Here was a complication of circumstances. What would Jack Belllounds insist upon? How would Columbine take this plot against the honor and liberty of Wilson Moore? How would Moore himself react to it? Wade confessed that he was helpless to solve these queries, and there seemed to be a further one, insistent and gathering—what was to be his own attitude here? That could not be answered, either, because only a future moment, over which he had no control, and which must decide events, held that secret. Worry beset Wade, but he still found himself proof against the insidious gloom ever hovering near, like his shadow.
He waited near the trail to intercept Billings and Moore on their way to the ranch-house; and to his surprise they appeared sooner than it would have been reasonable to expect them. Wade stepped out of the willows and held up his hand. He did not see anything unusual in Moore's appearance.
“Wils, I reckon we'd do well to talk this over,” said Wade.
“Talk what over?” queried the cowboy, sharply.
[Illustration: “Jack Belllounds!” she cried. “You put the sheriff on that trail!”]
“Why, Old Bill's sendin' for you, an' the fact of Sheriff Burley bein' here.”
“Talk nothing. Let's see what they want, and then talk. Pard, you remember the agreement we made not long ago?”
“Sure. But I'm sort of worried, an' maybe—”
“You needn't worry about me. Come on,” interrupted Moore. “I'd like you to be there. And, Lem, fetch the boys.”
“I shore will, an' if you need any backin' you'll git it.”
When they reached the open Lem turned off toward the corrals, and Wade walked beside Moore's horse up to the house.
Belllounds appeared at the door, evidently having heard the sound of hoofs.
“Hello, Moore! Get down an' come in,” he said, gruffly.
“Belllounds, if it's all the same to you I'll take mine in the open,” replied the cowboy, coolly.
The rancher looked troubled. He did not have the ease and force habitual to him in big moments.
“Come out hyar, you men,” he called in the door.
Voices, heavy footsteps, the clinking of spurs, preceded the appearance of the three strangers, followed by Jack Belllounds. The foremost was a tall man in black, sandy-haired and freckled, with clear gray eyes, and a drooping mustache that did not hide stern lips and rugged chin. He wore a silver star on his vest, packed a gun in a greasy holster worn low down on his right side, and under his left arm he carried a package.
It suited Wade, then, to step forward; and if he expected surprise and pleasure to break across the sheriff's stern face he certainly had not reckoned in vain.
“Wal, I'm a son-of-a-gun!” ejaculated Burley, bending low, with quick movement, to peer at Wade.
“Howdy, Jim. How's tricks?” said Wade, extending his hand, and the smile that came so seldom illumined his sallow face.
“Hell-Bent Wade, as I'm a born sinner!” shouted the sheriff, and his hand leaped out to grasp Wade's and grip it and wring it. His face worked. “My Gawd! I'm glad to see you, old-timer! Wal, you haven't changed at all!... Ten years! How time flies! An' it's shore you?”
“Same, Jim, an' powerful glad to meet you,” replied Wade.
“Shake hands with Bridges an' Lindsay,” said Burley, indicating his two comrades. “Stockmen from Grand Lake.... Boys, you've heerd me talk about him. Wade an' I was both in the old fight at Blair's ranch on the Gunnison. An' I've shore reason to recollect him!... Wade, what're you doin' up in these diggin's?”
“Drifted over last fall, Jim, an' have been huntin' varmints for Belllounds,” replied Wade. “Cleaned the range up fair to middlin'. An' since I quit Belllounds I've been hangin' round with my young pard here, Wils Moore, an' interestin' myself in lookin' up cattle tracks.”
Burley's back was toward Belllounds and his son, so it was impossible for them to see the sudden little curious light that gleamed in his eyes as he looked hard at Wade, and then at Moore.
“Wils Moore. How d'ye do? I reckon I remember you, though I don't ride up this way much of late years.”
The cowboy returned the greeting civilly enough, but with brevity.
Belllounds cleared his throat and stepped forward. His manner showed he had a distasteful business at hand.
“Moore, I sent for you on a serious matter, I'm sorry to say.”
“Well, here I am. What is it?” returned the cowboy, with clear, hazel eyes, full of fire, steady on the old rancher's.
“Jack, you know, is foreman of White Slides now. An' he's made a charge against you.”
“Then let him face me with it,” snapped Moore.
Jack Belllounds came forward, hands in his pockets, self-possessed, even a little swaggering, and his pale face and bold eyes showed the gravity of the situation and his mastery over it.
Wade watched this meeting of the rivals and enemies with an attention powerfully stimulated by the penetrating scrutiny Burley laid upon them. Jack did not speak quickly. He looked hard into the tense face of Moore. Wade detected a vibration of Jack's frame and a gleam of eye that showed him not wholly in control of exultation and revenge. Fear had not struck him yet.
“Well, Buster Jack, what's the charge?” demanded Moore, impatiently.
The old name, sharply flung at Jack by this cowboy, seemed to sting and reveal and inflame. But he restrained himself as with roving glance he searched Moore's person for sight of a weapon. The cowboy was unarmed.
“I accuse you of stealing my father's cattle,” declared Jack, in low, husky accents. After he got the speech out he swallowed hard.
Moore's face turned a dead white. For a fleeting instant a red and savage gleam flamed in his steady glance. Then it vanished.
The cowboys, who had come up, moved restlessly. Lem Billings dropped his head, muttering. Montana Jim froze in his tracks.
Moore's dark eyes, scornful and piercing, never moved from Jack's face. It seemed as if the cowboy would never speak again.
“You call me thief! You?” at length he exclaimed.
“Yes, I do,” replied Belllounds, loudly.
“Before this sheriff and your father you accuse me of stealing cattle?”
“Yes.”
“And you accuse me before this man who saved my life, whoknows me—before Hell-Bent Wade?” demanded Moore, as he pointed to the hunter.
Mention of Wade in that significant tone of passion and wonder was not without effect upon Jack Belllounds.
“What in hell do I care for Wade?” he burst out, with the old intolerance. “Yes, I accuse you. Thief, rustler!... And for all I know your precious Hell-Bent Wade may be—”
He was interrupted by Burley's quick and authoritative interference.
“Hyar, young man, I'm allowin' for your natural feelin's,” he said, dryly, “but I advise you to bite your tongue. I ain't acquainted with Mister Moore, but I happen to know Wade. Do you savvy?... Wal, then, if you've any more to say to Moore get it over.”