CHAPTER XXVIII

THE RECKONING

Thorne's last load of wheat had been hauled in, and he had duly met his obligations, when he drove into Graham's Bluff early one evening. The days were rapidly getting shorter, and though it was not yet dark there was a chill in the air, and here and there a light blinked in the window of a store. Odd groups of loiterers stood about the sidewalk or strolled along the rutted street, for it was Saturday evening, and now that harvest was generally over the outlying farmers had driven in to purchase provisions or to gather any news that might be had, in accordance with their usual custom. It was about their only relaxation, and of late a supplementary mail arrived on Saturdays, which was another excuse for the visit.

Thorne was in an unusually optimistic mood. He had left his troubles behind him, there was an alluring prospect opening out ahead, and he expected to meet Alison and Mrs. Farquhar at the hotel. Besides, he had driven fast, and the swift motion had stirred his blood. He answered with a cheerful laugh when some of the loungers called to him. As he drove by one corner Corporal Slaney raised a greeting hand, and Thorne, wondering what he was doing there, waved his whip. It was, as a rule, only when he had some particular business on hand that the corporal was seen at Graham's Bluff. Supper had been over some time when Thorne stopped his team at the back of the hotel, and getting down handed it over to a man who came out from the stable.

"Has the mail-carrier got in yet, Bill?" he asked.

"No; he's most an hour behind his usual time. Guess you're late, too. They've cleared the tables quite a while ago."

"I got supper with Forrester as I came along. I suppose you haven't any idea as to what has brought Slaney over?"

Bill grinned.

"It is my opinion that's about the one thing Slaney's not going to explain, though he was in the stable talking, and I saw him looking kind of curious at Lucy Calvert. She's in town, and so is Mrs. Hunter. She came in alone, but somebody told me that Hunter had ridden round by Hall's place and would be along by and by."

"Are there any of my other friends about?"

"I don't know if you'd call Nevis one, but he's in the hotel; when I last saw him he looked powerful mad. Mrs. Hunter had pulled up before the dry-goods store when he walked up and started to talk to her. I don't know what she said to him, but it kind of struck me she'd have liked to lay into him with the whip, and Nevis came back across the road mighty quick. After that Mrs. Farquhar drove in with Miss Leigh and left word that you were to wait at the hotel."

Bill paused a moment and grinned at Thorne mischievously.

"Guess they didn't want you trailing round after them in the dry-goods store. Looks as if they'd been buying quite a lot, for it's most half an hour since they went in. The lawyer man who came to see Miss Leigh has gone off up the street."

"The lawyer man!" exclaimed Thorne in some astonishment, for, though he could guess what Alison was buying, the last piece of news roused his interest.

"Parsons--from somewhere down the line. He has been in the settlement once or twice lately. Wanted to know where Miss Leigh was, and when she'd be back again."

Thorne, without asking any more questions, walked round to the front of the hotel, where he found Nevis talking to several farmers on the veranda. He was inclined to think the man had not noticed his arrival, and sitting down he took out his pipe without greeting him. He had treated Nevis to a somewhat forcible expression of opinion when he had met Grantly's note a few days earlier, and they had by no means parted on friendly terms. Soon after he sat down Symonds, the hotel-keeper, came out on the veranda.

"Are you going to stay here to-night, Mr. Nevis?" he inquired.

"Yes," said Nevis. "I didn't intend to when I drove in, but I think I'll stop over until Monday morning. I'll drive on to Hunter's place after breakfast then."

Thorne, remembering what Bill had told him, wondered how far Nevis's meeting with Mrs. Hunter might explain his change of mind. He could think of no very definite reason that would warrant the conjecture, but a stream of light from the room behind the veranda fell on the man's face and its expression suggested vindictive malice. Just then two or three newcomers strolled on to the veranda, and a teamster, who had been sitting at the farther side of it, moved toward Nevis.

"What do you want to go to Hunter's for?" he asked bluntly. "You and he haven't had any dealings since he beat you out of the creamery."

Thorne watched Nevis closely, and imagined that the ominous look in his face grew plainer still.

"Well," he said, with a jarring laugh, "Mrs. Hunter is a customer of mine."

There was a murmur of astonishment and the men gathered round the speaker, evidently in the expectation of hearing something more.

"Is that a cold fact?" one of them inquired.

"Certainly," answered Nevis; and Thorne joined the group.

"Even if it is, this isn't the place to discuss it!" he broke in. "Perhaps I'd better mention that if Hunter isn't in town already he will be very soon."

Nevis looked around at him, and Thorne fancied that the man, who was evidently filled with savage resentment, intended, with some vindictive purpose, to take the gathering group of bystanders into his confidence. Several more men were ascending the steps.

"Have you any reason to doubt what I'm saying?" he asked.

"Well," drawled Thorne, "there's your general character, for one thing."

Some of the others laughed, but it occurred to Thorne that his interference had not been particularly tactful when one of them asked a question.

"Are you telling us that Hunter, who has plenty of money, lets his wife go borrowing from people like you?"

"I can't say that he lets her," Nevis retorted meaningly. "I've the best of reasons, however, for being certain that she does so."

There was an awkward silence, which indicated that all who had heard it grasped the full significance of the last statement. Nevis smiled as he glanced round at them.

"You mean he doesn't know anything about it?" somebody exclaimed.

"If you insist, that's about the size of it," Nevis answered. "Since her husband cuts down her allowance to the last dollar, it's not an altogether unnatural thing that Mrs. Hunter should borrow from her friends without mentioning it to him."

The speech was offensive on the face of it, but there was in addition something in the man's manner which endued it with a gross suggestiveness. It implied that he could furnish a reason why the woman should have no hesitation in borrowing from him. Thorne stood still fuming. He recognized that an altercation with Nevis would in all probability only provide the latter with an opportunity for making further undesirable insinuations.

Just then, however, the group suddenly fell apart and another man strode across the veranda. He carried a riding-quirt, and his face showed white and set in the stream of light.

"It's a malicious lie!"

He raised the plaited quirt, and the hotel-keeper flung himself in front of Nevis.

"Stop there!" he cried. "Hold on, Hunter!"

Thorne, springing forward, grasped his friend's arm. He felt it his duty to restrain him, though it was one that he undertook most reluctantly.

"Thrashing him wouldn't be an answer," he insisted. "After what he has just said, it would be very much better if you gave us your account of the thing."

There was a murmur of approval from the assembly. The men had heard the accusation cunningly conveyed, and although the prospect of a sensational climax in which the riding-quirt should figure appealed to them, they felt it only fitting that they should also hear it proved or withdrawn.

"I'll do that--first," consented Hunter, very grimly. "I have just this to say. I'm perfectly aware that Mrs. Hunter borrowed from this man on two occasions, and to bear it out I'll state the fact that the loans fall due on Tuesday."

Nevis made no attempt to deny it, and one of the bystanders spoke.

"We can let it go at that, boys; Nevis said he was going over to Hunter's place on Monday."

"In that case," continued Hunter, "he will have the notes my wife gave him in his pocket. I'll mention what the amounts are, and afterward ask Nevis to produce the papers, and Symonds will tell you if I'm correct."

"Then if he doesn't want us to strip him he had better trot them out!" cried another man.

Nevis, who saw no help for it, produced two papers, which the hotel-keeper seized. The latter made a sign of agreement when Hunter spoke again.

"Yes," he confirmed; "you have given the figures right."

Hunter once more turned to the waiting men.

"I think I've made out my case. Are you convinced that he's a dangerous liar, boys?"

There were cries of assent.

"Lay into the hog with the quirt!" somebody added.

Thorne chuckled at the sight of Nevis's face. It was suffused with blood and dark with baffled malevolence. The man evidently recognized that he was discredited and would get no further hearing now. It occurred to Thorne, however, that his friend had succeeded better than he could reasonably have expected, for, after all, he had not disproved the fact that his wife had, in the first place at least, borrowed the money without his knowledge. The others, he thought, had not noticed that point.

Then Hunter raised his hand for silence.

"I'll ask Symonds and Thorne to come into the room with Nevis and me," he said. "I want a table to write at, for one thing."

It did not look as if Nevis were particularly anxious to accompany them, but Symonds, who was a powerful man, hustled him forward, and Thorne took his place with his back to the door to keep out the others, who seemed desirous of following them. Hunter, sitting down at a table, wrote out a check and pocketed the papers Nevis gave him in exchange for it. Then he rose and took up the strongly plaited quirt.

"Now," he said, addressing Nevis, "I'll ask you to walk out on to the veranda and inform our friends outside that you wish to express your regret for the malicious statements you have lately made, and that you declare they were completely unjustified."

"I'll see you damned first!" muttered Nevis with a dangerous glitter in his eyes.

The events of the next few moments were sudden and confusing, and Thorne was never able to arrange them clearly in his mind. It speedily became evident, however, that the equity of his cause does not necessarily render a man either invincible or invulnerable. Nevis, although a person of somewhat lethargic physical habits, appeared when forced to action sufficiently vigorous, and Hunter was hampered by the quirt to which he persistently clung. Though he managed to use it once or twice it was a serious handicap when they came to grips. In the meanwhile, the dust flew up from the uncovered floor and obscured the view of the men on the veranda, who crowded about the window and clamored furiously to get in. Then in the midst of the turmoil the lamp went out and Thorne felt a hand on his shoulder.

"Let them out!" the hotel-keeper cried.

As Thorne was forcibly driven away from the door, it swung open and a man sprang out on to the veranda with another close behind, while confused cries went up.

"Head him off from the stairway!"

"Leave them to it!"

"Get a light!"

In a few moments, Bill pushed through the crowd with a lantern in his hand, but before he crossed the veranda another light sprang up again in the room and streamed out through the door and window. It fell upon the waiting men and the two dominant figures in the narrow clear space in front of them--Nevis, standing still, looking about him savagely with a darkly suffused face, and Hunter, gripping his quirt, very quiet and very grim. He was, however, breathing heavily, and signs of the conflict were plain on both of them.

There was an impressive silence, and everybody stood tensely expectant, until it was suddenly broken by a murmur and a movement of those nearest the steps. They drew back, and Mrs. Farquhar and Mrs. Hunter, with Alison and Lucy Calvert, came up on the veranda. Moving forward a few paces they stopped in very natural surprise, and the stillness grew deeper when Hunter suddenly flung down his quirt. This was a change in the situation which nobody had anticipated.

Then a cry rose sharply from somewhere below.

"Miss Leigh! Get back there! Let me up!"

It was followed by a shout from the crowd.

"Winthrop!"

The next moment a man came scrambling up the steps. He was hot and dusty and apparently in desperate haste, but to Thorne's astonishment he ran toward Alison. As he did so, Nevis sprang toward the veranda rails.

"Slaney!" he shouted.

He was still almost breathless from the struggle, and it scarcely seemed possible that his hoarse voice would carry far, but Winthrop turning suddenly, grabbed up a shotgun that lay on a chair. One of the outlying farmers had brought it with him, for there were duck about just then.

"Call out again and I'll plug you sure!" he threatened, and the look in his face suggested that he fully meant it. "You've hounded me from place to place up and down the prairie; you've got my money, more than you lent, and that wouldn't satisfy you. Two weeks ago I was working quietly when you put the blamed police on my trail again. Now I guess I've got you, and we're going to straighten things."

He broke off as Lucy stepped forward and laid her hand on the gun, and Thorne noticed that she placed it with deliberate purpose over the muzzle.

"Let me have it, Jake! The boys will see that he doesn't call out."

There was a murmur of assent from the crowd, and Thorne seized Winthrop's arm.

"What do you want Miss Leigh for, anyway?" Lucy asked Winthrop.

The instinct which had prompted the question seemed so natural to Thorne that, strung up and intent as he was, he smiled; but just then Winthrop lowered the gun and turned to Alison.

"Have you got that mortgage deed and shown it to the lawyer man?" he asked.

"It's here," said Alison. "Mr. Parsons is in the settlement; I expect to see him in the next few minutes."

It struck Thorne that Nevis started, but before any of those most concerned could speak there was a rapid thud of horse-hoofs approaching down the street. Then a man on the steps cried out:

"Here's Slaney and a trooper! You've got to quit, Jake!"

Winthrop plunged into the lighted room and the door closed behind him with a crash; a moment or two later another door banged somewhere below and the men poured tumultuously down the steps. Lucy followed them, and almost immediately the veranda was deserted except for Thorne and Alison and Hunter, who remained there with his wife, though he did not speak to her. Mrs. Farquhar had apparently been hustled down the steps by the others in their haste, and Nevis had also vanished. Nobody had noticed what became of him in the confusion that succeeded Winthrop's flight.

The thud of hoofs, which had ceased for a moment, almost immediately began again. Once the corporal's voice rose sharply, and then there were disconnected cries, a sound of running feet, and a clamor that rapidly receded down the street. When it grew very faint Thorne turned to Alison.

"Haven't you got something to explain?" he asked.

"It's very simple," said Alison. "Winthrop gave me his mortgage deed some time ago; he said it would be wiser not to hand it to Lucy. Nevis had got it from him by an excuse, but he crept into his office for it late one night. I understand it proves that Nevis hadn't an indisputable claim to the cattle he sold. About a fortnight ago, Winthrop wrote to me that the police were on his trail again and I was to show the deed to a lawyer and see if it would clear him. I don't know why he came here, unless it was because the troopers had cut off any other means of escape and he fancied some of his friends would hide him; and it's also possible that he took the risk of being arrested because of his anxiety to find out what the lawyer thought."

Thorne nodded.

"That probably accounts for it; though there are still one or two points which are far from clear."

A few minutes later, a distant clamor broke out again, and by degrees confused voices and a sound of footsteps drew nearer. Then while Thorne and Alison leaned over the balustrade a crowd poured past in front of the hotel with a mounted figure showing above the shoulders of those about it. Thorne looked round at the girl.

"They've got him at last," he said.

Hunter crossed the veranda and drew him into the adjoining room, and Alison was left alone with Mrs. Hunter. The latter said nothing to her and she sat silent for some time until the lawyer walked up the steps.

"I was told that I should find Miss Leigh here."

Alison said that was her name, and the man, drawing a chair forward, sat down opposite her.

"I understand that you have Winthrop's mortgage deed in your possession. He now desires you to hand it to me."

"I shall be very glad to get rid of it," declared Alison, taking the document out of a pocket in her light jacket. "Will you be able to get him off with it?"

"That's a matter on which I can't very well express an opinion until I have read the deed and had a talk with Winthrop. I've no doubt you have heard that he has just been arrested while endeavoring to escape, but I contrived to get a word or two with him and Corporal Slaney. The latter considers it advisable to get his prisoner out of the settlement as soon as possible, and I understand he means to spend the night at a homestead a few miles away. He has promised me an opportunity for speaking to Winthrop when he gets there."

"I should very much like to hear what you decide," Alison informed him.

The lawyer rose.

"It's probable that I may find it necessary to make a few inquiries in connection with the affair, and I have another piece of business which will keep me a day or two in the neighborhood. If Winthrop has no objections, I could no doubt call on you at the Farquhar homestead on Monday."

Alison thanked him, and soon after he withdrew Hunter came out of the hotel with Thorne. Alison accompanied Thorne down to the street in search of Mrs. Farquhar. Then Hunter turned toward his wife.

"If you have nothing more to do here, we may as well be getting home," he said.