came Allifair Randolph, smiling. He
sprang up to meet her, but the bailiff snatched him back, the District
Attorney shouted out some protest; and then, still held apart, they
gave greeting with their eyes while the crowd rose up and gaped. Here
was the woman in the case, the woman we always look for, the one we are
directed to find; and when she stepped into the witness box, her face
radiant with love, the jury gazed about in wonder. But when they saw
the glare in the eyes of Mrs. Scarborough they read the whole story
at a glance. This case that they were trying was not a plain killing,
it was battle between women as well; and when women are involved, as
the jury knew full well, the facts are often thrown to the winds. Even
the sanctity of the oath is lightly disregarded and passion pulls down
reason from its throne; but now they leaned forward to listen with open
mind, as the Judge had so carefully instructed them.

Allifair, being questioned, explained the feud behind a feud--the
Randolph-McIvor war and its relation to the battle which had ended
in the death of Isham. Hall's lawyer repeated the questions as Hall
whispered them into his ear, and after she had told of the opposition
to their marriage the lawyer suddenly saw a way out.

"And do I understand," he asked, "that the complaining witness, Mrs.
Scarborough, is a member of the Randolph clan? Well, please inform the
jury if at any time, to your knowledge, she threatened the life of the
defendant."

"Yes," answered Allifair. "One night he came to meet me and while we
were talking my aunt crept up behind us and threatened to shoot him
with a pistol. And when I interfered she said she would kill _me_
before she would let me marry a McIvor."

"And do you consider that this prejudice, this clan feeling as a
Randolph, would render it impossible for your aunt to give fair
testimony where the life of the defendant was at stake?"

"I object!" spoke up the District Attorney; but the judge overruled him
and Allifair answered the question.

"I believe she would say anything, or do anything," she replied, "that
would keep us from being married."

"That is all," smiled the lawyer, and summoned Meshackatee; but before
he took the stand Meshackatee whispered to the bailiff, who turned and
looked sharply into the audience.

"Your honor," began Meshackatee, as the bailiff seemed to hesitate, "I
have reason to believe that a band of armed men have come into court
here to kill me. I refer particularly to that bunch of bad Texans."

He jerked his thumb in the direction of the front seats where the
Scarborough gunmen under the direction of Burge Masters sat glaring
with narrowed eyes.

"Search the gentlemen," ordered the Judge, "and while you are about it,
remove that pistol from the witness."

The bailiff rapped for silence and the Judge went on sternly. "At the
first sign of disturbance I will order the courtroom cleared. Any who
wish may now leave the room."

The gunmen rose up, drawing their coats over their pistols, and filed
sullenly out of court.

"Thank you, Judge," bowed Meshackatee, turning his belt over to the
bailiff, and he stepped ponderously up into the witness chair.

"I am a deputy sheriff of Tonto County," he replied to the lawyer's
first question. "Yes, I know the defendant well. He served as a deputy
during the Maverick Basin trouble, and is a gentleman of the highest
integrity. Yes, I have often heard him say that he disapproved of all
feuds and especially of the Randolph-McIvor war. His sole object, so
he informed me, in entering Maverick Basin was to rescue and marry
Miss Randolph. She was being held, practically as a prisoner, by Mrs.
Scarborough."

Hall's lawyer was beginning to beam, the jury exchanged glances; and as
Meshackatee went on to show Miz Zoolah's prejudice against McIvor, she
rose up and left the room. Allifair nodded to Hall and smiled, even the
Judge began to unbend; but as he was making a ruling Hall sprang to his
feet and pointed towards the door.

"Your Honor!" he cried, "I want that woman restrained. I have reason to
believe----"

"Sit down!" ordered the Judge, and as Hall obeyed Mrs. Scarborough came
swiftly down the aisle. Her face was half concealed beneath the veil of
heavy crêpe that hung from her widow's bonnet, but her right hand was
hidden beneath the folds of a black shawl which she had thrown about
her shoulders. And something about her step as she came down towards
him warned Hall of the murder in her heart.

"This is not Kentucky," went on the Judge severely, "nor is it Maverick
Basin. You are safe in the custody of the court."

Hall rose up again and glanced helplessly about, then dropped his hands
by his side.

"Very well," he replied, and as Mrs. Scarborough swept by him he turned
and met her eye. "I have never struck a woman yet," he said, and her
thin lips parted in a sneer.

"No," she answered, and while they gazed at her fascinated she whipped
out a pistol, full-cocked. "I'll show you!" she cried, and, pressing
it against his breast, she gave the trigger a jerk. But the gun only
snapped; for her widow's veil, hanging down from her bonnet, had caught
on the hammer and fouled it. She struggled to release it, to cock and
fire again; and Hall turned his eyes on the Judge.

"And I never will," he added, "not even to save my life."

"Seize that woman!" shouted the Judge, suddenly roused from the
paralysis which had frozen every man in his place; but the bailiff
had come to life first. He struck the gun to one side and crushed Miz
Zoolah's arms to her sides, and as she fought like a wild-cat others
rushed in to help him, while the crowd stampeded through the doors.

"I'll git you!" she shrieked, her pale eyes blazing with rage as
McIvor stood smiling before her--but his smile was not for her.
Allifair had stood fast and now she came running to throw herself into
his arms.

"God has saved you!" she sobbed, and he bowed his head.

"Yes," he said. "Saved me for you."

They stood locked in each other's arms, oblivious of the spectators,
unconscious of what was going on; and when they looked about the clerk
was piling up his books and the District Attorney was speaking.

"If the court please," he said, "the conduct of the complaining
witness has destroyed the value, in my opinion, of her testimony; and
I therefore ask the court to direct an acquittal, since no jury would
convict on such evidence."

As court was adjourned he came over and shook hands, wishing them all
the happiness in life; and Hall and Allifair were still receiving
congratulations when Meshackatee came hurrying back.

"Well, come on; come on!" he boomed, "we've got her locked up in jail.
And I'll say right now she's half red and the other half stinging
scorpion. So if you're going to git married you'd better do it
quick, before she breaks down the bars. I'll give the bride away, if
you'll excuse these clothes; but by grab if them scoundrels hadn't
jinglebobbed my ears I'd've stole Miss Allifair myself. A prettier
woman--or a braver woman, either--I never expect to see. She lived up
in them cliff-dwellings for nigh onto two months; and when I come by
there----Well, I'll go and git the license. There's the Judge there,
trying to flag you."

The Judge indeed was beckoning them to his chambers, and when they had
entered he gave Hall his hand while Allifair looked on, smiling.

"Mr. McIvor," he said, "I owe you an apology. And allow me to retract
what I said about Kentucky, a state which may well be proud of you.
Whatever she may lack in respect for the law, you have learned there
a chivalry and a reverence for womankind which I never expected to
witness. If you and Miss Randolph will do me the honor I shall be happy
to officiate at your marriage."

Hall hesitated a moment and glanced down at Allifair, who blushed and
nodded her head.

"We thank you, Judge," he said, "and since you have referred to
Kentucky, let me say that our marriage will end the greatest feud that
has ever existed in that state. The Randolphs and McIvors have fought
for twenty years, and our code may seem different from yours; but
despite our lawless acts we McIvors love truth and justice and hold our
honor above our lives."

"You have shown," declared the Judge, "that that is no idle phrase--I
can see that it comes from your heart. But why, if I may ask, did you
refuse to strike that woman? Would you stand there and allow her to
kill you?"

"No gentleman----" began Hall, and then he stopped and met Allifair's
unbelieving gaze. "She was a Randolph," he said, and bowed. "Oh,
Hall!" reproached Allifair, suddenly clutching at his hand, and then
her eyes softened and she smiled.

"The Randolphs love honor, too," she said. "They will learn to forgive
us--now."

END




BY THE SAME AUTHOR


 THE FIGHTING FOOL
   A Tale of the Western Frontier

 SILVER AND GOLD
   A Story of Luck and Lore in a
     Western Mining Camp

 WUNPOST


E.P. DUTTON & COMPANY



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