CHAPTER XIX

THE WORK OF AN ENEMY

Whatever action the police took concerning Lane's descent upon Crane Valley was not apparent, and Thorn may have been justified in deciding that they took none at all. However that may have been, Lane left us in peace for a while, and it was not by his own hands that the next bolt was launched against me. He preferred, as a rule, to strike through another person's agency, and usually contrived it so that when trouble resulted the agent bore the brunt of it.

I was tramping behind the seeder one fine morning, alternately watching the somewhat unruly team and the trickle of golden grain into the good black loam, when two horsemen appeared on the prairie. They headed for the homestead, and living in a state of expectancy, as we then did, I shared the misgivings of Thorn. "They're coming our way in a hurry, sure; and the sight of anyone whose business I don't know worries me just now," he said.

"If it's bad news we'll learn it soon enough," I said. "Go on to the end of the harrowing. That we'll have a frost-nipped harvest if we're not through with the sowing shortly is the one thing certain."

The two horsemen drew nearer, and it appeared that both wore uniform, while I caught the glint of carbines. This in itself was significant, and I wondered whether Mackay had discovered the identity of Boone. Shortly I recognized the sergeant and Cotton, who a little later drew bridle beside the seeder. Mackay's face was expressionless, but Cotton looked distinctly unhappy, and once more I felt sorry for Boone.

"I have a word for ye. Will ye walk to the house with me?" said the former. I glanced at Cotton, who, stooping, pretended to examine his carbine. Thorn appeared suspicious, for he dropped the lines he held, and his eyes grew keen.

"I'm sorry that is the one thing I can't do just now, when every moment of this weather is precious," I said. "If you can't wait until we stop at noon, there's no apparent reason why you shouldn't state your business here."

"Ye had better come," said Mackay, looking very wooden. "Forby, I'm thinking ye will sow no more to-day."

"I'm not in the humor for joking, and intend to continue sowing until it is too dark to see," I answered shortly. "Have you any authority to prevent me?"

"I have," said the sergeant. "Well, if ye will have it--authority to arrest ye on a charge of unlawfully burning the homestead of Gaspard's Trail."

Astonishment, dismay, and anger held me dumb between them for a few moments. Then, as the power of speech returned, I said: "Confound you, Mackay! You don't think I could possibly have had any hand in that?"

"It's no' my business to think," was the dry answer; "I'm here to carry out orders. What was it ye were observing, Foreman Thorn?"

"Only that Niven or Lane was a mighty long time finding this thing out; and that, while nobody expects too much from the police, we never figured they were clean, stark, raging lunatics," said Thorn.

"I'm no' expecting compliments," said Mackay. "Ye will do your duty, Corporal Cotton."

"You can put that thing back. I'm not a wild beast, and have sense enough to see that I must wait for satisfaction until some of your chiefs at headquarters hear of your smartness," I said. Then Cotton positively hung his head as he let the carbine slip back into its holster, while Mackay stared after the departing Thorn, who made for the homestead as fast as he could run.

"What is his business?" he said.

"His own!" I answered shortly. "Unless you have also a warrant for his arrest, it would be injudicious of you to stop him. Thorn has an ugly temper, and would be justified in resenting the interference. What is your program?"

"To ride in to the railroad whenever ye are ready, and deliver ye safely in Empress City."

"I suppose one can only make the best of it; but considering that you were probably consulted before a warrant was issued, I can't help feeling astonished," I said. "However, there is no use in wasting words, and an hour will suffice me to get ready in."

I left the team standing before the seeder, careless as to what became of them, for, even if acquitted, I felt that my career was closed at last. No forced labor could make up for time lost now, and, because justice in the West is slow, it was perfectly clear why the charge had been made. There was a scene with Sally when we reached the homestead, and Cotton fled before her biting comments on police sagacity. Even Mackay winced under certain allusions, and when I asked him: "Am I permitted to talk to my housekeeper alone?" assented readily.

"Ye may," he said, "and welcome; I do not envy ye."

If Sally's tongue could be venomous, her brain was keen, and, as Steel was absent, it was with confidence I left instructions with her. Thorn had vanished completely, and the girl only looked mysterious when questioned concerning him. At length all was ready, and turning in the saddle as we rode away, I waved my hat to Sally, who stood in the doorway of the homestead with eyes suspiciously dim. I wondered, with a strange lack of interest, whether I should ever see either it or her again. Cotton also saluted her, and the girl suddenly moved forward a pace, holding up her hand.

"Make sure of your prisoner, Sergeant," she said. "What's the use of talking justice to the poor man when he's ground down by the thief with capital? We're getting tired--we have waited for that justice so long--and I give you and the fools or rogues behind you warning that if you jail Ormesby, the boys will come for him with rifles a hundred strong."

Mackay touched his beast with the spurs, and as we passed out of earshot, said to me: "If the boys have her spirit I'm thinking it's not impossible. Your friends are not judicious, Henry Ormesby."

"They are stanch, at least, and above being bought," I said; and Mackay stiffened.

"What were ye meaning?"

"I think my meaning was plain enough," I answered him.

Many leagues divided us from the railroad, and the way seemed very long. The dejection that settled upon me brought a physical lassitude with it, and I rode wearily, jolting in the saddle before the journey was half done. Since the memorable night at Bonaventure, when I first met Boone, trouble after trouble had crowded on me, and, supported by mere obstinacy when hope had gone, I still held on. Now it seemed the end had come, and, at the best, I must retire beaten to earn a daily wage by the labor of my hands if I escaped conviction as a felon. Lane would absorb Crane Valley, as he had done Gaspard's Trail. As if in mockery the prairie had donned its gayest robe of green, and lay flooded with cloudless sunshine.

Mackay made no further advances since my last repulse, but rode silently on my right hand, Cotton on my left, holding back a little so that I could not see him, and so birch bluff, willows, and emerald levels rolled up before us and slid back to the prairie's rim until, towards dusk on the second day, cubes of wooden houses and a line of gaunt telegraph poles loomed up ahead.

"I'm glad," said Corporal Cotton, breaking into speech at last. "I don't know if you'll believe it, Ormesby, but this has been a sickening day to me. I'm tired of the confounded service--I'm tired of everything."

"Ye're young and tender on the bit, and without the sense to go canny when it galls ye. What ails ye at the service anyway?" interposed the sergeant.

"I'll say nothing about some of the duties. They're a part of the contract," answered Cotton. "Still, I never bargained to arrest my best friends when I became a policeman."

"Friends!" said Mackay. "Who were ye meaning?" and Cotton turned in my direction with the face of one who had narrowly escaped a blunder.

"Aren't you asking useless questions? I mean Rancher Ormesby."

"I observed ye used the plural," said Mackay.

Cotton answered shortly: "When one is going through a disgusting duty to the best of his ability, he may be forgiven a trifling lapse in grammar."

The light was failing as we rode up to the station some time before the train was due, and looking back, I saw several diminutive objects on the edge of the prairie. They were, I surmised, mounted settlers coming in for letters or news, but except that the blaze of crimson behind them forced them up, it would have been hard to recognize the shapes of men and beasts. Round the other half of the circle the waste was fading into the dimness that crept up from the east, and feeling that I had probably done with the prairie, and closed another chapter of my life, I turned my eyes towards the string of giant poles and the little railroad station ahead.

There were fewer loungers than usual about it, but when we dismounted, Cotton started as two feminine figures strolled side by side down the platform, and said something softly under his breath.

"What has surprised you?" I asked, and he pointed towards the pair.

"Those are Haldane's daughters, by all that is unfortunate!"

There was no avoiding the meeting. Darkness had not settled yet, and Mackay, who failed to recognize the ladies, was regarding us impatiently. "I'll do my best, and they may not notice anything suspicious," the corporal said.

We moved forward, Mackay towards the office, Cotton hanging behind me, but, as ill-luck would have it, both ladies saw us when we reached the track, and before I could recover from my dismay, I stood face to face with Beatrice Haldane. She was, it seemed to me, more beautiful than ever, but I longed that the earth might open beneath me.

"It is some time since I have seen you, and you do not look well," she said. "You once described the Western winters as invigorating; but one could almost fancy the last had been too much for you."

"I cannot say the same thing, and if we had nothing more than the weather to contend with, we might preserve our health," I said. "I did not know you were at Bonaventure, or I should have ridden over to pay my respects to you."

Beatrice Haldane did not say whether this would have given her pleasure or otherwise. Indeed, her manner, if slightly cordial, was nothing more, and I found it desirable to study a rail fastening when I saw her sister watching me.

"I arrived from the East only a few days ago, and we are now awaiting my father, who had some business down the line. Are you going out with the train?"

"I am going to Empress," I said; and Lucille Haldane interposed: "That is a long way; and the last time he met you, you told father you were too busy to visit Bonaventure. Who will see to your sowing--and will you stay there long?"

I heard Corporal Cotton grind his heel viciously into the plank beneath him; and I answered, in desperation:

"I do not know. I am afraid so."

Perhaps the girl noticed by my voice that all was not well. Indeed, Beatrice also commenced to regard the corporal and myself curiously.

"What has happened, Mr. Ormesby? You look positively haggard?" the younger sister said. "Why are you keeping in the background, Corporal Cotton? Have you done anything to be ashamed of?" Then she ceased with a gasp of pained surprise, and I read consternation in her eyes.

"You have guessed aright. I am not making this journey of my own will," I said.

Beatrice Haldane turned with a swift movement, which brought us once more fully face to face, and, unlike her sister, she was strangely cold and grave.

"Is it permissible to ask any questions?" she said, and her even tone stung me to the quick. One whisper against the speaker would have roused me to fury.

"Everybody will know to-morrow or the next day, and I may as well tell you now," I said, in a voice which sounded, even in my own ears, hoarse with bitterness. "I am to be tried for burning down the homestead of Gaspard's Trail."

Beatrice Haldane certainly showed surprise, but she seemed more thoughtful than indignant, and still fixed me with her eyes. They were clear and very beautiful, but I had begun to wonder if a spark of human passion would ever burn within them.

"It is absurd--preposterous. Come here at once, Sergeant!" a clear young voice with a thrill of unmistakable anger in it said; but Mackay seemed desirous of backing into the station agent's office instead.

"I want you," added Lucille Haldane. "Come at once, and tell me why you have done this."

The sergeant's courage was evidently unequal to the task, for with a brief, "I will try to satisfy ye when I have transacted my business," he disappeared into the office, and I turned again to Beatrice Haldane.

"You see it is unfortunately true; but you do not appear astonished," I said.

Beatrice Haldane looked at me sharply, but without indignation, for she was always mistress of herself, and before she could speak her sister broke in: "Do you wish to make us angry, when we are only sorry for you, Mr. Ormesby? Everybody knows that neither you nor any rancher in this district could be guilty. Corporal Cotton, will you inquire if your superior has finished his business, and tell him that I am waiting?"

"The old heathen deserves it!" said Cotton aside to me, as, with unfeigned relief, he hurried away, and it was only by an effort I refrained from following him. The interview was growing painful in the extreme. Still, I was respited, for Beatrice Haldane turned from us suddenly.

"What can this mean? There is a troop of horsemen riding as for their lives towards the station," she said.

It was growing dark, but not too dark to see a band of mounted men converge at a gallop upon the station, and for the first time I noticed how the loungers stared at them, and heard the jingle of harness and thud of drumming hoofs. None of them shouted or spoke. They came on in ominous silence, the spume flakes flying from the lathered beasts, the clods whirling up, until a voice cried:

"Two of you stand by to hold up the train! The rest will come along with me!"

Amid a musical jingling, the horses were pulled up close beside the track, and men in embroidered deerskin with broad white hats and men in old blue-jean leaped hurriedly down. Several carried rifles, while, guessing their purpose, I pointed towards the frame houses across the unfenced track. "You must go at once, Miss Haldane. There may be a tumult," I said.

Lucille seemed reluctant, Beatrice by no means hurried, and I do not remember whether I bade either of them farewell, for as the newcomers came swiftly into the station a gaunt commanding figure holding a carbine barred their way, and Corporal Cotton leaped out from the office. The station agent, holding a revolver, also placed himself between them and me.

"What are ye wanting, boys?" a steady voice asked; and the men halted within a few paces of the carbine's muzzle. I could just see that they were my friends and neighbors, and I noticed that one who rode up and down the track seemed inclined to civilly prevent the ladies from retiring to the wooden settlement. Perhaps he feared they intended to raise its inhabitants.

"We want Harry Ormesby," answered a voice I recognized as belonging to Steel. "Stand out of the daylight, Sergeant. We have no call to hurt you."

"I'm thinking that's true," said Mackay; and I admired his coolness as he stood alone, save for the young corporal, grimly eying the crowd. "It will, however, be my distressful duty to damage the first of ye who moves a foot nearer my prisoner. Noo will ye hear reason, boys, or will I wire for a squadron to convince ye? Ormesby ye cannot have, and will ye shame your own credit and me?"

There was a murmur of consultation, but no disorderly clamor. The men whom Thorn had raised to rescue me were neither habitual brawlers nor desperadoes, but sturdy stock-riders and tillers of the soil, smarting under a sense of oppression. They were all fearless, and would, I knew, have faced a cavalry brigade to uphold what appeared their rights, but they were equally averse to any bloodshed or violence that was not necessary.

"There's no use talking, Sergeant," somebody said. "We don't go back without our man, and it will be better for all of us if you release him. You know as well as we do there's nothing against him."

Meanwhile, I could not well interfere without precipitating a crisis. The station agent, who stated that Mackay had deputed him authority, stood beside me with the pistol in his hand. Neither was I certain what my part would be, for, stung to white heat by Beatrice Haldane's coldness, which suggested suspicion, and came as a climax to a series of injuries, I wondered whether it might not be better to make a dash for liberty and leave the old hard life behind me. There might be better fortune beyond the Rockies, and I felt that Lane would not have instigated the charge of arson unless he saw his way to substantiate it.

Nevertheless, I could watch the others with a strange and almost impersonal curiosity--the group of men standing with hard hands on the rifle barrels ready for a rush; the grim figure of the sergeant, and the young corporal poised with head held high, left foot flung forward, and carbine at hip, in front of them.

"We'll give you two minutes in which to make up your mind. Then, if you can't climb down, and anything unpleasant happens, it will be on your head. Can't you see you haven't the ghost of a show?" said one.

Turning my eyes a moment, I noticed a fan-shaped flicker swinging like a comet across the dusky waste far down the straight-ruled track, and when a man I knew held up his watch beneath a lamp, I had almost come to a decision. If the sergeant had shown any sign of weakness it is perhaps possible that decision might have been reversed; but Mackay stood as though cast in iron, and equally unyielding. I would at least have no blood shed on my account, and would not leave my friends to bear the consequences of their unthinking generosity. Meanwhile, stock-rider and teamster were waiting in strained attention, and there was still almost a minute left to pass when a light hand touched my shoulder, and Lucille Haldane, appearing from behind me, said: "You must do something. Go forward and speak to them immediately." She was trembling with eagerness, but the station agent stood on my other side, and he was woodenly stolid.

"Put down that weapon. I will speak to them," I said.

"You're healthier here," was the suspicious answer; and chiefly conscious of the appeal and anxiety in Lucille Haldane's eyes, I turned upon him.

"Stand out of my way--confound you!" I shouted.

The man fingered the pistol uncertainly, and I could have laughed at his surmise that the sight of it would have held me then. Before, even if he wished it, his finger could close on the trigger, I had him by the wrist, and the weapon fell with a clash. Then I lifted him bodily and flung him upon the track, while, as amid a shouting, Cotton sprang forward, Mackay roared: "Bide ye, let him go!"

The shouting ceased suddenly when I stood between my friends and the sergeant with hands held up. "I'll never forget what you have done, boys; but it is no use," I said; and paused to gather breath, amid murmurs of surprise and consternation. "In the first place, I can't drag you into this trouble."

"We'll take the chances willing," a voice said, and there was a grim chorus of approval. "We've borne enough, and it's time we did something."

"Can't you see that if I bolted now it would suit nobody better than Lane? Boys, you know I'm innocent----"

Again a clamor broke out, and somebody cried: "It was Lane's own man who did it, if anybody fired Gaspard's Trail!"

"He may not be able to convict me, and if instead of rushing the sergeant you will go home and help Thorn with the sowing, we may beat him yet," I continued. "Even if I am convicted, I'll come back again, and stay right here until Lane is broken, or one of us is dead."

The hoot of a whistle cut me short, the brightening blaze of a great headlamp beat into our faces, and further speech was out of the question, as with brakes groaning the lighted cars clanged in.

"Be quick, Sergeant, before they change their minds!" I shouted, and Mackay and Cotton scrambled after me on to a car platform. No train that ever entered that station had, I think, so prompt dispatch, for Cotton had hardly opened the door of the vestibule than the bell clanged and the huge locomotive snorted as the cars rolled out. I had a momentary vision of the agent, who seemed partly dazed, scowling in my direction, a group of dark figures swinging broad-brimmed hats, and Lucille Haldane standing on the edge of the platform waving her hand to me. Then the lights faded behind us, and we swept out, faster and faster, across the prairie.