Chapter 13

"I warned you, girl," spoke up Ashby, "that you should bank with us oftener."

The Girl gave no sign of having heard him. Her slender figure seemed to have shrunken perceptibly as she stared stupidly, uncomprehendingly, into space.

"We say that Johnson was--" repeated Rance, impatiently.

"--what?" fell from the Girl's lips, her face pale and set.

"Are you deaf?" demanded Rance; and then, emphasising every word, he rasped out: "The fellow you've been polkying with is the man that has been asking people to hold up their hands."

"Oh, go on--you can't hand me out that!" Nevertheless the Girl looked wildly about the room.

Angrily Rance strode over to her and sneered bitingly:

"You don't believe it yet, eh?"

"No, I don't believe it yet!" rapped out the Girl, laying great stress upon the last word. "I know he isn't."

"Well, he _is_ Ramerrez, and he _did_ come to The Polka to rob it," retorted the Sheriff.

All at once the note of resentment in the Girl's voice became positive; she flared back at him, though she flushed in spite of herself.

"But he didn't rob it!"

"That's what gits me," fretted Sonora. "He didn't."

"I should think it would git you," snapped back the Girl, both in her look and voice rebuking him for his words.

It was left to Ashby to spring another surprise.

"We've got his horse," he said pointedly.

"An' I never knowed one o' these men to separate from his horse," commented Sonora, still smarting under the Girl's reprimand.

"Right you are! And now that we've got his horse and this storm is on, we've got him," said Rance, triumphantly. "But the last seen of Johnson," he went on with a hasty movement towards the Girl and eyeing her critically, "he was heading this way. You seen anything of him?"

The Girl struggled hard to appear composed.

"Heading this way?" she inquired, reddening.

"So Nick said," declared Sonora, looking towards that individual for proof of his words.

But Nick had caught the Girl's lightning glance imposing silence upon him; in some embarrassment he stammered out:

"That is, he was--Sid said he saw 'im take the trail, too."

"But the trail ends here," pointed out Rance, at the same time looking hard at the Girl. "And if she hasn't seen him, where was he going?"

At this juncture Nick espied a cigar butt on the floor; unseen by the others, he hurriedly picked it up and threw it in the fire.

"One o' our dollar Havanas! Good Lord, he's here!" he muttered to himself.

"Rance is right. Where was he goin'?" was the question with which he was confronted by Sonora when about to return to the others.

"Well, I tho't I seen him," evaded Nick with considerable uneasiness. "I couldn't swear to it. You see it was dark, an'--Moses but the Sidney Duck's a liar!"

At length, Ashby decided that the man had in all probability been snowed under, ending confidently with:

"Something scared him off and he lit out without his horse." Which remark brought temporary relief to the Girl, for Nick, watching her, saw the colour return to her face.

Unconsciously, during this discussion, the Girl had risen to her feet, but only to fall back in her chair again almost as suddenly, a sign of nervousness which did not escape the sharp eye of the Sheriff.

"How do you know the man's a road agent?" A shade almost of contempt was in the Girl's question.

Sonora breathed on his badly nipped fingers before answering:

"Well, two greasers jest now were pretty positive before they quit."

Instantly the Girl's head went up in the air.

"Greasers!" she ejaculated scornfully, while her eyes unfalteringly met Rance's steady gaze.

"But the woman knew him," was the Sheriff's vindictive thrust.

The Girl started; her face went white.

"The woman--the woman d'you say?"

"Why, yes, it was a woman that first tol' them that Ramerrez was in the camp to rob The Polka," Sonora informed her, though his tone showed plainly his surprise at being compelled to repeat a thing which, he wrongly believed, she already knew.

"We saw her at The Palmetto," leered Rance.

"And we missed the reward," frowned Ashby; at which Rance quickly turned upon the speaker with:

"But Ramerrez is trapped."

There was a moment's startled pause in which the Girl struggled with her passions; at last, she ventured:

"Who's this woman?"

The Sheriff laughed discordantly.

"Why, the woman of the back trail," he sneered.

"Nina Micheltoreña! Then she does know 'im--it's true--it goes through me!" unwittingly burst from the Girl's lips.

The Sheriff, evidently, found the Situation amusing, for he laughed outright.

"He's the sort of a man who polkas with you first and then cuts your throat," was his next stab.

The Girl turned upon him with eyes flashing and retorted:

"Well, it's my throat, ain't it?"

"Well I'll be!--" The Sheriff's sentence was left unfinished, for Nick, quickly pulling him to one side, whispered:

"Say, Rance, the Girl's cut up because she vouched for 'im. Don't rub it in."

Notwithstanding, Rance, to the Girl's query of "How did this Nina Micheltoreña know it?" took a keen delight in telling her:

"She's his girl."

"His girl?" repeated the Girl, mechanically.

"Yes. She gave us his picture," went on Rance; and taking the photograph out of his pocket, he added maliciously, "with love written on the back of it."

A glance at the photograph, which she fairly snatched out of his hands, convinced the Girl of the truthfulness of his assertion. With a movement of pain she threw it upon the floor, crying out bitterly:

"Nina Micheltoreña! Nina Micheltoreña!" Turning to Ashby with an abrupt change of manner she said contritely: "I'm sorry, Mr. Ashby, I vouched for 'im."

The Wells Fargo Agent softened at the note in the Girl's voice; he was about to utter some comforting words to her when suddenly she spoke again.

"I s'pose they had one o' them little lovers' quarrels an' that made 'er tell you, eh?" She laughed a forced little laugh, though her heart was beating strangely as she kept on: "He's the kind o' man who sort o' polkas with every girl he meets." And at this she began to laugh almost hysterically.

Rance, who resented her apologising to anyone but himself, stood scowling at her.

"What are you laughing at?" he questioned.

"Oh, nothin', Jack, nothin'," half-cried, half-laughed the Girl. "Only it's kind o' funny how things come out, ain't it? Took in! Nina Micheltoreña! Nice company he keeps--one o' them Cachuca girls with eyelashes at half-mast!"

Once more, she broke out into a fit of laughter.

"Well, well," she resumed, "an' she sold 'im out for money! Ah, Jack Rance, you're a better guesser'n I am!" And with these words she sank down at the table in an apathy of misery. Horror and hatred and hopelessness had possession of her. A fierce look was in her eyes when a moment later she raised her head and abruptly dismissed the boys, saying:

"Well, boys, it's gittin' late--good-night!"

Sonora was the first to make a movement towards the door.

"Come on, boys," he growled in his deep bass voice; "don't you intend to let a lady go to bed?"

One by one the men filed through the door which Nick held open for them; but when all but himself had left, the devoted little barkeeper turned to the Girl with a look full of meaning, and whispered:

"Do you want me to stay?"

"Me? Oh, no, Nick!" And with a "Good-night, all! Good-night, Sonora, an' thank you! Good-night, Nick!" the Girl closed the door upon them. The last that she heard from them was the muffled ejaculation:

"Oh, Lordy, we'll never git down to Cloudy to-night!"

Now the Girl slid the bolts and stood with her back against the door as if to take extra precautions to bar out any intrusion, and with eyes that blazed she yelled out:

"Come out o' that, now! Step out there, Mr. Johnson!"

Slowly the road agent parted the curtains and came forward in an attitude of dejection.

"You came here to rob me," at once began the Girl, but her anger made it impossible for her to continue.

"I didn't," denied the road agent, quietly, his countenance reflecting how deeply hurt he was by her words.

"You lie!" insisted the Girl, beside herself with rage.

"I don't--"

"You do!"

"I admit that every circumstance points to--"

"Stop! Don't you give me any more o' that Webster Unabridged. You git to cases. If you didn't come here to steal you came to The Polka to rob it, didn't you?"

Johnson, his eyes lowered, was forced to admit that such were his intentions, adding swiftly:

"But when I knew about you--" He broke off and took a step towards her.

"Wait! Wait! Wait where you are! Don't you take a step further or I'll--" She made a significant gesture towards her bosom, and then, laughing harshly, went on denouncingly: "A road agent! A road agent! Well, ain't it my luck! Wouldn't anybody know to look at me that a gentleman wouldn't fall my way! A road agent! A road agent!" And again she laughed bitterly before going on: "But now you can git--git, you thief, you imposer on a decent woman! I ought to have tol' 'em all, but I wa'n't goin' to be the joke o' the world with you behind the curtains an' me eatin' charlotte rusks an' lemming turnovers an' a-polkyin' with a road agent! But now you can git--git, do you hear me?"

Johnson heard her to the end with bowed head; and so scathing had been her denunciations of his actions that the fact that pride alone kept her from breaking down completely escaped his notice. With his eyes still downcast be said in painful fragments:

"One word only--only a word and I'm not going to say anything in defence of myself. For it's all true--everything is true except that I would have stolen from you. I _am_ called Ramerrez; I _have_ robbed; I _am_ a road agent--an outlaw by profession. Yes, I'm all that--and my father was that before me. I was brought up, educated, thrived on thieves' money, I suppose, but until six months ago when my father died, I did not know it. I lived much in Monterey--I lived there as a gentleman. When we met that day I wasn't the thing I am to-day. I only learned the truth when my father died and left me with a rancho and a band of thieves--nothing else--nothing for us all, and I--but what's the good of going into it--the circumstances. You wouldn't understand if I did. I was my father's son; I have no excuse; I guess, perhaps, it was in me--in the blood. Anyhow, I took to the road, and I didn't mind it much after the first time. But I drew the line at killing--I wouldn't have that. That's the man that I am, the blackguard that I am. But--" here he raised his eyes and said with a voice that was charged with feeling--"I swear to you that from the moment I kissed you to-night I meant to change, I meant to--"

"The devil you did!" broke from the Girl's lips, but with a sound that was not unlike a sob.

"I did, believe me, I did," insisted the man. "I meant to go straight and take you with me--but only honestly--when I could honestly. I meant to work for you. Why, every word you said to me to-night about being a thief cut into me like a knife. Over and over again I have said to myself, she must never know. And now--well, it's all over--I have finished."

"An' that's all?" questioned the Girl with averted face.

"No--yes--what's the use . . .?"

The Girl's anger blazed forth again.

"But there's jest one thing you've overlooked explainin', Mr. Johnson. It shows exactly what you are. It wasn't so much your bein' a road agent I got against you. It's this:" And here she stamped her foot excitedly. "You kissed me--you got my first kiss."

Johnson hung his head.

"You said," kept on the Girl, hotly, "you'd ben thinkin' o' me ever since you saw me at Monterey, an' all the time you walked straight off an' ben kissin' that other woman." She shrugged her shoulder and laughed grimly. "You've got a girl," she continued, growing more and more indignant. "It's that I've got against you. It's my first kiss I've got against you. It's that Nina Micheltoreña that I can't forgive. So now you can git--git!" And with these words she unbolted the door and concluded tensely:

"If they kill you I don't care. Do you hear, I don't care . . ."

At those bitter words spoken by lips which failed so utterly to hide their misery, the Girl's face became colourless.

With the instinct of a brave man to sell his life as dearly as possible, Johnson took a couple of guns from his pocket; but the next moment, as if coming to the conclusion that death without the Girl would be preferable, he put them back, saying:

"You're right, Girl."

The next instant he had passed out of the door which she held wide open for him.

"That's the end o' that--that's the end o' that," she wound up, slamming the door after him. But all the way from the threshold to the bureau she kept murmuring to herself: "I don't care, I don't care . . . I'll be like the rest o' the women I've seen. I'll give that Nina Micheltoreña cards an' spades. There'll be another hussy around here. There'll be--" The threat was never finished. Instead, with eyes that fairly started out of their sockets, she listened to the sound of a couple of shots, the last one exploding so loud and distinct that there was no mistaking its nearness to the cabin.

"They've got 'im!" she cried. "Well, I don't care--I don't--" But again she did not finish what she intended to say. For at the sound of a heavy body falling against the cabin door she flew to it, opened it and, throwing her arms about the sorely-wounded man, dragged him into the cabin and placed him in a chair. Quick as lightning she was back at the door bolting it.

With his eyes Johnson followed her action.

"Don't lock that door--I'm going out again--out there. Don't bar that door," he commanded feebly, struggling to his feet and attempting to walk towards it; but he lurched forward and would have fallen to the floor had she not caught him. Vainly he strove to break away from her, all the time crying out: "Don't you see, don't you see, Girl--open the door." And then again with almost a sob: "Do you think me a man to hide behind a woman?" He would have collapsed except for the strong arms that held him.

"I love you an' I'm goin' to save you," the Girl murmured while struggling with him. "You asked me to go away with you; I will when you git out o' this. If you can't save your own soul--" She stopped and quickly went over to the mantel where she took down a bottle of whisky and a glass; but in the act of pouring out a drink for him there came a loud rap on the window, and quickly looking round she saw Rance's piercing eyes peering into the room. For an instant she paled, but then there flashed through her mind the comforting thought that the Sheriff could not possibly see Johnson from his position. So, after giving the latter his drink, she waited quietly until a rap at the door told her that Rance had left the window when, her eye having lit on the ladder that was held in place on the ceiling, she quickly ran over to it and let it down, saying:

"Go up the ladder! Climb up there to the loft You're the man that's got my first kiss an' I'm goin' to save you . . ."

"Oh, no, not here," protested Johnson, stubbornly.

"Do you want them to see you in my cabin?" she cried reproachfully, trying to lift him to his feet.

"Oh, hurry, hurry . . .!"

With the utmost difficulty Johnson rose to his feet and catching the rounds of the ladder he began to ascend. But after going up a few rounds he reeled and almost fell off, gasping:

"I can't make it--no, I can't . . ."

"Yes, you can," encouraged the Girl; and then, simultaneously with another loud knock on the door: "You're the man I love an' you must--you've got to show me the man that's in you. Oh, go on, go on, jest a step an' you'll git there."

"But I can't," came feebly from the voice above. Nevertheless, the next instant he fell full length on the boarded floor of the loft with the hand outstretched in which was the handkerchief he had been staunching the blood from the wound in his side.

With a whispered injunction that he was all right and was not to move on any account, the Girl put the ladder back in its place. But no sooner was this done than on looking up she caught sight of the stained handkerchief. She called softly up to him to take it away, explaining that the cracks between the boards were wide and it could plainly be seen from below.

"That's it!" she exclaimed on observing that he had changed the position of his hand. "Now, don't move!"

Finally, with the lighted candle in her hand, the Girl made a quick survey of the room to see that nothing was in sight that would betray her lover's presence there, and then throwing open the door she took up such a position by it that it made it impossible for anyone to get past her without using force.

"You can't come in here, Jack Rance," she said in a resolute voice. "You can tell me what you want from where you are."

Roughly, almost brutally, Rance shoved her to one side and entered.

"No more Jack Rance. It's the Sheriff coming after Mr. Johnson," he said, emphasizing each word.

The Girl eyed him defiantly.

"Yes, I said Mr. Johnson," reiterated the Sheriff, cocking the gun that he held in his hand. "I saw him coming in here."

"It's more 'n I did," returned the Girl, evenly, and bolted the door. "Do you think I'd want to shield a man who tried to rob me?" she asked, facing him.

Ignoring the question, Rance removed the glove of his weaponless hand and strode to the curtains that enclosed the Girl's bed and parted them. When he turned back he was met by a scornful look and the words:

"So, you doubt me, do you? Well, go on--search the place. But this ends your acquaintance with The Polka. Don't you ever speak to me again. We're through."

Suddenly there came a smothered groan from the man in the loft; Rance wheeled round quickly and brought up his gun, demanding:

"What's that? What's that?"

Leaning against the bureau the Girl laughed outright and declared that the Sheriff was becoming as nervous as an old woman. Her ridicule was not without its effect, and, presently, Rance uncocked his gun and replaced it in its holster. Advancing now to the table where the Girl was standing, he took off his cap and shook it before laying it down; then, pointing to the door, his eyes never leaving the Girl's face, he went on accusingly:

"I saw someone standing out there against the snow. I fired. I could have sworn it was a man."

The Girl winced. But as she stood watching him calmly remove his coat and shake it with the air of one determined to make himself at home, she cried out tauntingly:

"Why do you stop? Why don't you go on--finish your search--only don't ever speak to me again."

At that, Rance became conciliatory.

"Say, Min, I don't want to quarrel with you."

Turning her back on him the Girl moved over to the bureau where she snapped out over her shoulder:

"Go on with your search, then p'r'aps you'll leave a lady to herself to go to bed."

The Sheriff followed her up with the declaration:

"I'm plumb crazy about you, Min."

The Girl shrugged her shoulder.

"I could have sworn I saw--I--Oh, you know it's just you for me--just you, and curse the man you like better. I--I--even yet I can't get over the queer look in your face when I told you who that man really was." He stopped and flung his overcoat down on the floor, and fixing her with a look he demanded: "You don't love him, do you?"

Again the Girl sent over her shoulder a forced little laugh.

"Who--me?"

The Sheriff's face brightened. Taking a few steps nearer to her, he hazarded:

"Say, Girl, was your answer final to-night about marrying me?"

Without turning round the Girl answered coyly:

"I might think it over, Jack."

Instantly the man's passion was aroused. He strode over to her, put his arms around her and kissed her forcibly.

"I love you, I love you, Minnie!" he cried passionately.

In the struggle that followed, the Girl's eyes fell on the bottle on the mantel. With a cry she seized it and raised it threateningly over her head. Another second, however, she sank down upon a chair and began to sob, her face buried in her hands.

Rance regarded her coldly; at last he gave vent to a mirthless laugh, the nasty laugh of a man whose vanity is hurt.

"So, it's as bad as that," he sneered. "I didn't quite realise it. I'm much obliged to you. Good-night." He snatched up his coat, hesitated, then repeated a little less angrily than before: "Good-night!"

But the Girl, with her face still hidden, made no answer. For a moment he watched the crouching form, the quivering shoulders, then asked, with sudden and unwonted gentleness:

"Can't you say good-night to me, Girl!"

Slowly the Girl rose to her feet and faced him, aversion and pity struggling for mastery. Then, as she noted the spot where he was now standing, his great height bringing him so near to the low boards of the loft where her lover was lying that it seemed as though he must hear the wounded man's breathing, all other feelings were swept away by overwhelming fear. With the one thought that she must get rid of him,--do anything, say anything, but get rid of him quickly, she forced herself forward, with extended hand, and said in a voice that held out new promise:

"Good-night. Jack Rance,--good-night!"

Rance seized the hand with an almost fierce gladness in both his own, his keen glance hungrily striving to read her face. Then, suddenly, he released her, drawing back his hand with a quick sharpness.

"Why, look at my hand! There's blood on it!" he said.

And even as he spoke, under the yellow flare of the lamp, the Girl saw a second drop of blood fall at her feet. Like a flash, the terrible significance of it came upon her. Only by self-violence could she keep her glance from rising, tell-tale, to the boards above.

"Oh, I'm so sorry," she heard herself saying contritely, all the time desperately groping to invent a reason; at length, she added futilely: "I must have scratched you."

Rance looked puzzled, staring at the spatter of red as though hypnotised.

"No, there's no scratch there," he contended, wiping off the blood with his handkerchief.

"Oh, yes, there is," insisted the Girl tremulously; "that is, there will be in the mornin'. You'll see in the mornin' that there'll be--" She stopped and stared in frozen terror at the sinister face of the Sheriff, who was coolly watching his handkerchief turn from white to red under the slow rain of blood from the loft above.

"Oho!" he emitted sardonically, stepping back and pointing his gun towards the loft. "So, he's up there!"

The Girl's fingers clutched his arm, dragging desperately.

"No, he isn't, Jack--no, he isn't!" she iterated in blind, mechanical denial.

With an abrupt movement, Rance flung her violently from him, made a grab at the suspended ladder and lowered it into position; then, deaf to the Girl's pleadings, harshly ordered Johnson to come down, meanwhile covering the source of the blood-drops with his gun.

"Oh, wait,--wait a minute!" begged the Girl helplessly. What would happen if he couldn't obey the summons? He had spent himself in his climb to safety. Perhaps he was unconscious, slowly bleeding to death! But even as she tortured herself with fears, the boards above creaked as though a heavy body was dragging itself slowly across them. Johnson was evidently doing his best to reach the top of the ladder; but he did not move quickly enough to suit the Sheriff.

"Come down, or I'll--"

"Oh, just a minute, Jack, just a minute!" broke in the Girl frantically. "Don't shoot!--Don't you see he's tryin' to--?"

"Come down here, Mr. Johnson!" reiterated the Sheriff, with a face inhuman as a fiend.

The Girl clenched her hands, heedless of the nails cutting into her palms: "Won't you wait a moment,--please, wait, Jack!"

"Wait? What for?" the Sheriff flung at her brutally, his finger twitching on the trigger.