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It was afternoon before Joan could trust herself sufficiently to go outagain, and when she did she saw that she attracted very little attentionfrom the bandits.
Kells had a springy step, a bright eye, a lifted head, and he seemed tobe listening. Perhaps he was--to the music of his sordid dreams.Joan watched him sometimes with wonder. Even a bandit--plotting goldrobberies, with violence and blood merely means to an end--built castlesin the air and lived with joy!
All that afternoon the bandits left camp in twos and threes, each partywith pack burros and horses, packed as Joan had not seen them before onthe border. Shovels and picks and old sieves and pans, these swinging ortied in prominent places, were evidence that the bandits meant to assumethe characters of miners and prospectors. They whistled and sang. It wasa lark. The excitement had subsided and the action begun. Only in Kells,under his radiance, could be felt the dark and sinister plot. He was theheart of the machine.
By sundown Kells, Pearce, Wood, Jim Cleve, and a robust, grizzledbandit, Jesse Smith, were left in camp. Smith was lame from his ride,and Joan gathered that Kells would have left camp but for the fact thatSmith needed rest. He and Kells were together all the time, talkingendlessly. Joan heard them argue a disputed point--would the men abideby Kells's plan and go by twos and threes into the gold-camp, and hidetheir relations as a larger band? Kells contended they would and Smithhad his doubts.
"Jack, wait till you see Alder Creek!" ejaculated Smith, wagging hisgrizzled head. "Three thousand men, old an' young, of all kinds--gonegold--crazy! Alder Creek has got California's '49 and' '51 cinched tothe last hole!" And the bandit leader rubbed his palms in great glee.
That evening they all had supper together in Kell's cabin. Bate Woodgrumbled because he had packed most of his outfit. It so chanced thatJoan sat directly opposite Jim Cleve, and while he ate he pressed herfoot with his under the table. The touch thrilled Joan. Jim did notglance at her, but there was such a change in him that she feared itmight rouse Kells's curiosity. This night, however, the bandit could nothave seen anything except a gleam of yellow. He talked, he sat at table,but did not eat. After supper he sent Joan to her cabin, saying theywould be on the trail at daylight. Joan watched them awhile fromher covert. They had evidently talked themselves out, and Kells grewthoughtful. Smith and Pearce went outside, apparently to roll their bedson the ground under the porch roof. Wood, who said he was never a goodsleeper, smoked his pipe. And Jim Cleve spread blankets along the wallin the shadow and and lay down. Joan could see his eyes shining towardthe door. Of course he was thinking of her. But could he see her eyes?Watching her chance, she slipped a hand from behind the curtain, and sheknew Cleve saw it. What a comfort that was! Joan's heart swelled. Allmight yet be well. Jim Cleve would be near her while she slept. Shecould sleep now without those dark dreams--without dreading to awaken tothe light. Again she saw Kells pacing the room, silent, bent, absorbed,hands behind his back, weighted with his burden. It was impossible notto feel sorry for him. With all his intelligence and cunning power,his cause was hopeless. Joan knew that as she knew so many other thingswithout understanding why. She had not yet sounded Jesse Smith, but nota man of all the others was true to Kells. They would be of his BorderLegion, do his bidding, revel in their ill-gotten gains, and then, whenhe needed them most, be false to him.
When Joan was awakened her room was shrouded in gray gloom. A bustlesound from the big cabin, and outside horses stamped and men talked.
She sat alone at breakfast and ate by lantern-light. It was necessaryto take a lantern back to her cabin, and she was so long in herpreparations there that Kells called again. Somehow she did not want toleave this cabin. It seemed protective and private, and she feared shemight not find such quarters again. Besides, upon the moment of leavingshe discovered that she had grown attached to the place where she hadsuffered and thought and grown so much.
Kells had put out the lights. Joan hurried through the cabin andoutside. The gray obscurity had given way to dawn. The air was cold,sweet, bracing with the touch of mountain purity in it. The men, exceptKells, were all mounted, and the pack-train was in motion. Kells draggedthe rude door into position, and then, mounting, he called to Joan tofollow. She trotted her horse after him, down the slope, across thebrook and through the wet willows, and out upon the wide trail. Sheglanced ahead, discerning that the third man from her was Jim Cleve; andthat fact, in the start for Alder Creek, made all the difference in theworld.
When they rode out of the narrow defile into the valley the sun wasrising red and bright in a notch of the mountains. Clouds hung overdistant peaks, and the patches of snow in the high canons shone blue andpink. Smith in the lead turned westward up the valley. Horses troopedafter the cavalcade and had to be driven back. There were also cattle inthe valley, and all these Kells left behind like an honest rancherwho had no fear for his stock. Deer stood off with long ears pointedforward, watching the horses go by. There were flocks of quail, andwhirring grouse, and bounding jack-rabbits, and occasionally a braceof sneaking coyotes. These and the wild flowers, and the wavingmeadow-grass, the yellow-stemmed willows, and the patches of alder, allwere pleasurable to Joan's eyes and restful to her mind.
Smith soon led away from this valley up out of the head of a ravine,across a rough rock-strewn ridge, down again into a hollow that grew tobe a canon. The trail was bad. Part of the time it was the bottom of aboulder-strewn brook where the horses slipped on the wet, round stones.Progress was slow and time passed. For Joan, however, it was a relief;and the slower they might travel the better she would like it. At theend of that journey there were Gulden and the others, and the gold-campwith its illimitable possibilities for such men.
At noon the party halted for a rest. The camp site was pleasant and themen were all agreeable. During the meal Kells found occasion to remarkto Cleve:
"Say youngster, you've brightened up. Must be because of our prospectsover here."
"Not that so much," replied Cleve. "I quit the whisky. To be honest,Kells, I was almost seeing snakes."
"I'm glad you quit. When you're drinking you're wild. I never yet sawthe man who could drink hard and keep his head. I can't. But I don'tdrink much."
His last remark brought a response in laughter. Evidently his companionsthought he was joking. He laughed himself and actually winked at Joan.
It happened to be Cleve whom Kells told to saddle Joan's horse, and asJoan tried the cinches, to see if they were too tight to suit her, Jim'shand came in contact with hers. That touch was like a message. Joan wasthrilling all over as she looked at Jim, but he kept his face averted.Perhaps he did not trust his eyes.
Travel was resumed up the canon and continued steadily, thoughleisurely. But the trail was so rough, and so winding, that Joanbelieved the progress did not exceed three miles an hour. It was thekind of travel in which a horse could be helped and that entailedattention to the lay of the ground. Before Joan realized the hours wereflying, the afternoon had waned. Smith kept on, however, until nearlydark before halting for camp.
The evening camp was a scene of activity, and all except Joan had workto do. She tried to lend a hand, but Wood told her to rest. This she wasglad to do. When called to supper she had almost fallen asleep. Aftera long day's ride the business of eating precluded conversation. Later,however, the men began to talk between puffs on their pipes, and fromthe talk no one could have guessed that here was a band of robberson their way to a gold camp. Jesse Smith had a sore foot and he wascompared to a tenderfoot on his first ride. Smith retaliated in kind.Every consideration was shown Joan, and Wood particularly appearedassiduous in his desire for her comfort. All the men except Cleve paidher some kind attention; and he, of course, neglected her because he wasafraid to go near her. Again she felt in Red Pearce a condemnation ofthe bandit leader who was dragging a girl over hard trails, making hersleep in the open, exposing her to danger and to men like himself andGulden. In his own estimate Pearce, like every one of his kind, was notso slow as the others.
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Joan watched and listened from her blankets, under a leafy tree, somefew yards from the camp-fire. Once Kells turned to see how far distantshe was, and then, lowering his voice, he told a story. The otherslaughed. Pearce followed with another, and he, too, took care that Joancould not hear. They grew closer for the mirth, and Smith, who evidentlywas a jolly fellow, set them to roaring. Jim Cleve laughed with them.
"Say, Jim, you're getting over it," remarked Kells.
"Over what?"
Kells paused, rather embarrassed for a reply, as evidently in the humorof the hour he had spoken a thought better left unsaid. But there was nomore forbidding atmosphere about Cleve. He appeared to have rounded togood-fellowship after a moody and quarrelsome drinking spell.
"Why, over what drove you out here--and gave me a lucky chance at you,"replied Kells, with a constrained laugh.
"Oh, you mean the girl?... Sure, I'm getting over that, except when Idrink."
"Tell us, Jim," said Kells, curiously.
"Aw, you'll give me the laugh!" retorted Cleve.
"No, we won't unless your story's funny."
"You can gamble it wasn't funny," put in Red Pearce.
They all coaxed him, yet none of them, except Kells, was particularlycurious; it was just that hour when men of their ilk were lazy andcomfortable and full fed and good-humored round the warm, blazingcamp-fire.
"All right," replied Cleve, and apparently, for all his complaisance, acall upon memory had its pain. "I'm from Montana. Range-rider in winterand in summer I prospected. Saved quite a little money, in spite of afling now and then at faro and whisky.... Yes, there was a girl, I guessyes. She was pretty. I had a bad case over her. Not long ago I left allI had--money and gold and things--in her keeping, and I went prospectingagain. We were to get married on my return. I stayed out six months, didwell, and got robbed of all my dust."
Cleve was telling this fabrication in a matter-of-fact way, growing alittle less frank as he proceeded, and he paused while he lifted sandand let it drift through his fingers, watching it curiously. All the menwere interested and Kells hung on every word.
"When I got back," went on Cleve, "my girl had married another fellow.She'd given him all I left with her. Then I got drunk. While I was drunkthey put up a job on me. It was her word that disgraced me and run meout of town.... So I struck west and drifted to the border."
"That's not all," said Kells, bluntly.
"Jim, I reckon you ain't tellin' what you did to thet lyin' girl an' thefeller. How'd you leave them?" added Pearce.
But Cleve appeared to become gloomy and reticent.
"Wimmen can hand the double-cross to a man, hey, Kells?" queried Smith,with a broad grin.
"By gosh! I thought you'd been treated powerful mean!" exclaimed BateWood, and he was full of wrath.
"A treacherous woman!" exclaimed Kells, passionately. He had takenCleve's story hard. The man must have been betrayed by women, andCleve's story had irritated old wounds.
Directly Kells left the fire and repaired to his blankets, near whereJoan lay. Probably he believed her asleep, for he neither looked norspoke. Cleve sought his bed, and likewise Wood and Smith. Pearce was thelast to leave, and as he stood up the light fell upon his red face, leanand bold like an Indian's. Then he passed Joan, looking down upon herand then upon the recumbent figure of Kells; and if his glance was notbaleful and malignant, as it swept over the bandit, Joan believed herimagination must be vividly weird, and running away with her judgment.
The next morning began a day of toil. They had to climb over themountain divide, a long, flat-topped range of broken rocks. Joan sparedher horse to the limit of her own endurance. If there were a trail Smithalone knew it, for none was in evidence to the others. They climbed outof the notched head of the canon, and up a long slope of weathered shalethat let the horses slide back a foot for every yard gained, and througha labyrinth of broken cliffs, and over bench and ridge to the height ofthe divide. From there Joan had a magnificent view. Foot-hills rolledround heads below, and miles away, in a curve of the range, glistenedBear Lake. The rest here at this height was counteracted by the factthat the altitude affected Joan. She was glad to be on the move again,and now the travel was downhill, so that she could ride. Still it wasdifficult, for horses were more easily lamed in a descent. It tooktwo hours to descend the distance that had consumed all the morning toascend. Smith led through valley after valley between foot-hills, andlate in the afternoon halted by a spring in a timbered spot.
Joan ached in every muscle and she was too tired to care what happenedround the camp-fire. Jim had been close to her all day and that had keptup her spirit. It was not yet dark when she lay down for the night.
"Sleep well, Dandy Dale," said Kells, cheerfully, yet not withoutpathos. "Alder Creek to-morrow!... Then you'll never sleep again!"
At times she seemed to feel that he regretted her presence, and alwaysthis fancy came to her with mocking or bantering suggestion that thecostume and mask she wore made her a bandit's consort, and she could notescape the wildness of this gold-seeking life. The truth was that Kellssaw the insuperable barrier between them, and in the bitterness of hislove he lied to himself, and hated himself for the lie.
About the middle of the afternoon of the next day the tired cavalcaderode down out of the brush and rock into a new, broad, dusty road. Itwas so new that the stems of the cut brush along the borders were stillwhite. But that road had been traveled by a multitude.
Out across the valley in the rear Joan saw a canvas-topped wagon, andshe had not ridden far on the road when she saw a bobbing pack-burros tothe fore. Kells had called Wood and Smith and Pearce and Cleve together,and now they went on in a bunch, all driving the pack-train. Excitementagain claimed Kells; Pearce was alert and hawk-eyed; Smith looked like ahound on a scent; Cleve showed genuine feeling. Only Bate Wood remainedproof to the meaning of that broad road.
All along, on either side, Joan saw wrecks of wagons, wheels, harness,boxes, old rags of tents blown into the brush, dead mules and burros.It seemed almost as if an army had passed that way. Presently the roadcrossed a wide, shallow brook of water, half clear and half muddy; andon the other side the road followed the course of the brook. Joan heardSmith call the stream Alder Creek, and he asked Kells if he knew whatmuddied water meant. The bandit's eyes flashed fire. Joan thrilled, forshe, too, knew that up-stream there were miners washing earth for gold.
A couple of miles farther on creek and road entered the mouth of a widespruce-timbered gulch. These trees hid any view of the slopes or floorof the gulch, and it was not till several more miles had been passedthat the bandit rode out into what Joan first thought was a hideousslash in the forest made by fire. But it was only the devastationwrought by men. As far as she could see the timber was down, andeverywhere began to be manifested signs that led her to expecthabitations. No cabins showed, however, in the next mile. They passedout of the timbered part of the gulch into one of rugged, bare, andstony slopes, with bunches of sparse alder here and there. The gulchturned at right angles and a great gray slope shut out sight of whatlay beyond. But, once round that obstruction, Kells halted his men withshort, tense exclamation.
Joan saw that she stood high up on the slope, looking down upon thegold-camp. It was an interesting scene, but not beautiful. To Kells itmust have been so, but to Joan it was even more hideous than the slashin the forest. Here and there, everywhere, were rude dugouts, littlehuts of brush, an occasional tent, and an occasional log cabin; andas she looked farther and farther these crude habitations of minersmagnified in number and in dimensions till the white and black broken,mass of the town choked the narrow gulch.
"Wal, boss, what do you say to thet diggin's?" demanded Jesse Smith.
Kells drew a deep breath. "Old forty-niner, this beats all I ever saw!"
"Shore I've seen Sacramento look like thet!" added Bate Wood.
Pearce and Cleve gazed with fixed eyes, and, however different theiremotions, they rivaled each other in attention.<
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"Jesse, what's the word?" queried Kells, with a sharp return to thebusiness of the matter.
"I've picked a site on the other side of camp. Best fer us," he replied.
"Shall we keep to the road?"
"Certain-lee," he returned, with his grin.
Kells hesitated, and felt of his beard, probably conjecturing thepossibilities of recognition.
"Whiskers make another man of you. Reckon you needn't expect to be knownover here."
That decided Kells. He pulled his sombrero well down, shadowing hisface. Then he remembered Joan and made a slight significant gesture ather mask.
"Kells, the people in this here camp wouldn't look at an army ridin'through," responded Smith. "It's every man fer hisself. An' wimmen, say!there's all kinds. I seen a dozen with veils, an' them's the sameas masks." Nevertheless, Kells had Joan remove the mask and pull hersombrero down, and instructed her to ride in the midst of the group.Then they trotted on, soon catching up with the jogging pack-train.
What a strange ride that was for Joan! The slope resembled a magnifiedant-hill with a horde of frantic ants in action. As she drew closer shesaw these ants were men, digging for gold. Those near at hand could beplainly seen--rough, ragged, bearded men and smooth-faced boys. Fartheron and up the slope, along the waterways and ravines, were miners soclose they seemed almost to interfere with one another. The creekbottom was alive with busy, silent, violent men, bending over the water,washing and shaking and paddling, all desperately intent upon something.They had not time to look up. They were ragged, unkempt, barearmed andbare-legged, every last one of them with back bent. For a mile or moreKells's party trotted through this part of the diggings, and everywhere,on rocky bench and gravel bar and gray slope, were holes with menpicking and shoveling in them. Some were deep and some were shallow;some long trenches and others mere pits. If all of these prospectorswere finding gold, then gold was everywhere. And presently Joan did notneed to have Kells tell her that all of these diggers were finding dust.How silent they were--how tense! They were not mechanical. It was a soulthat drove them. Joan had seen many men dig for gold, and find a littlenow and then, but she had never seen men dig when they knew they weregoing to strike gold. That made the strange difference.
Joan calculated she must have seen a thousand miners in less than twomiles of the gulch, and then she could not see up the draws and washesthat intersected the slope, and she could not see beyond the camp.
But it was not a camp which she was entering; it was a tent-walledtown, a city of squat log cabins, a long, motley, checkered jumble ofstructures thrown up and together in mad haste. The wide road split itin the middle and seemed a stream of color and life. Joan rodebetween two lines of horses, burros, oxen, mules, packs and loads andcanvas-domed wagons and gaudy vehicles resembling gipsy caravans. Thestreet was as busy as a beehive and as noisy as a bedlam. The sidewalkswere rough-hewn planks and they rattled under the tread of booted men.There were tents on the ground and tents on floors and tents on logwalls. And farther on began the lines of cabins-stores and shops andsaloons--and then a great, square, flat structure with a flaring sign incrude gold letters, "Last Nugget," from which came the creak of iddlesand scrape of boots, and hoarse mirth. Joan saw strange, wild-lookingcreatures--women that made her shrink; and several others of her sex,hurrying along, carrying sacks or buckets, worn and bewildered-lookingwomen, the sight of whom gave her a pang. She saw lounging Indians andgroups of lazy, bearded men, just like Kells's band, and gamblers inlong, black coats, and frontiersmen in fringed buckskin, and Mexicanswith swarthy faces under wide, peaked sombreros; and then in greatmajority, dominating that stream of life, the lean and stalwart miners,of all ages, in their check shirts and high boots, all packing guns,jostling along, dark-browed, somber, and intent. These last were theworkers of this vast beehive; the others were the drones, the parasites.
Kell's party rode on through the town, and Smith halted them beyond theoutskirts, near a grove of spruce-trees, where camp was to be made.
Joan pondered over her impression of Alder Creek. It was confused; shehad seen too much. But out of what she had seen and heard loomed twocontrasting features: a throng of toiling miners, slaves to their lustfor gold and actuated by ambitions, hopes, and aims, honest, rugged,tireless workers, but frenzied in that strange pursuit; and a lessercrowd, like leeches, living for and off the gold they did not dig withblood of hand and sweat of brow.
Manifestly Jesse Smith had selected the spot for Kells's permanentlocation at Alder Creek with an eye for the bandit's peculiar needs. Itwas out of sight of town, yet within a hundred rods of the nearest huts,and closer than that to a sawmill. It could be approached by a shallowravine that wound away toward the creek. It was backed up against arugged bluff in which there was a narrow gorge, choked with pieces ofweathered cliff; and no doubt the bandits could go and come in thatdirection. There was a spring near at hand and a grove of spruce-trees.The ground was rocky, and apparently unfit for the digging of gold.
While Bate Wood began preparations for supper, and Cleve built the fire,and Smith looked after the horses, Kells and Pearce stepped off theground where the cabin was to be erected. They selected a level benchdown upon which a huge cracked rock, as large as a house, had rolled.The cabin was to be backed up against this stone, and in the rear, undercover of it, a secret exit could be made and hidden. The bandit wantedtwo holes to his burrow.
When the group sat down to the meal the gulch was full of sunset colors.And, strangely, they were all some shade of gold. Beautiful goldenveils, misty, ethereal, shone in rays across the gulch from the brokenramparts; and they seemed so brilliant, so rich, prophetic of thetreasures of the hills. But that golden sunset changed. The sun wentdown red, leaving a sinister shadow over the gulch, growing darker anddarker. Joan saw Cleve thoughtfully watching this transformation, andshe wondered if he had caught the subtle mood of nature. For whateverhad been the hope and brightness, the golden glory of this new Eldorado,this sudden uprising Alder Creek with its horde of brave and toilingminers, the truth was that Jack Kells and Gulden had ridden into thecamp and the sun had gone down red. Joan knew that great mining-campswere always happy, rich, free, lucky, honest places till the fame ofgold brought evil men. And she had not the slightest doubt that the sunof Alder Creek's brief and glad day had set forever.
Twilight was stealing down from the hills when Kells announced to hisparty: "Bate, you and Jesse keep camp. Pearce, you look out for any ofthe gang. But meet in the dark!... Cleve, you can go with me." Then heturned to Joan. "Do you want to go with us to see the sights or wouldyou rather stay here?"
"I'd like to go, if only I didn't look so--so dreadful in this suit,"she replied.
Kells laughed, and the camp-fire glare lighted the smiling faces ofPearce and Smith.
"Why, you'll not be seen. And you look far from dreadful."
"Can't you give me a--a longer coat?" faltered Joan.
Cleve heard, and without speaking he went to his saddle and unrolled hispack. Inside a slicker he had a gray coat. Joan had seen it many a time,and it brought a pang with memories of Hoadley. Had that been years ago?Cleve handed this coat to Joan.
"Thank you," she said.
Kells held the coat for her and she slipped into it. She seemed lost. Itwas long, coming way below her hips, and for the first time in days shefelt she was Joan Randle again.
"Modesty is all very well in a woman, but it's not alwaysbecoming," remarked Kells. "Turn up your collar.... Pull down yourhat--farther--There! If you won't go as a youngster now I'll eat DandyDale's outfit and get you silk dresses. Ha-ha!"
Joan was not deceived by his humor. He might like to look at her inthat outrageous bandit costume; it might have pleased certain vainand notoriety-seeking proclivities of his, habits of his Californiaroad-agent days; but she felt that notwithstanding this, once she haddonned the long coat he was relieved and glad in spite of himself. Joanhad a little rush of feeling. Sometimes she almost liked this bandit.Once he must have
been something very different.
They set out, Joan between Kells and Cleve. How strange for her! Shehad daring enough to feel for Jim's hand in the dark and to give it asqueeze. Then he nearly broke her fingers. She felt the fire in him. Itwas indeed a hard situation for him. The walking was rough, owing to theuneven road and the stones. Several times Joan stumbled and her spursjangled. They passed ruddy camp-fires, where steam and smoke arose withsavory odors, where red-faced men were eating; and they passed othercamp-fires, burned out and smoldering. Some tents had dim lights,throwing shadows on the canvas, and others were dark. There were men onthe road, all headed for town, gay, noisy and profane.
Then Joan saw uneven rows of lights, some dim and some bright, andcrossing before them were moving dark figures. Again Kells bethoughthimself of his own disguise, and buried his chin in his scarf and pulledhis wide-brimmed hat down so that hardly a glimpse of his face could beseen. Joan could not have recognized him at the distance of a yard.
They walked down the middle of the road, past the noisy saloons,past the big, flat structure with its sign "Last Nugget" and its openwindows, where shafts of light shone forth, and all the way down to theend of town. Then Kells turned back. He scrutinized each group of men hemet. He was looking for members of his Border Legion. Several times heleft Cleve and Joan standing in the road while he peered into saloons.At these brief intervals Joan looked at Cleve with all her heart in hereyes. He never spoke. He seemed under a strain. Upon the return, whenthey reached the Last Nugget, Kells said:
"Jim, hang on to her like grim death! She's worth more than all the goldin Alder Creek!"
Then they started for the door.
Joan clung to Cleve on one side, and on the other, instinctively with afrightened girl's action, she let go Kells's arm and slipped her hand inhis. He seemed startled. He bent to her ear, for the din made ordinarytalk indistinguishable. That involuntary hand in his evidently hadpleased and touched him, even hurt him, for his whisper was husky.
"It's all right--you're perfectly safe."
First Joan made out a glare of smoky lamps, a huge place full of smokeand men and sounds. Kells led the way slowly. He had his own reason forobservance. There was a stench that sickened Joan--a blended odor oftobacco and rum and wet sawdust and smoking oil. There was a noise thatappeared almost deafening--the loud talk and vacant laughter of drinkingmen, and a din of creaky fiddles and scraping boots and boisterousmirth. This last and dominating sound came from an adjoining room, whichJoan could see through a wide opening. There was dancing, but Joan couldnot see the dancers because of the intervening crowd. Then her gaze cameback to the features nearer at hand. Men and youths were lined up to along bar nearly as high as her head. Then there were excited shoutinggroups round gambling games. There were men in clusters, sitting onupturned kegs, round a box for a table, and dirty bags of gold-dust werein evidence. The gamblers at the cards were silent, in strange contrastwith the others; and in each group was at least one dark-garbed,hard-eyed gambler who was not a miner. Joan saw boys not yet of age,flushed and haggard, wild with the frenzy of winning and cast down indefeat. There were jovial, grizzled, old prospectors to whom thisscene and company were pleasant reminders of bygone days. There weredesperados whose glittering eyes showed they had no gold with which togamble.
Joan suddenly felt Kells start and she believed she heard a low, hissingexclamation. And she looked for the cause. Then she saw familiar darkfaces; they belonged to men of Kells's Legion. And with his broad backto her there sat the giant Gulden. Already he and his allies had gottentogether in defiance of or indifference to Kells's orders. Some of themwere already under the influence of drink, but, though they saw Kells,they gave no sign of recognition. Gulden did not see Joan, and for thatshe was thankful. And whether or not his presence caused it, the factwas that she suddenly felt as much of a captive as she had in CabinGulch, and feared that here escape would be harder because in acommunity like this Kells would watch her closely.
Kells led Joan and Cleve from one part of the smoky hall to another, andthey looked on at the games and the strange raw life manifested there.The place was getting packed with men. Kells's party encountered Blickyand Beady Jones together. They passed by as strangers. Then Joan sawBeard and Chick Williams arm in arm, strolling about, like roysteringminers. Williams telegraphed a keen, fleeting glance at Kells, then wenton, to be lost in the crowd. Handy Oliver brushed by Kells, jostled him,apparently by accident, and he said, "Excuse me, mister!" There wereother familiar faces. Kells's gang were all in Alder Creek and the darkmachinations of the bandit leader had been put into operation.What struck Joan forcibly was that, though there were hilarity andcomradeship, they were not manifested in any general way. These minerswere strangers to one another; the groups were strangers; the gamblerswere strangers; the newcomers were strangers; and over all hung anatmosphere of distrust. Good fellowship abided only in the many smallcompanies of men who stuck together. The mining-camps that Joan hadvisited had been composed of an assortment of prospectors and hunterswho made one big, jolly family. This was a gold strike, and thedifference was obvious. The hunting for gold was one thing, in itsrelation to the searchers; after it had been found, in a rich field,the conditions of life and character changed. Gold had always seemedwonderful and beautiful to Joan; she absorbed here something that wasthe nucleus of hate. Why could not these miners, young and old, stay intheir camps and keep their gold? That was the fatality. The pursuitwas a dream--a glittering allurement; the possession incited a lust formore, and that was madness. Joan felt that in these reckless, honestminers there was a liberation of the same wild element which was thedriving passion of Kells's Border Legion. Gold, then, was a terriblething.
"Take me in there," said Joan, conscious of her own excitement, and sheindicated the dance-hall.
Kells laughed as if at her audacity. But he appeared reluctant.
"Please take me--unless--" Joan did not know what to add, but she meantunless it was not right for her to see any more. A strange curiosityhad stirred in her. After all, this place where she now stood was notgreatly different from the picture imagination had conjured up. Thatdance-hall, however, was beyond any creation of Joan's mind.
"Let me have a look first," said Kells, and he left Joan with Cleve.
When he had gone Joan spoke without looking at Cleve, though she heldfast to his arm.
"Jim, it could be dreadful here--all in a minute!" she whispered.
"You've struck it exactly," he replied. "All Alder Creek needed to makeit hell was Kells and his gang."
"Thank Heaven I turned you back in time!... Jim, you'd have--have gonethe pace here."
He nodded grimly. Then Kells returned and led them back through the roomto another door where spectators were fewer. Joan saw perhaps a dozencouples of rough, whirling, jigging dancers in a half-circle of watchingmen. The hall was a wide platform of boards with posts holding a canvasroof. The sides, were open; the lights were situated at each end-huge,round, circus tent lamps. There were rude benches and tables wherereeling men surrounded a woman. Joan saw a young miner in dusty bootsand corduroys lying drunk or dead in the sawdust. Her eyes were drawnback to the dancers, and to the dance that bore some semblance to awaltz. In the din the music could scarcely be heard. As far as themen were concerned this dance was a bold and violent expression ofexcitement on the part of some, and for the rest a drunken, mad fling.Sight of the women gave Joan's curiosity a blunt check. She felt queer.She had not seen women like these, and their dancing, their actions,their looks, were beyond her understanding. Nevertheless, they shockedher, disgusted her, sickened her. And suddenly when it dawned upon herin unbelievable vivid suggestion that they were the wildest and mostterrible element of this dark stream of humanity lured by gold, then shewas appalled.
"Take me out of here!" she besought Kells, and he led her out instantly.They went through the gambling-hall and into the crowded street, backtoward camp.
"You saw enough," said Kells, "but nothing to what
will break out by andby. This camp is new. It's rich. Gold is the cheapest thing. It passesfrom hand to hand. Ten dollars an ounce. Buyers don't look at thescales. Only the gamblers are crooked. But all this will change."
Kells did not say what that change might be, but the click of his teethwas expressive. Joan did not, however, gather from it, and the darkmeaning of his tone, that the Border Legion would cause this change.That was in the nature of events. A great strike of gold might enrichthe world, but it was a catastrophe.
Long into the night Joan lay awake, and at times, stirring the silence,there was wafted to her on a breeze the low, strange murmur of thegold-camp's strife.
Joan slept late next morning, and was awakened by the unloading oflumber. Teams were drawing planks from the sawmill. Already a skeletonframework for Kells's cabin had been erected. Jim Cleve was working withthe others, and they were sacrificing thoroughness to haste. Joan hadto cook her own breakfast, which task was welcome, and after it had beenfinished she wished for something more to occupy her mind. But nothingoffered. Finding a comfortable seat among some rocks where she would beinconspicuous, she looked on at the building of Kells's cabin. It seemedstrange, and somehow comforting, to watch Jim Cleve work. He had neverbeen a great worker. Would this experience on the border make a man ofhim? She felt assured of that.
If ever a cabin sprang up like a mushroom, that bandit rendezvous wasthe one. Kells worked himself, and appeared no mean hand. By noon theroof of clapboards was on, and the siding of the same material had beenstarted. Evidently there was not to a be a fireplace inside.
Then a teamster drove up with a wagon-load of purchases Kells hadordered. Kells helped unload this and evidently was in search ofarticles. Presently he found them, and then approached Joan, to depositbefore her an assortment of bundles little and big.
"There Miss Modestly," he said. "Make yourself some clothes. You canshake Dandy Dale's outfit, except when we're on the trail.... And, say,if you knew what I had to pay for this stuff you'd think there was abigger robber in Alder Creek than Jack Kells.... And, come to think ofit, my name's now Blight. You're my daughter, if any one asks." Joan wasso grateful to him for the goods and the permission to get out of DandyDale's suit as soon as possible, that she could only smile her thanks.Kells stared at her, then turned abruptly away. Those little unconsciousacts of hers seemed to affect him strangely. Joan remembered that hehad intended to parade her in Dandy Dale's costume to gratify some vainabnormal side of his bandit's proclivities. He had weakened. Here wasanother subtle indication of the deterioration of the evil of him. Howfar would it go? Joan thought dreamily, and with a swelling heart, ofher influence upon this hardened bandit, upon that wild boy, Jim Cleve.
All that afternoon, and part of the evening in the campfire light, andall of the next day Joan sewed, so busy that she scarcely lifted hereyes from her work. The following day she finished her dress, and withno little pride, for she had both taste and skill. Of the men, Bate Woodhad been most interested in her task; and he would let things burn onthe fire to watch her.
That day the rude cabin was completed. It contained one long room; andat the back a small compartment partitioned off from the rest, and builtagainst and around a shallow cavern in the huge rock. This compartmentwas for Joan. There were a rude board door with padlock and key, a benchupon which blankets had been flung, a small square hole cut in the wallto serve as a window. What with her own few belongings and the articlesof furniture that Kells bought for her, Joan soon had a comfortableroom, even a luxury compared to what she had been used to for weeks.Certain it was that Kells meant to keep her a prisoner, or virtuallyso. Joan had no sooner spied the little window than she thought that itwould be possible for Jim Cleve to talk to her there from the outside.
Kells verified Joan's suspicion by telling her that she was not to leavethe cabin of her own accord, as she had been permitted to do back inCabin Gulch; and Joan retorted that there she had made him a promise notto run away, which promise she now took back. That promise had worriedher. She was glad to be honest with Kells. He gazed at her somberly.
"You'll be worse off it you do--and I'll be better off," he said. Andthen as an afterthought he added: "Gulden might not think you--a whiteelephant on his hands!... Remember his way, the cave and the rope!"
So, instinctively or cruelly he chose the right name to bring shudderingterror into Joan's soul.