The Lost Cabin Mine. Frederick Niven

CHAPTER V

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I Agree to "Keep the Peace" in a New Sense

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      t was at once evident that I was not to be murdered in H. B. Blaine's place, and also evident that I had been invited to meet Apache Kid to hear some matter that was not for all to hear; for immediately on our entering the little rear room he flung aside a paper he had been reading and leaped to his feet to meet us. He put a hand on Donoghue's shoulder and the other he extended to me.

      "We'll not talk here," he said. "Walls have ears:" and so we all turned about and marched out again.

      "Going out for a strowl?" asked Blaine.

      "Yes," said Apache. "Fine night for a strowl." And we found ourselves on the street down which we turned and walked in silence.

      Suddenly Apache Kid slowed down and swore to himself.

      "I should n't have said that!" he remarked angrily.

      "Said what?" Donoghue interrogated.

      "O! mocked Blaine like that—said we were going for a strowl."

      "What do you mean?" asked Donoghue, whose ear did not seem very acute.

      Apache looked at him with a relieved expression.

      "Well, that's hopeful," he said. "Perhaps Blaine would n't catch it either. Still, still, I should n't have mocked him. You noticed, I bet?" he said to me.

      "Strowl?" I inquired.

      He sighed.

      "There 's no sense in trying to make fun of anything in a man's clothes or talk or manner. Besides, it's excessively vulgar, excessively vulgar."

      "Here 's an interesting 'bad man,'" I mused; but there was no more said till we won clear of the town, quite beyond the last sidewalks that stretched and criss-crossed among the rocks and sand, marking out the prospective streets. There, on a little rising place of sand and rocks, we sat down.

      It was a desolate spot. A gentle wind was blowing among the dunes and the sand was all moving, trickling down here and piling up there. Being near sunset the cicadi had disappeared and the evening light falling wan on the occasional tufts of sage-brush gave them a peculiar air of desolation. Donoghue pulled out a clasp-knife and sat progging in the sand with it, and then Apache Kid jerked up his head and smiled on me, a smile entirely friendly. And suddenly as he looked at me his face became grave.

      "Have you had supper yet?" he asked.

      "No," I said. "It's early yet."

      He looked at me keenly and then: "You 'll excuse me remarking on your appearance, but you look extraordinarily tired."

      "Oh," said I, lightly, "I have not been feeling just up to the scratch and—well, I thought I 'd try the fasting cure."

      He hummed to himself and dived a hand into his trousers pocket and held out a five-dollar bill under my nose.

      "There," he said, "go and eat and don't lie any more. I 've been there myself—when I was new to the country and could n't get into its ways."

      There was something of such intense warm-heartedness behind the peremptory tones (while Donoghue turned his face aside, running the sand between his fingers and looking foolishly at it) that to tell you the truth, I found the tears in my eyes before I was aware. But this sign of weakness Apache Kid made pretence not to observe.

      "We 'll wait here for you till you get fed," said he, examining the back of his hand.

      "No, no," I answered hastily, "I had rather hear what you have to say just now." Thank him for his kindness I could not, for I felt that thanks would but embarrass him. "To tell you the truth, the mere knowledge that I need not go to bed hungry is sufficient."

      "Well," said he, looking up when my voice rang firm. "The fact is, I am going to offer you a job; but it is a job you might not care to take unless you were hard pressed; so you will please consider that a loan, not a first instalment, and the fact of settling it must not influence."

      This was very fairly spoken and I felt that I should say something handsome, but he gave me no opportunity, continuing at once: "Donoghue here and I are wanting a partner on an expedition that we are going on. We 're very old friends, we two, but for quite a little while back we had both been meditating going on this expedition separately. Fact is, we are such very old friends and know each other's weaknesses so well that, though we both had the idea of the expedition in our heads, we did n't care about going together."

      All this he spoke as much to Donoghue as to me, with a bantering air; and one thing at least I learned from this—the reason why these two had not done as Laughlin thought the natural thing for them to do, namely, to go out together, heedless of Canlan. For I had no doubt whatever that the expedition was to the Lost Cabin Mine. That was as clear as the sun. Further observation of their natures, if further observation I was to have, might explain their long reluctance to "go partners" on the venture, a reluctance now evidently overcome.

      "Get to your job," growled Donoghue, "and quit palaver."

      It was evident that Apache Kid was determined not to permit himself to be irritated, for he only smiled on Donoghue's snarl and turned to me: "My friend Donoghue and I," said he, "it is necessary to explain, are such very old friends that we can cordially hate each other."

      "At times," interjected Donoghue.

      "Yes; upon occasion," said Apache Kid. "To you, new to this country, such a state of things between friends may be scarcely comprehensible, but——" and Apache Kid stopped.

      "It's them mountains that does it," said Donoghue, with a heavy frown.

      "Them mountains, as Donoghue says; that's it. It's queer how the mountains, when you get among them, seem to creep in all round you and lock you up. It does n't take long among them with a man to know whether you and he belong to the same order and breed. There are men who can never sleep under the same blanket; yes, never sleep on the same side of the fire; never, after two days in the hills, ride side by side, but must get space between them."

      His eyes were looking past me on things invisible to me, looking in imagination, I suppose, on his own past from which he spoke.

      "And if you don't like your partner, you know it then," Donoghue said. "You go riding along and if he speaks to you, you want him to shut it. And if he don't speak, you ask him what in thunder he's broodin' about. And you look for him to fire up at you then, and if he don't, you feel worse than ever and go along with just a little hell burning against him in here," and he tapped his chest. "You could turn on him and eat him; yes siree, kill him with your teeth in his neck."

      "This is called the return to Nature," said Apache Kid, calmly.

      "Return to hell!" cried Donoghue, and Apache Kid inclined his head in acquiescence. He seemed content to let Donoghue now do the talking.

      "Apache and me has come to an agreement, as he says, to go out on the trail, and though we 've chummed together a heap——"

      "In the manner of wolves," said Apache, with a half sneer.

      "Yes," said Donoghue, "a good bit like that, too. Well, but on this trail we can't go alone. It's too all-fired far and too all-fired lonely."

      His gaze wandered to the mountains behind the town and Apache took up the discourse.

      "You see the idea? We want a companion to help us to keep the peace. Foolish—eh? Well, I don't blame you if you don't quite understand. You