Part 13

"Well, me boy, our fight against Ladd is goin' to precipitate the whole thing. You see, instead of communicatin' in a genteel whisper they're beginnin' to shout in Washington, and when they shout in Washington it makes the God-fearin' business man nervous and hysterical. I guess we ought to let this agitation against Ladd drop."

"Why, we can't do that," protested Hal warmly. "Why let it drop?"

"Well, son, here's the situation. We got a bill before Congress, ain't we? To make good our title if it ain't good already. Well, we're a menace to the Trust. They may queer our bill, but if they do, they got to prove the lands are Government lands, and that shuts _them_ out, except for a lease from the Injins, and that we can make cost 'em a pretty penny, maybe we can queer it altogether. If everything is quiet in Washington our bill has a good chance, because we can make terms with the Trust to _let it go through_ by agreein' to sell them our rights if it does go through. We are bound to git something! How much we can make 'em pay depends on how close we stick together. Now, if we put up a fight against Ladd in Washington, Ladd is the Trust's agent, they're goin' to stand behind him, and we've got a big fight on our hands, and if we get to screamin' at each other in Washington, why, every newsboy in America'll know all about it."

"Suppose he does?" asked the preacher, deeply interested.

"Well, the present Secretary of the Interior has intimated that he might on investigation insist on these lands being held for the benefit of the _general public_. The 'general public'! What do you think of that? Did you ever hear anything so funny in your life?"

"Why, that doesn't strike me as funny, McShay," said the preacher. "That seems to be a very just and splendid solution of the difficulty."

"And where would we come in?" yelled the Irishman.

"You're part of the general public."

"Hah!" he snorted, then turning to Hal; "ain't parsons the limit?"

"I know Secretary Walker slightly," added McCloud. "He strikes me as a strong man."

"I'll tell you how strong he is," bellowed McShay. now thoroughly aroused. "He can't hold his job. That's how much the 'general public' amounts to. He don't please anybody. He's got to resign."

"Well, you may quit the firing line, Mac," said Hal quietly. "But I promised Ladd to have his scalp, and I'd hate to break a promise I'd made to Ladd."

"You ain't practical, either," shouted McShay. "That's the Injin in you."

And the parson was in a dilemma too. He didn't know whether to praise the boy for being honest or reprove him for being vindictive.

"Boss, Curley's come in with the mail," said Bill as he came to Hal and handed him a telegram. "Nuthin' but this."

Curley completely recovered, but minus a right arm, was now one of Hal's retainers, and like all converts he was a fanatic where the owner of the Red Butte Ranch was concerned.

"I hope it's news from Washington," said Hal. "No, it's from London."

It read: "Your father ill. Come back immediately. Rundall."

"It's from my father's physician," explained Hal, handing the cable to McCloud.

"And say, Boss," said Bill, trying to keep the worst news to the last, "Ladd's out here."

"Ain't a-losin' any time, is he?" commented McShay.

"And he's got quite a few Injins with him," added Bill slowly. "In fact, they got us surrounded, I reckon." And Bill returned to his post.

"Go out and see Ladd, will you?" Hal said to his two friends. "And let me know what he has to propose? It'll give me a moment to think."

"Come on, Parson," said McShay, and he took the preacher affectionately by the arm. "By the way, would you say that Ladd was a _Scotch_ name?"

McCloud shot him a sly glance.

"I shouldn't wonder, McShay; but I don't think the yellow canine mixture is _monopolized_ by the Scotch, do you?"

"Oh, ain't you touchy about your damned old race?"

And the two queer pals walked away arm in arm.

"Wah-na-gi, come here, please."

Hal called gently at the door. She did not hear. It was a shame to wake her. He called again and then again. When she did awaken it was with a start, her heart throbbing violently until she saw him, then she breathed evenly with an assured smile. He thought she had never looked so beautiful as she stood holding to the support of the portico, and then he noticed for the first time that she was dressed like her people, and the brave flash and glitter of the barbaric colors stirred something within him; something strange, mystical. He felt the touch of an unseen hand, heard the sound of a silent voice. He thrilled to vague impulses, to a half-remembered strain that might have been a love song or a lullaby, that had in it the note of the primeval woods and the vastness of the sky and plain. He forgot the exigency of the moment, the dangers that confronted them, and said: "Wah-na-gi, wait here for a moment. I've something I want to give you."

And he disappeared into the house leaving her wondering and alone. She, too, was conscious of some occult force to whose vibration she thrilled. When Hal woke her she was quivering with the ragged remnants of a dream. Nat-u-ritch had come to her and said: "You will be very happy. My son loves you." Then John McCloud had come and led her away to the Land of Shadows. Here were shadow streams and shadow hills, shadow wickiups, shadow horses and cattle, shadow lovers and shadow children. Then Hal had come and called her away, and she woke to see him.

This dream came back to her as she waited. There was the grave of Nat-u-ritch. She walked over to it. The gravestone was very simple like her life, a rough bowlder torn from the bed of a mountain torrent. It displayed no date of birth or death, no line of eulogy, no word of sentiment, just her name in rude lettering cut into the face of the rock, but to any one who knew her tragic story it seemed appropriate and impressive. To Wah-na-gi it made the whole dingy, desolate place sacred. Nat-u-ritch seemed very real as she stood there by her grave. She knew Nat-u-ritch's story and understood it. The resignation of the Indian woman toiling patiently through life knowing that she was unloved, finding consolation in her child; then bewildered, unable to understand why her baby should be taken from her arms and given to a strange white woman to be taken into a far country; then the tall chief bringing his dead daughter in his arms and holding her out to the white man, all that was left of the little savage who was wife and mother, with the weapon of destruction in one hand and her child's little moccasins in the other. Nat-u-ritch was very real to Wah-na-gi just then. Her spirit brooded near.

"Wah-na-gi, I want you to have these as a keepsake."

Hal held something in his hands at which he looked intently. Something glittered and gleamed like her buckskin dress. They were a tiny pair of child's moccasins.

"They were mine," he said, "when I was a little boy running around here on the ranch. Those were happy days," he added dreamily. "My father gave them to me before I left England. He took them from my dead mother's hand. When my father gave them to me I knew I had seen them before, often and often in my dreams. I used to think it was Nat-u-ritch, my little mother, holding them out to me. Then it seemed to me to be you, calling to me, calling me to leave the cities, the limits, the din, the make-believe, the murderous crowds; calling me to the desert, the naked rocks, and the far spaces, the brooding snows, the camp-fires, the songs of the pines, and the angry rapids; calling me to my own, to live my life in the open, and be a man among men."

His eye was fixed on space and he spoke like one hypnotized or in a dream. She knew it was the son of Nat-u-ritch speaking to her, speaking to his own soul.

"Perhaps--you would like them," he added. "I would like you to have them," and he held them toward her. "It's the best I have to give. They are my 'medicine,' my 'sacred bundle.'"

Tears were gathering in her eyes as she took and kissed them.

"And now John McCloud says I must go back to all that--to the land and the life where I was an idler, a drunkard, and a failure."

Her heart stood still.

"Go back! Why?"

"Because I love you, because I want you, because I can't live without you."

She was in his arms and knew the supremest joy of her life.

"And nobody is going to take you from me," he added defiantly.

He was fighting McCloud, doing battle with himself. He had forgotten the agent until McShay entered with a face graver than his wont.

"Well, what does he say, Mike?"

"He insists on talkin' things over with you in person."

"Oh, well, bring him in. Wah-na-gi," he turned to her as the Irishman disappeared, "_Ladd is here_."

*CHAPTER XVI*

Wan-na-gi shrank back, her eyes set with terror.

"Don't let him take me away. I couldn't go back there. When I sent to you I had stood all I could. Don't let that man put his hand on me. You thought he was protecting me from Appah. I didn't tell you--I was ashamed. It was because, because----"

"He wanted you for himself."

"Yes."

"He won't take you back; not if I live. Now listen and don't be afraid. My men believe in me, better still, in my luck. McShay's men want nothing better than a chance to even scores with Ladd. We have the position. Ladd isn't a soldier. He doesn't know this game. I do. He couldn't take the ranch if he had twice as many braves, except at a fearful cost----"

"My own people!" she said, as if it just occurred to her for the first time. "We shall kill our own people!" This time she included him.

"You are my people," he said passionately. "You are my country, my all. Nothing else matters. Go in, Wah-na-gi, and don't be afraid."

"We must not kill our own people. They're your people as well as mine."

"A fight's a fight, Wah-na-gi. Leave it to me."

"I didn't think of this when I called to you. I was tortured, mad, desperate, and I cried out for help. It was a mistake. I--I--yes, I will go back."

"No, that would be horrible; I could not let you go back. We don't know what may happen, but I could not do that. Won't you leave it to me? Trust to me?"

She raised her eyes to him with a look of serene abnegation, of exalted self-surrender, that transported him, then sobered him.

He took her in his arms, kissed her as a brother might, and she went within.

"Howd'y, Calthorpe?" said Ladd easily as he entered with McShay and McCloud.

"How are you, Mr. Ladd?"

"I want to talk to Calthorpe alone, if you don't mind," said the agent to the other two.

"Certainly," said Hal; "these gentlemen will step into the house for a moment."

The Irishman drew the preacher toward the upper wing of the house, keeping his eye steadily on the agent who sauntered away. Suddenly he stopped.

"On second thought you may have him," he said _sotto voce_ to McCloud.

"Suppose we divide the responsibility," responded the preacher with a grave face, "and call him--Scotch-Irish?"

And they went within to continue the animated discussion as to the relative contributions of each country to the world's greatness.

As Ladd turned the two men faced each other.

"I understand," said Hal easily, "that you threatened to shoot me on sight. Well, I'm on sight."

"Well," said the other calmly, "it may come to that, and it may not. That's up to you."

"Sit down," and Hal motioned to a seat with a smile.

"Thanks!" and Ladd sat on the harrow and nursed his knee in a careless off-hand way. "The Indians are very mad. Abduction of women is a serious matter, isn't it? Even a mean, dispirited race will fight for its women. Well, her people think you stole Wah-na-gi."

Hal thought for a moment and then as he did not see any advantage in dodging the issue, he said:

"Yes, I took her. She's here."

"Oh, you admit it?" said the agent with elation. "Well, that's something. Then perhaps you'll be good enough to hand her over to me."

"Well, no, not exactly. You see she's claimed my protection."

"_Your_ protection?" responded Ladd with a cynical laugh. "That's rather feeble, isn't it? Well, the Indians claim my protection; protection for their women, for their homes!"

To Hal, who knew the extent of Wah-na-gi's obligations to her own people and their supreme indifference to the girl, this buncombe was peculiarly exasperating, but he did not honor it with a reply.

Ladd rose and came over to him. Hal was seated and the other bent down over him: "Now, you're no fool, Calthorpe; you know that you've done a wild, reckless, impossible thing, and you also know that you can't get away with it," and the smooth, cool, even manner gave place to the aggressive attitude of the bully who felt secure in his position. "Now, after what happened at the powwow over at the Agency, no one State is big enough for you and me."

"Yes," assented Hal complacently, "I've realized that you and I were a bit crowded."

"You're in wrong this time, Calthorpe, and I've got you where I want you," and Ladd chuckled over the prospect.

In the cold light of day and in the scrutiny of second thought and under hostile criticism, Hal had a sickening sense that his act was crazy, quixotic, indefensible, and yet what could he have done otherwise? Could he as a man have left this woman he loved to be hounded into self-destruction or dishonor? She had called to him in her desperation. Could he have turned a deaf ear to that cry? He had as usual acted on impulse. Having at very great risk effected her rescue, was he to face the ultimate and inevitable and hand her back to these wolves? It was inconceivable. One step involved another. He must go on, trusting to chance, a perilous trust.

"What is the idea?" asked Ladd with sarcastic tolerance. "The Government, the Army, and the American nation is behind me."

Hal knew that this was too true.

"I am responsible to the Government and the people for this girl. And you come over and take her away from me by force."

"Because you have betrayed your trust."

"I was in the very act of affording her protection from the man of whom she complained when you stole her. Well, what are you going to do with her now that you've got her?"

Hal did not quail under Ladd's merciless gaze, but inwardly he writhed.

What was he going to do? Oh, if he could take this wretch by the throat and say: "She's mine--my wife, my wife!"

Ladd waited, then added: "Why, if you try to keep her, we'll wipe you out of existence--you and your ranch."

"That sounds like a threat."

"We'll make it good. Now you and McShay and your crowd have been getting busy at Washington! You have been trying to get me removed, haven't you?"

"We have."

"And you haven't done it, have you?"

"Not yet, but we have hopes; we have hopes, Brother Ladd."

"It didn't take you long to discover that I had a few friends in Washington myself, did it?"

"No, we found that you were a patriot who had all his life sacrificed his own interests to the good of his country. We found it was first Washington, then Lincoln, and now Ladd."

"Your only excuse is that you're a kid. You make it hard for me to keep my temper. You make it hard for me to let you out of the hole you've put yourself in."

"Let me out?"

"Yes, I can let you out or I can drown you in it. You want this woman."

"So do you."

The two men stood eye to eye for a tense moment. Then Ladd shrugged his shoulders and returned to the business in hand.

"Cadger has decided that I cannot afford such a luxury under the circumstances, and perhaps I can't. He thinks, and perhaps he's right, that you and I could do a whole lot better than fight each other. If you think so too, I'll meet you half-way."

"What's your game, Mr. Agent?"

"Well, I can arrest Appah and take these Indians home, and--forget it. Now you call off your crowd in Washington and I'll call off mine here. What do you say?"

"Your offer takes me by surprise. I'll have to submit it to McShay."

As Hal walked to the house it went through his brain that this was a very quick solution of a very dangerous situation. It was obvious that it would meet the worldly views of McShay. That astute politician had just expressed the belief that the war on Ladd was bad policy. It also shot through his brain that it would not coincide with the unworldly views of McCloud. Should he call out McShay alone? It is useless to deny that he was tempted. In fact, he was on the Mount of Temptation and was to miss no phase of that ordeal.

Ladd hesitated. "Why, you're not going to--Can't this be settled between you and me?" he suggested nervously.

"You two Macs come out here," called Hal through the door.

"These men are interested with me in this fight. I can't act without them. Gentlemen," said Hal to the Irishman and the Scotchman as they came forward with an air of expectancy; "the agent has made me a proposition. Unless we agree to call off the fight against him in Washington, or I surrender Wah-na-gi, he will turn Appah and his friends loose on us and make the ranch a dust heap. That's about it."

"Now, ain't that nice?" said McShay with the air of a pleased child. "Now, Parson, you have an introduction to practical politics. Well, son," he continued, turning to Hal; "it's up to you to decide. Of course my constituents will say I was bought off, but it wouldn't be the first time they've said unpleasant things about me, and I'll see you through this either way. To me and the parson you're on the square with regards to this girl, but we're only two people and we ain't a workin' majority. Ladd's got a strangle holt on you in a way, so if you want to buy him off--well, I'll stand in."

"Thank you, Mike. What do you say, John?"

"What you have done, you have done. For the protection of this fine Indian girl, well, trust her to God. Omnipotence can care for her."

"Well, Parson," said Mike doubtfully, "just for the sake of argument; why not leave Ladd to Omnipotence? Think the agent's too many for Omnipotence?"

The clergyman ignored the irrepressible Irishman.

"You have asserted," he went on, "that Agent Ladd is unfit for his responsible position, that he has been untrue to his trust. If you go back on that you make yourselves liars and frauds, and continue this man's tyranny, and fasten it on these helpless people. There are those who are looking to you, trusting to you, who have enlisted under you in this fight. You can't betray them. You can't juggle with the right. You can't do it."

"That's the answer, Mr. Agent," said Hal quietly.

"Ain't parsons the limit?" murmured McShay to himself.

"Then of course you've decided to hand Wah-na-gi over to me," said Ladd with menace.

"I'll see you damned first," was Hal's reply.

"Then you'll be responsible for hell cut loose," and the agent started to go.

"See here; wait a minute!" cried McShay intercepting him. "I've got it, and I can fix it so as to satisfy everybody."

He put his hand in his pocket and pulled out a coin. "I'll match you for it--to see whether we give up the fight against you in Washington, or you throw up the sponge here. Now that's fair, Parson. That sort of puts it up to Providence, don't you see?"

"We're wasting time," snapped Ladd, now quivering with rage. "I'll give you ten minutes to produce Wah-na-gi or take the consequences."

The participants in this scene had been so intent on the business in hand that they were oblivious to the noise of horses' hoofs beating the plain and the rattle of accoutrements as a couple of troops of United States cavalry swept through the Indian lines and the cowboy outposts without stopping to say by your leave, and came to a sudden and spectacular halt just back of the grave of Nat-u-ritch.

Captain Baker dismounted and advanced to the group in front of the house.

"What is the meaning of this, gentlemen?" he asked in a clear, ringing voice that had the cut of a sabre in it. His mouth was set, his face firm and four square, determination and authority written in every angle. He looked from one to the other and waited for the answer. Meanwhile Appah, in war bonnet and war-paint, pushed his pony to the background as if determined not to be ignored in the settlement of the dispute. Big Bill followed him.

It was obvious to Hal and McShay that Baker's advent was not just what Ladd had planned.

"I didn't call on you, Captain," said the agent, "because my Indian police are quite sufficient."

"Police?" said Captain Baker, eying the other sternly. "Why, you've got the whole tribe out here. Some one sent me a wire that a fight was on at Red Butte Ranch between the settlers and the Indians."

The Irishman grinned.

"Sure, I took the liberty of invitin' you, Captain! Knew you wouldn't like to miss a little thing like that."

After the asphalt conference Baker's opinion of the agent wasn't printable, and now he looked him over with unmistakable disapproval. That Ladd hadn't appealed to him or notified him of the trouble seemed to him most suspicious.

"Well, there isn't going to be any scrap between the settlers and the Indians. I'll see to that."

Knowing that he could not move without orders, he had telegraphed to head-quarters.

"Mr. Ladd, your Indians are off the Reservation. I've instructions to put them back."

Ladd saw that he could expect no favors from the officer.

"Correct, Captain," he answered, meeting the challenge.

"And I call upon you to see to it that they go back, _all of them_."

"I'll do that fast enough."

Wah-na-gi could stand the strain no longer. She had crouched within the door of the cabin trying to follow the course of events which were to decide her fate: hearing something, missing much, trying to fill in the gaps, scanning the faces to read there the answer that meant so much to her, every nerve and muscle tense, her heart pounding like an engine carrying too heavy a load. She seemed to be suffocating in the house, and she walked out and faced them. Every eye was turned upon her. She saw the troopers cleared for action, bronzed, clean-cut figures, with no frills or gold braid, their service khaki covered with alkali dust, weather stained, sitting potential on their smoking horses, so much bigger than the Indian ponies or the cowboys' mustangs, waiting for the word of this quiet young man who eyed her sternly. What was all this fuss about? Nothing but an Indian woman! nothing but an Indian woman! That was what she seemed to feel.

Realizing that the Army would cast the deciding vote, the Indians had broken their formation, and the cowboys had come in from the cover of the outbuildings and their hastily constructed intrenchments and were standing about in groups awaiting developments. There was Appah's hawk-like face, the agent's penetrating stare! Big Bill and McShay! So many cruel, hostile eyes! The air seemed filled with poisoned arrows.

She slipped without design between McCloud and Hal, like a hunted animal seeking shelter. Hal felt her fear, her craving for love and shelter, and put his hand on her arm.

The agent advanced toward the officer and pointed at her.

"Calthorpe, here, has kidnapped an Indian woman, and holds her by force against me, the agent, and against her relatives and friends."

Appah cut his pony with a quirt and pushed to the front.

"My squaw--my woman!" he said, pointing too.

So that was it. All this fuss and fury over a woman, an Indian woman at that. The captain was beginning to feel distinctly annoyed. He and his men in a forced march in the broiling sun and the choking dust! A squaw! However, as he took another good look at the Indian Helen, perhaps there were mitigating circumstances--she was pretty; she was damn pretty.

"Your woman?" he said without looking at Appah, and deciding on the spot that she was entirely too good for that copper-colored malefactor.