The Complete Novels of Ernest Haycox. Ernest Haycox

do it, then I got to do it. But you want to figure a high-power rifle kicks back blamed near as hard as it shoots forward. Which applies to Gillette. And don't come running to me if you get hurt. You're going to discover you can't hide behind the petticoats of Justice all the time."

      The two of them arrived at the Circle G houses and were confronted by Quagmire and Christine Ballard. The marshal, under the influence of her smile, thawed and reached for his hat.

      "I'm inquirin' for Tom Gillette."

      "Deadwood," grunted Quagmire. "I'm jef here temporary. Le's have the hard news."

      "Orders to get off," was the marshal's equally laconic answer. "You ain't on the place you filed on. Said place, apparently, is nearer the north pole. This fellow"—indicating Grist—"has got the drop on you boys."

      Quagmire squinted at Grist until the latter shifted in the saddle. But the wizened puncher showed no surprise at the news. He dwelt in pessimism, he always expected the worst to happen. He contented himself with saying, "Something smells around here."

      "I didn't ask him to come along," explained the marshal. He got down and tacked the notice to the ranchhouse wall. "Said movin' orders are meant to be promptly obeyed. But seein' as Gillette ain't here and it'd work a plain hardship to move without him on hand to superintend such I'll hold off till he get back."

      "Oh, look here," protested Grist.

      "Shut up. I obey my orders. I also got a right to interpret some of 'em. I'm doin' a little interpretin' now. If you don't like it write East to them land grabbers." He remounted and started away. Then yards off he turned in the saddle and added, as an apparent afterthought, "I also hold a warrant for Gillette. Murder. Have to execute that personally. When you see him, tell him to come and get it."

      Quagmire met the marshal's sober glance and held it for a long while. "Yeah. All right."

      "Listen," cried Grist, suddenly aroused, "are you trying to warn Gillette away?"

      "A man's got a right to know the law's after him," was the marshal's blunt answer. "Out here he has. That's another interpretation. You better be amiable, brother, or I'll let you ride across Gillette range alone. And how far do you think you'd get before a bullet slapped you down?"

      They went on. Quagmire waited only until the two were decently beyond talking distance before he turned to read the notice its full length. Then he ran for the bunkhouse and collected his possibles. He saddled a horse and he haltered another. He gave abrupt orders to one of the arriving punchers. "Yo' in charge, Red. I'm lopin' fo' Deadwood to find Tom."

      Christine crossed the yard and put a detaining hand on Quagmire's arm. "Tell him I'm still waiting."

      Quagmire ducked his solemn visage and galloped away. Presently his path was marked by a faint ball of dust to the southwest.

      XV. FLOOD TIDE—AND EBB

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      For seventy-two hours Lorena Wyatt kept her solitary vigil by the bunk, her eyes watching his face for the slightest movement, her hands now and then questing across his heart; and for seventy-two hours he lay in the self-same posture of death with only the faint rise and fall of his chest to indicate he still lived. In washing him and binding the cuts about his body she found the bruises on his temple to be only superficial, they were not bullet made, although in receiving them he must have been tremendously battered. On his flank, one long furrow cut through the outer flesh and left a path more sinister to look upon than dangerous. This she had wrapped as well as his head, knowing they would mend, but the deep hole just below and inside his arm socket was another matter. The bullet still lodged there, and whether it was seated in solid flesh or whether it touched his lungs she couldn't tell.

      Time was the only mender—time and this man's splendid power of body. There was a doctor in Deadwood, but Lorena knew the medico had gone into the hills a day before to take care of some distant prospector crushed by a slide. And he wouldn't be back until the crisis came and passed with Tom Gillette. So she watched, sitting helpless on the box beside the bunk, occasionally touching him as if wishing to send some message down into the deep pit he had descended; watching him grow grayer and grayer and hearing his breathing shorten and diminish. To Lorena it was agony. She could do nothing but wait—nothing but sit by while he slipped away from her; and through her mind marched the thousand things she wanted to tell him, wanted him to know about herself. After that first cry she set her lips together and never uttered another sound; when she sat her hands locked tightly together; when she rose to replenish the fire her eyes kept straying back to where he lay. Thus the hours dragged interminably. Daylight wasn't so bad, for she could throw open the door and see the sun and let the wind strike her body. There was the sight and the sound of life by day, and it seemed to her Tom held his own during those hours. But at night there were only the blackness and the silence surrounding her little cell, only herself sitting beside him and praying passionately to herself and thinking queer unrelated thoughts...how the shadows fell across the strong bridge of his nose...how much of a man he looked...Christine Ballard sitting on her horse while Tom and the Blond Giant slashed and punished each other. That day Lorena saw the tiger in Tom Gillette and all his quiet reserve and all his humour had been laid aside to reveal the primitive depths. He was a man!

      The first night was the longest, for at every stray gust of breeze and every sound she thought Hazel and Saba were returning to thresh the woods again; if they did so they would surely come across her cabin and break in. She put the table against the door and turned down the lamp until the room was dim and shadowy. But they didn't come that night, and at early dawn she left the cabin long enough to run along the trail and retrieve both her basket and the gun Tom had dropped. She wanted to go on to Deadwood, yet didn't dare. Anything might happen during the interval. So the day dragged and the night came once more with her perched on the box and her fists locking each other. And over and over again she tried to throw her will and her desire across the infinite chasm separating them, repeating to herself a thousand times, "You must get well—Tom! You must not die! Here I am, right beside you—waiting for you! You must not die!"

      Sleep was the drug she feared, and she sat in the most cramped positions to keep herself awake. Even so the time came when she started out of what had been a sound sleep, to find herself lying on the hard floor. After that she walked the floor in a kind of shame. "I don't deserve to have him. What am I? What can I do for my part in his life? what do I know? Oh, why didn't my mother live to make me a real woman!" And then she bent over Gillette for the hundredth time, to pull the quilt higher up, to let her hands stray across the jet hair; once she kissed him and drew back startled.

      That night the woods seemed full of prowling creatures. She heard something rustling the underbrush, she heard the scuff of boots at her very door. And she was swept by all the mixed fear and despair and cold anger of a trapped animal when she saw the latch slowly rise and the door give imperceptibly against the barrier. Then the latch fell back, the brush marked a retreating body, and she relaxed. The man, whoever it was, was lucky; she would have shot him before he made his entrance, for there was something of the wild in Lorena Wyatt these dreary hours. Another time that same night, well along toward morning, she heard a cavalcade gallop down the trail, stop, and go on again. Then it was day—a long-drawn day that marched into the third night. And without warning Tom Gillette turned his head toward her, his eyes clear, and a trace of colour staining the gray of his features. He spoke.

      "I'm all right, Lorena girl. Get some sleep. Roll me over and turn in." That was all, he fell into a sound slumber. It was rest this time, not an unconsciousness. The crisis seemed to have come and gone. He would get well.

      "Thank God!" she murmured. She dropped to the floor and was lost to the world.

      She was roused by Tom's voice. "Girl—get up from the floor!"

      The sun streamed in between the cracks of the cabin; she had slept the night through, Gillette moved his head slowly. "Lord, how long has this been goin' on? What day is it, Lorena?"

      She rose quickly. "Thursday,