"Bury it, of course," Paul snapped.
Tough as they were, the men did not smile at the savage jest, and their sullen faces told him it was ill-timed. He tried to make amends:"His share will be split amongst you." He got no thanks, a circumstance he was to remember. Lem put a question about Lora.
"She's gone to Green, I expect," Paul replied. "We must keep a look-out, in case they try anything. I'll take the first spell." He went back to the fire. He had seen Mary, with Snowy endeavouring to comfort her, vanish into the tent. The old man, rolled in his blanket, was lying across the entrance. Paul's lips curled disdainfully at the sight.
Chapter XXIII
Sunrise found the camp astir, but Mary did not appear for the morning meal. Snowy made her excuses:
"She ain't feelin' too good, which you can't wonder at; it warn't a pretty sight for a gal."
"Nevertheless, I must speak with her," Paul replied. "In any case, we are leaving, and she must come with us."
"Leavin'?" Snowy repeated.
"We are going to drive those damned interlopers out and take possession," Lesurge explained. "Did you imagine I would let a mad woman upset my plans? Send Mary to me, and mind your step, if you want to go on living." Presently the girl joined him; her face was pale and weary, but there was a resoluteness in her bearing. Paul's manner had none of the brusqueness he had shown to Snowy.
"I am deeply grieved about last night, Mary, but you must not judge me too severely," he began. "The discovery of that woman's treachery angered me beyond measure. Of course, I " should not have allowed the matter to go further--I only wished to frighten her."
"If she is not your wife, you deceived her cruelly," Mary said quietly. "No woman could forgive such a shameful trick."
"It was an accident," Paul said quickly. "We were married in a small settlement in Missouri, by a man whom everyone called `Judge.' It was only much later that I learned it was but a courtesy title, and that he was a dissolute old rascal who would do anything for a fee. We were travellers, you see, and went on the following day. When I found out, by chance, I dared not tell her--she would have killed me." The explanation was plausible enough, but Mary Ducane did not find it convincing.
"You should have told her, and made the only possible reparation," she said. "By all the laws of morality, she is your wife."
"It would have been suicide--Lora's temper is that of a fiend; Hank was the second victim of it since we came to Deadwood" His voice acquired a pleading note. "When you know more of the world, you will understand what a lovely unscrupulous woman can accomplish. I was infatuated, and it was only after I came to Wayside that I began to realize that she was an evil influence in my life. When I saw you ... "
"you deceived me also," she coldly reminded. "Had I been aware that Lora was not your sister ... "
"An arrangement made before I met you--at her wish," he explained eagerly. "She revelled in her ability to attract men, and insisted on posing as a single woman. Not only a traitor, but unfaithful, in love with that cowpuncher. My dear, don't waste any pity on her; she has gone from our lives like an evil dream. Your wish will be my law now, Mary." The impassioned appeal fell on deaf ears. "I have but one--to get away from this accursed country immediately," she said. "And leave the mine?" he asked incredulously.
"Yes, I am sorry I ever heard of it," she cried.
"It brought us together," he said softly. "Don't say you regret that."
"I do," she replied firmly. "Mister Lesurge
"Paul," he corrected.
"Mister Lesurge," she repeated. "Until last evening, I fancied I cared for you, but now I know it was no more than the fascination of an inexperienced girl for a man unlike any she had met."
"Your love for me will revive."
"No, it never existed." The finality in her tone told him that this was no whim of an overwrought mind, and it came like a blow in the face. He had been so sure. Her very coldness fed the fire within him.
"I'll teach you to care," he muttered thickly.
One swift step and she was captive, pressed close to him, his hot lips showering kisses upon her own, frozen, unresponsive. She made no attempt to resist, lying limply in his arms. But for the scorn in her eyes he might have been embracing a corpse. Some realization of this brought her release.
"And now I hate you," she said.
"School your tongue," he warned. "I know how to deal with vixens. You may yet have to choose between myself and--Fagan." "Of two evils " she began contemptuously.
"You would prefer Fagan," he finished furiously. "The fellow who knifed your " He saw the dawning horror in her face, and paused, too late.
"Fagan--slew--my--father?" she panted. "And you--were waiting for us at Wayside. The cowboy was right." She swayed like a sapling in the breeze but steadied herself when he advanced, "Don't touch me, you murderer." Nor did he stay her, when with stumbling steps, she ran towards the tent. Snowy came to meet her.
"Take me away, Uncle Phil, anywhere," she sobbed.
The old man put an arm round her. "We gotta be patient, honey," he said. "They'd just naturally shoot us down. Things'll come right."
"I've no one but you."
"Well, I wouldn't say just that. There's a young fella not so far off mightn't agree." It brought the colour into her cheeks again; the thought of Gerry was very pleasant. "I expect he's forgotten," she whispered.
"When I see him last he was mighty partic'lar in his inquiries," Snowy lied cheerfully.
Lesurge was giving orders to Fagan. "That old fraud and the girl must be watched," he concluded. "By the way, she knows you assisted her father into the next world."
"The hell she does'?' the other growled. "Who told her?"
"Lora, I expect," Paul prevaricated. "She can prove nothing, and out here . . ." He shrugged his shoulders. "Of course, if she took the story to that gun-slinger, Sudden ... " Fagan's alarmed expression told him that Mary Ducane would be well guarded.
"Get busy," he said, "and we'll smoke those rats out of their hole."
* * *
The morning sun shone down upon a saddened but grimly determined group in the Rocking Stone mine.
"They'll strike to-day," Sudden said, and no one doubted it.
Jacob and Humit were placed on guard, while the rest dug and washed for gold, their rifles beside them. The two cowboys were working together, glumly and silently. Both were seeing visions: Sudden, of an apparently fear-distraught, frantic woman, and Gerry, a pair of frosty blue eyes, in a proud little face, rosily indignant because he had told the owner he meant to marry her.
"Damnation!" he said presently.
"Scratched yore finger?" Sudden asked solicitously.
"No, broke my neck," Gerry retorted, and then, "Wonder if she's all right?"
"Reckon so--her brother'll look after her," was the reply. "What the ?" Gerry commenced, adding, as comprehension came to him, "I warn't thinkin' o' Miss Lesurge."
"No?" his friend asked innocently.
"Yo're the wise guy, ain't yu?" Gerry gibed. "S'pose yu tell me how them poison-toads is goin' to get us outa here?"
"They might starve us, or plug the outlet o' the creek an' flood the basin--the entrance bein' considerable above the floor level," Sudden pointed out. "But both them methods is kind o' slow, an' I'd say--" Crack! The spiteful report of a rifle rang out and Husky swung round, clutching his left arm.
"Hell's bells, yu got yore answer," Sudden swore, and jumped for his Winchester.
A thinning puff of smoke showed that the shot had come from the slope leading to the Rocking Stone, and a moment later, three others, from different points, followed. One swept Gerry's hat from his head, while another whistled uncomfortably close to his companion's ear. Sudden flung himself at full length behind a heap of gravel.