Part 36 (1/2)

But the presence of difficulties only strengthened Buck's resolution and confidence. As he sped on through the luminous darkness, the cool night wind brus.h.i.+ng his face, a seething rage against Tex Lynch dominated him.

Now and then the thought of Mary Thorne came to torture him. Vividly he pictured the scene at the ranch-house which Mrs. Archer had described, imagining the girl's fear and horror and despair, then and afterward, with a realism which made him wince. But always his mind flashed back to the man who was to blame for it all, and with savage curses he pledged himself to a reckoning.

And so, with mind divided between alternating spasms of tenderness and fury, he came at last to the further side of middle pasture and dismounted to let down the fence. It was characteristic of the born and bred ranchman that instead of riding swiftly on and letting the cut wires dangle, he automatically obeyed one of the hard and fast rules of the range and fastened them behind him. He did not pause again until he reached the little sheltered nook in the face of the high cliffs, out of which led the trail.

Had those two pa.s.sed yet, or were they still out there somewhere in the sandy wastes of north pasture? He wondered as he reined in his horse. He scarcely dared hope that already he could have forestalled the crafty Lynch, but it was important to make sure. And so, slipping out of the saddle, he flung the reins over the roan's head and, walking forward a few steps, lit a match and searched the ground carefully for any signs.

Three matches had been consumed before he found what he was looking for--the fresh prints of two horses leading toward the trail. Hastily returning to his cayuse, he swung into the saddle and headed the roan toward the grade. They were ahead of him, then; but how far?

It was impossible to make any speed along the rough uncertainties of this rocky trail, but Buck wasted no time. Down in the further hollow he turned aside to the spring, not knowing when he would again find water for his horse. He did not dismount, and as the roan plunged velvet nozzle into the spring, a picture rose in Buck's mind of that other day--how long ago it seemed!--when he himself, sagging painfully in the saddle, had sucked the water with as great an eagerness out of a woman's soggy Stetson, and then, over the limp brim, gazed gratefully into a pair of tender hazel eyes which tried in vain to mask anxiety beneath a surface of lightness.

He bit his lips and struck the saddle-horn fiercely with one clenched fist. When the horse had finished drinking, he turned him swiftly and, regaining the trail, pushed on feverishly at reckless speed.

About an hour later the first pale signs of dawn began to lighten the darkness. Slowly, gradually, almost imperceptibly, a cold gray crept into the sky, blotting out the stars. Little by little the light strengthened, searching out shadowy nooks and corners, revealing this peak or that, widening the horizon, until at length the whole, wide, tumbled ma.s.s of peak and precipice, of canon, valley, and tortuous, twisted mountain trail lay revealed in all its grim, lifeless, forbidding desolation.

From his point of vantage at the summit of a steep grade, Buck halted and stared ahead with a restless, keen eagerness. He could see the trail curving over the next rise, and farther still he glimpsed a tiny patch of it rounding the shoulder of a hill. But it was empty, lifeless; and as he loosed the reins and touched the roan lightly with a spur, Stratton's face grew blank and hard again.

From somewhere amongst the rocks the long-drawn, quavering howl of a coyote sounded mournfully.

CHAPTER x.x.xIII

CARRIED AWAY

The same dawn unrolled before the eyes of a man and a girl, riding southward along the ragged margin of the T-T ranch. Westward stretched the wide, rolling range-land, empty at the moment of any signs of life. And somehow, for the very reason that one expected something living there, it seemed even more desolate than the rough, broken country bordering the mountains on the other side.

That, at least, was Mary Thorne's thought. Emerging from the mountain trail just as dawn broke, her eyes brightened as she took in the flat, familiar country, even noting a distant line of wire fence, and for the first time in many hours despair gave place to sudden hope. Where there was range-land there must be cattle and men to tend them, and her experience with Western cow-men had not been confined to those of Lynch's type. Him she knew now, to her regret and sorrow, to be the great exception. The majority were clean-cut, brave, courteous, slow of speech, perhaps, but swift in action; simple of mind and heart--the sort of man, in short, to whom a woman in distress might confidently turn for help.

But presently, as the rising sun, gilding the peaks that towered above her, emphasized the utter emptiness of those sweeping pastures, the light died out of her eyes and she remembered with a sinking heart the blackleg scourge which had so recently afflicted the T-T outfit. There had been much discussion of it at the Shoe-Bar, and now she recalled vaguely hearing that it had first broken out in these very pastures. Doubtless, as a method of prevention, the surviving stock had been moved elsewhere, and her chances for help would be as likely in the midst of a trackless desert as here.

The reaction made her lips quiver and there swept over her with renewed force that wave of despair which had been gaining strength all through those interminable black hours. She had done her best to combat it. Over and over again she told herself that the situation was far from hopeless.

Something must happen. Some one--mostly she thought of Buck, though she did not name him even to herself--would come to her aid. It was incredible that in this day and generation a person could be successfully carried off even by one as crafty, resourceful, and unscrupulous as Tex Lynch. But in spite of all her reasoning there remained in the back of Mary's mind a feeling of cold horror, born of those few sentences she had overheard while Pedro was saddling the horses. Like a poisonous serpent, it reared its ugly head persistently, to demolish in an instant her most specious arguments. The very thought of it now filled her with the same fear and dread that had overwhelmed her when the incredible words first burned into her consciousness, and made her glance with a sudden, sharp terror at the man beside her. She met a stare from his bold, heavy-lidded eyes that sent the blood flaming into her cheeks.

”Well?” queried Lynch, smiling. ”Feelin' better, now it's mornin'?”

The girl made no answer. Hastily averting her eyes, she rode on in silence, lips pressed together and chin a little tilted.

”Sulking, eh?” drawled Lynch. ”What's the good? Yuh can't keep that sort of thing up forever. After we're--married--”

He paused significantly. The girl's lip quivered but she set her teeth into it determinedly. Presently, with an effort, she forced herself to speak.

”Aren't you rather wasting time trying to--to frighten me with that sort of rubbish?” she asked coldly. ”In these days marriage isn't something that can be forced.”

The man's laugh was not agreeable. ”Oh, is that so?” he inquired. ”You're likely to learn a thing or two before long, I'll say.”

His tone was so carelessly confident, so entirely a.s.sured, that in an instant her pitiful little pretense of courage was swept away.

”It isn't so!” she cried, turning on him with wide eyes and quivering lips. ”You couldn't-- There isn't a--real clergyman who'd do--do such a thing. No one could force me to--to-- Why, I'd rather die than--”

She paused, choking. Lynch shrugged his shoulders.