CHAPTER XVIII
THE TEXAN TAKES THE TRAIL
At the mouth of the coulee, Janet McWhorter stared in astonishment asthe Texan swung into the saddle and headed the big blue roan up theravine at a run. A moment later the bay mare was following, the girlplying quirt and spur in an endeavour to keep the flying horseman insight. The roan's pace slackened, and the bay mare closed up thedistance. The girl could see that the man was leaning far over studyingthe ground as he rode. Suddenly, without a moment's hesitation he turnedinto a side coulee, gained the bench, and headed straight for the badlands. The pace was slower, now. The Texan rode with his eyes glued tothe ground. She drew up beside him and, as she expected, found that hewas following the trail of two horses. The trail was easily followed inthe mud of the recent rains, and they made good time, dipping intocoulees, scrambling out, crossing ridges. Purdy had evidently wasted notime in picking his trail, but had taken the country as it came, his oneidea evidently had been to gain the bad lands that loomed in the neardistance.
"What will he do when he gets there?" wondered the girl, as she glancedinto the set face of the man who rode with his eyes on the tracks in themud, "he can't follow him in. There won't be any trail."
True to her prediction, the Texan drew up at the edge of a black ridgethat cut diagonally into the treeless, soilless waste. Since he haduttered Purdy's name at the mouth of the coulee, he had spoken no word,and now, as he faced her, the girl saw that his face looked tense anddrawn. "You've got to go back," he said looking straight into her eyes,"it's a blind trail from here, an' God knows where it will lead to."
"But--you--where are you going?"
"To find Purdy." There was a steely glint in the man's eyes, and hisvoice grated harshly.
"But you can't find him!" she cried. "He knows the bad lands. Purdy's ahorse-thief, and if you did find him there would be others. He's one ofa gang, and--they'll kill you!"
The Texan nodded: "Maybe--an' then, again, maybe they won't. There's twosides to this killin' game."
"But you wouldn't have a chance."
"As long as I've got a gun, I've got a chance--an' a good one."
The spirit of perversity that had prompted her to insist upon riding theblue roan, asserted itself, "I'm going with you," she announced. "I'vegot a gun, and I can shoot."
"You're goin' home." The Texan spoke quietly, yet with an air offinality that brooked no argument. The hot blood mounted to the girl'sface, and her eyes flashed. Her lips opened to frame an angry retort butthe words were never spoken, for the Texan leaned suddenly toward herand his gauntleted hand rested lightly on her arm, "For God's sake,don't hinder--_help_!" There was no trace of harshness in thevoice--only intense appeal. She glanced into his eyes, and in theirdepths read misery, pain, worry--the very soul of him was wrung withtorture. He was not commanding now. This strong, masterful man wasimploring help. A lump rose in her throat. Her eyes dropped before his.She swallowed hard, and nodded: "All right--only--promise me--if youdon't find him, you'll return to the ranch tonight. You've got to eat,and Blue has got to eat. I'll have a pack ready for you to start againearly in the morning."
"I promise," he said, simply. His gloved hand slipped from her sleeveand closed about her own. Once more their eyes met, once more the girlfelt the hot blood mount to her cheeks, and once more her glance fellbefore his. And then--he was gone and she was alone upon the edge of thebad lands, listening to catch the diminishing sound of his horse's hoofson the floor of the black coulee.
The sound died away. Minutes passed as she sat staring out over the badlands. There was a strange ache at her throat, but in her heart welled agreat gladness. What was it she had read in his eyes--during the momentof that last glance? The pain, and the worry, and the misery were stillthere but something else was there also--something that leaped from hisheart straight to hers; something held in restraint that burst throughthe restraint, overrode the pain and the worry and the misery, and for abrief instant blazed with an intensity that seemed to devour her verysoul. Slowly she raised the hand that had returned the firm, gentlepressure of his clasp and drew the back of it across her cheek, thenwith a laugh that began happily and ended in a choking sob, she turnedthe mare toward home.
She rode slowly, her thoughts centred upon the Texan. She had liked himfrom the moment of their first meeting. His eagerness to return to theaid of his friend, his complete mastery of Blue, his unhesitating plungeinto the bad lands to fight against odds, all pointed to him as a manamong men. "And, aside from all that," she murmured, as she reached tosmooth the bay mare's mane, "There's something about him--sowholesome--so clean--" Her words trailed into silence, and as herthoughts followed him into the trailless maze of the bad lands, herfists clenched tight, "Oh, I hope he won't find Purdy. They'll killhim."
She turned the mare into the corral, and entering the cabin, preparedher solitary luncheon, and as she ate it her thoughts retraced theevents of the morning. She remembered how he had looked when she hadmentioned Purdy's name--the horrified tone with which he had repeatedthe name--and how he had recoiled from it as though from a blow. "Whatdoes he know of Purdy?" she asked herself, "and why should the fact thatPurdy had ridden away with his friend have affected him so? Purdywouldn't kill his friend--there had been no sign of a struggle there onthe river bank. If the man went with Purdy, he went of his own freewill--even a horse-thief couldn't steal a full grown cowpuncher withouta struggle." She gave it up, and busied herself with the preparation ofa pack of food for the morrow. "It seems as though I had known him foryears," she murmured, "and I never laid eyes on him till this morning.But--Mr. Colston would never have made him foreman, if he wasn't allright. Anyway, anybody with half sense can see that by just looking intohis eyes, and he's really handsome, too--I'll never forget how he lookedwhen I first saw him--standing there beside the haystack with his hat inhis hand and his bandaged head--" she paused and frowned at the thoughtof that bandage, "I'll dress his wound tonight," she murmured "but--Iwonder."
From time to time during the afternoon, she stepped to the door andglanced anxiously up and down the creek. At last, just at sundown, shesaw a rider pause before the gate of the corral. She flew to the door,and drew back hurriedly: "It's that horrid Long Bill Kearney," shemuttered, in disappointment, "disreputable old coot! He ought to be injail along with other denizens of the bad lands. Dad sure picked a finebunch of neighbours--all except the Cinnabar Joes--and they say he usedto be a bartender--but he's a nice man--I like him."
Long Bill rode on, and glancing out the window Janet saw a fragment ofpaper flapping in the wind. She hurried to the corral and removing thepaper that had been secured to a post by means of a sliver of wood, readit hurriedly. The blood receded slowly from her face, and a great weightseemed pressing upon her heart. She reread the paper carefully word forword. This Texan, then, was a man with a price on his head. He was nobetter than Purdy, and Long Bill, and all the others. And now she knewwhy there was tatting on the bandage! She turned indifferently at asound from the direction of the barn, and hurriedly thrust the paperinto the bosom of her grey flannel shirt as McWhorter appeared aroundthe corner of the haystack.
* * * * *
Once into the bad lands the Texan slowed the blue roan to a walk, andriding in long sweeping semicircles, methodically searched for Purdy'strail. With set face and narrowed eyes the man studied every foot of theground, at times throwing himself from the saddle for closer scrutiny ofsome obscure mark or misplaced stone. So great was his anxiety toovertake the pair that his slow pace became a veritable torture. And attimes his struggle to keep from putting spurs to his horse and dashingwildly on, amounted almost to physical violence.
Bitterly he blamed himself for Alice Endicott's plight. He raved andcursed like a madman, and for long periods was silent, his eyes hot andburning with the intensity of his hate for Purdy. Gradually thehopelessness of picking up the trail among the rocks and disintegratedlava, forced itself upon him. More than once in utter despai
r and miseryof soul, he drew the six-gun from its holster and gazed long andhungrily at its blue-black barrel. One shot, and--oblivion. His was theblame. He sought no excuse--no palliation of responsibility. This womanhad trusted him--had risked life and happiness to protect him from thebullets of the mob--and he had failed her--had abandoned her to a fateworse--a thousand times worse than death. Sweat stood upon his foreheadin cold beads as he thought of her completely in the power of Purdy. Hecould never face Win--worst of all he could never face himself. Nightand day as long as he should live the torture would be upon him. Therecould be but one end--madness--unless, he glanced again at the long bluebarrel of his Colt. With an oath he jammed it into its holster. Thecoward's way out! The girl still lived. Purdy still lives--and whilePurdy lives his work is cut out for him. Later--perhaps--but, first hemust find Purdy. On and on he rode pausing now and then to scan thehorizon and the ridges and coulees between, for sight of some living,moving thing. But always it was the same--silence--the hot dead silenceof the bad lands. With the passing of the hours the torture became lessacute. The bitter self-recrimination ceased, and the chaos of emotionwithin his brain shaped and crystallized into a single overmasteringpurpose. He would find Purdy. He would kill him. Nothing else mattered.A day--a year--ten years--it did not matter. He would find Purdy andkill him. He would not kill him quickly. Purdy must have time tothink--plenty of time to think. The man even smiled grimly as he devisedand discarded various plans. "They're all too easy--too gentle. I'llleave it to Old Bat--he's Injun--he'll know. An' if Bat was here he'dpick up the trail." A wild idea of crossing the river and fetching Batflashed into his mind, but he banished it. "Bat'll come," he muttered,with conviction. "He's found out before this that I've gone an' he'llcome."
As the sun sank below the horizon, the Texan turned his horse towardMcWhorter's. He paused on a rocky spur for one last look over the badlands, and raising his gauntleted fist, he shook it in the face of thesolitude: "I'll get you! Damn you! _Damn you!_"
As he whirled his horse and headed him out into the open bench, a squat,bow-legged man peered out from behind a rock, not fifty feet from wherethe Texan had sat his horse. A tuft of hair protruded from a hole in thecrown of his battered hat as he fingered his stubby beard: "Pretty damnlively for a corpse," grinned the squat man, "an' he _will_ git him,too. An' if that there gal wasn't safe at Cinnabar Joe's, I'd see thathe got him tonight. It looks from here as if God A'mighty's gittin'ready to call Purdy's bluff."