won't hurt anybody else."
A dull red tinge came out under Clinch's tan:
"Who asked _you_ to worry about Eve?"
"She's a fine girl: that's all."
Clinch's steely glare measured the young man:
"You trying to make up to her?" he enquired gently.
"No. She has no use for me."
Clinch reflected, his cold tiger-gaze still fastened on Smith.
"You're right," he said after a moment. "Eve is a good girl. Some dayI'll make a lady of her."
"She _is_ one, Clinch."
At that Clinch reddened heavily -- the first finer emotion ever betrayedbefore Smith. He did not say anything for a few moments, but his grimmouth worked. Finally:
"I guess you was a gentleman once before you went crooked, Hal," hesaid. "You act up like you once was. ... Say; there's only one thing onGod's earth I care about. You've guessed it, too." He was off again onhis ruling passion.
"Eve," nodded Smith.
"Sure. She isn't my flesh and blood. But it seems like she's more,even. I want she should be a lady. It's _all_ I want. That damnedmillionaire Harrod bust me. But he couldn't stop me giving Eve herschooling. And now all I'm livin' for is to be fixed so's to give hermoney to go to the city like a lady. I don't care how I make money; allI want is to make it. And I'm a-going to."
Smith nodded again.
Clinch, now obsessed by his monomania, went on with an oath:
"I can't make no money on the level after what Harrod done to me. And Igotta fix up Eve. What the hell do you mean by asking me would it payme to travel straight. I dunno."
"I was only thinking of Eve. A lady isn't supposed to have a crook fora father."
Clinch's grey eyes blazed for a moment, then their menacing glaredulled, died out into wintry fixity.
"I warn't bon a crook," he said. "I ain't got no choice. And don'tworry, young fella; they ain't a-going to get me."
"You can't go on beating the game forever, Clinch."
"I'm beating it----" he hesitated -- "and it won't be so long, neither,before I turn over enough to let Eve live in the city like any lady,with her autymobile and her own butler and her swell friends, in a bighouse like she is educated for----"
H broke off abruptly as a procession approached from the lake, escortingthe battered gentry who now were able to wabble about a little.
One of them, a fox-faced trap thief named Earl Leverett, slunk hastilyby as though expecting another kick from Clinch.
"G'wan inside, Earl, and act up right," said Clinch pleasantly. "Yououghter have more sense than to start a fight in my place -- you and SidHone and Harvey Chase. G'wan in and behave."
He and Smith followed the procession of damaged ones into the house.
The big unpainted room where a bar had once been was blue with cheapcigar smoke; the air reeked with the stench of beer and spirits. Ascore or more shambling forest louts in their dingy Saturday finery weregathered here playing cards, shooting craps, lolling around tables andtilting sloping glasses at one another.
Heavy pleasantries were exchanged with the victims of Clinch's ponderousfists as they re-entered the room from which they had been borne sorecently, feet first.
"Now, boys," said Clinch kindly, "act up like swell gents and behavefriendly. And if any ladies come in for the chicken supper, why, goldang it, we'll have a dance!"
* * * * *
III
Toward sundown the first woodland nymph appeared -- a half-shy,half-bold, willowy thing in the rosy light of the clearing.
Hal Smith, washing glasses and dishes on the back porch for Eve Strayerto dry, asked who the rustic beauty might be.
"Harvey Chase's sister," said Eve. "She shouldn't come here, but Ican't keep her away and her brother doesn't care. She's only a child,too."
"Is there any harm in a chicken supper and a dance?"
Eve looked gravely at young Smith without replying.
Other girlish shapes loomed in the evening light. Some were met bygallants, some arrived at the veranda unescorted.
"Where do they all come from? Do they live in trees like dryads?" askedSmith.
"There are always squatters in the woods," she replied indifferently.
"Some of these girls come from Ghost Lake, I suppose."
"Yes; waitresses at the Inn."
"What music is there?"
"Jim Hastings plays a fiddle. I play the melodeon if they need me."
"What do you do when there's a fight?" he asked, with a side glance ather pure profile.
"What do you suppose I do? Fight, too?"
He laughed -- mirthlessly -- conscious always of his secret pity forthis girl.
"Well," he said, "when your father makes enough to quit, he'll take youout of this. It's a vile hole for a young girl----"
"See here," she said, flushing; "you're rather particular for a youngman who stuck up a tourist and robbed him of four thousand dollars."
"I'm not complaining on my own account," returned Smith, laughing;"Clinch's suits me."
"Well, don't concern yourself on my account, Hal Smith. And you'dbetter keep out of the dance, too, if there are any strangers there."
"You think a State Trooper may happen in?"
"It's likely. A lot of people come and go. We don't always know them."She opened a sliding wooden shutter and looked into the bar room. Aftera moment she beckoned him to her side.
"There are strangers there now," she said, "-- that thin, dark man wholooks like a Kanuk. And those two men shaking dice. I don't know whothey are. I never before saw them."
But Smith had seen them at Ghost Lake Inn. One of them was Sard.Quintana's gang had arrived at Clinch's dump.
A moment later Clinch came through the pantry and kitchen and out ontothe rear porch where Smith was washing glasses in a tub filled from anever-flowing spring.
"I'm a-going to get supper," he said to Eve. "There'll be twenty-threeplates." And to Smith: "Hal -- you help Eve wait on the table. And ifanybody acts up rough you slam him on the jaw -- don' argue, don't wait-- just slam him good, and I'll come on the hop."
"Who are the strangers, dad?" asked Eve.
"Don't nobody know 'em, girlie. But they ain't State Troopers. Theytalk like they was foreign. One of 'em's English -- the big, bony onewith yellow hair and mustache."
"Did they give any names?" asked Smith.
"You bet. The stout, dark man calls himself Hongri Picket. French, Iguess. The fat beak is a fella names Sard. Sanchez is the guy with aface like a Canada priest -- Jose Sanchez -- or something on that style.And then the yellow skinned young man is Nichole Salzar; the Britisher,Harry Beck; and that good lookin' dark gent with a little black CharlieChaplin, he's Victor Georgiades."
"What are those foreigners doing in the North Woods, Clinch?" enquiredSmith.
"Oh, they all give the same spiel -- hire out in a lumber camp. But_they_ ain't no lumberjacks," added Clinch contemptuously. I don't knowwhat they be -- hootch runners maybe -- or booze bandits -- or they donesomething crooked som'ers r'other. It's safe to serve 'em drinks."
Clinch himself had been drinking. He always drank when preparing tocook.
He turned and went into the kitchen now, rolling up his shirt sleevesand relighting his clay pipe.
* * * * *
IV
By nine o'clock the noisy chicken supper had ended; the table had beencleared; Jim Hastings was tuning his fiddle in the big room; Eve hadseated herself before the battered melodeon.
"Ladies and gents," said Clinch in his clear, pleasant voice, whichcarried through the hubbub, "we're going to have dance -- thanks andbeholden to Jim Hastings and my daughter Eve. Eve, she don't drink andshe don't dance, so no use askin' and no hard feelin' toward nobody.
"So act up pleasant to one and all and have a good time and no roughstuff in no form, shape, or manner, but behave like gents all and swelldames, like you was to a swarry on Fifth Avenue. Let's go!"
&nb
sp; He went back to the pantry, taking no notice of the cheering. Thefiddler scraped a fox trot, and Eve's melodeon joined in. A vastscuffling of heavily shod feet filled the momentary silence, accented bythe shrill giggle of young girls.
"They're off," remarked Clinch to Smith, who stood at the pantry shelfprepared to serve whiskey or beer upon previous receipt of payment.
In the event of a sudden raid, the