"you see I'm making changes in my domestic arrangements. This is
temporary, I guess. However, if you don't just mind that, why--come
right in."

The man's whole manner was one of good-humored indifference. There was
an unruffled assurance about him that was quite perfect, if studied.
Scipio's presence there seemed the last thing of concern to him. And
the effect of his manner on his visitor entirely upset all the
latter's preconceived intentions. Astonishment was his first feeling.
Then a sudden diffidence seized him, a diffidence that was nearly akin
to fear of his rival. But this passed in a moment, and was instantly
replaced by a hot rush of blood through his small body. All his
pictured interview died out of his recollections, and, in place of
that calmness with which he had intended to meet the man, he found his
pulses hammering and hot anger mounting to his head. The commonest of
human passions stirred in him, and he felt it would be good to hurt
this man who had so wronged him.

"Where's my wife?" he demanded, with a sudden fierceness.

"Oh--it's that. Say, come right in?"

James was still smiling pleasantly. This time Scipio accepted the
invitation without thought of trap or anything else. He almost
precipitated himself into the room.

Nor in his fury did he observe his surroundings. He had no eyes for
the furnishings, the cheap comfort with which he was surrounded. And
though, as James had said, the place was untidy, he saw nothing and
none of it. His eyes were on the man; angry, bloodshot eyes, such eyes
as those of a furiously goaded dog, driven into a corner by the cruel
lash of a bully's whip.

"Yes, that's it. Wher's my wife?" Scipio demanded threateningly.
"You've stole her, and taken her from me. I've come to take her
back."

The force of his demands was tinged with the simplicity of a naturally
gentle disposition. And maybe, in consequence, something of their
sting was lost. The forceful bluster of an outraged man, determined
upon enforcing his demands, would probably have stirred James to
active protest, but, as it was, he only continued to smile his
insolence upon one whom he regarded as little better than a harmless
worm.

"One moment," he said, with an exasperating patience, "you say I stole
her. To have stolen her suggests that she was not willing to come
along. She came with me. Well, I guess she came because she fancied
it. You say you're going to take her back. Well," with a shrug, "I
kind of think she'll have something to say about going back."

For a moment Scipio stood aghast. He glanced about him helplessly.
Then, in a flash, his pale-blue eyes came back to the other's face.

"She's mine, I tell you! Mine! Mine! Mine!" he cried, in a frenzy of
rage and despair. "She's mine by the laws of God an' man. She's mine
by the love that has brought our kiddies into the world. Do you hear?
She's mine by every tie that can hold man and wife together. An'
you've stole her. She's all I've got. She's all I want. She's just
part of me, and I can't live without her. Ther's the kiddies to home
waitin' for her, and she's theirs, same as they are hers--and mine. I
tell you, you ain't going to keep her. She's got to come back." He
drew a deep breath to choke down his fury. "Say," he went on, with a
sudden moderating of his tone and his manner, taking on a pitiful
pleading, "do you think you love her? You? Do you think you know what
love is? You don't. You can't. You can't love her same as I do. I love
her honest. I love her so I want to work for her till I drop. I love
her so there's nothin' on earth I wouldn't do for her. My life is
hers. All that's me is hers. I ain't got a thought without her. Man,
you don't know what it is to love my Jessie. You can't, 'cos your
love's not honest. You've taken her same as you'd take any woman for
your pleasure. If I was dead, would you marry her? No, never, never,
never. She's a pastime to you, and when you've done with her you'd
turn her right out on this prairie to herd with the cattle, if ther'
wasn't anywher' else for her to go." Then his voice suddenly rose and
his fury supervened again. "God!" he cried fiercely. "Give me back my
wife. You're a thief. Give her back to me, I say. She's mine, d'you
understand--mine!"

Not for an instant did the smile on James' face relax. Maybe it became
more set, and his lips, perhaps, tightened, but the smile was there,
hard, unyielding in its very setness. And when Scipio's appeal came to
an end he spoke with an underlying harshness that did not carry its
way to the little man's distracted brain.

"She wouldn't go back to you, even if I let her--which I won't," he
said coldly.

The man's words seemed to bite right into the heart of his hearer.
Nothing could have been better calculated to goad him to extremity. In
one short, harsh sentence he had dashed every hope that the other
possessed. And with a rush the stricken man leapt at denial, which was
heartrending in its impotence.

"You lie!" he shouted. The old revolver was dragged from his pocket
and pointed shakingly at his tormentor's head. "Give her back to me!
Give her back, or--"

James' desperate courage never deserted him for an instant. And Scipio
was never allowed to complete his sentence. The other's hand suddenly
reached out, and the pistol was twisted from his shaking grasp with as
little apparent effort as though he had been a small child.

Scipio stared helpless and confused while James eyed the pattern of
the gun. Then he heard the man's contemptuous laugh and saw him pull
the trigger. The hammer refused to move. It was so rusted that the
weapon was quite useless. For a moment the desperado's eyes sought the
pale face of his would-be slayer. A devilish smile lurked in their
depths. Then he held out the pistol for the other to take, while his
whole manner underwent a hideous change.

"Here, take it, you wretched worm," he cried, with sudden savagery.
"Take it, you miserable fool," he added, as Scipio remained unheeding.
"It wouldn't blow even your fool brains out. Take it!" he reiterated,
with a command the other could no longer resist. "And now get out of
here," he went on mercilessly, as Scipio's hand closed over the
wretched weapon, "or I'll hand you over to the boys. They'll show you
less mercy than I do. They're waiting out there," he cried, pointing
at the door, "for my orders. One word from me and they'll cut the
liver out of you with rawhides, and Abe Conroy'll see it's done right.
Get you right out of here, and if ever you come squealing around my
quarters again I'll have you strung up by your wretched neck till
you're dead--dead as a crushed worm--dead as is your wife, Jessie, to
you from now out. Get out of here, you straw-headed sucker, get right
out, quick!"

But the tide of the man's fury seemed to utterly pass the little man
by. He made no attempt to obey. The pistol hung in his tightly
gripping hand, and his underlip protruded obstinately.

"She's mine, you thief!" he cried. "Give her back to me."

It was the cry of a beaten man whose spirit is unquenchable.

But James had finished. All that was worst in him was uppermost now.
With eyes blazing he stepped to the door and whistled. He might have
been whistling up his dogs. Perhaps those who responded were his dogs.
Three men came in, and the foremost of them was Abe Conroy.

"Here," cried James, his cruel eyes snapping, "take him out and set
him on his horse, and send him racing to hell after m'squitoes. And
don't handle him too easy."

What happened to him after that Scipio never fully understood. He had
a vague memory of being seized and buffeted and kicked into a state of
semi-unconsciousness. Nor did he rouse out of his stupor, until, sick
and sore in every limb, his poor yellow head aching and confused, he
found himself swaying dangerously about in the saddle, with Gipsy,
racing like a mad thing, under his helpless legs.

CHAPTER VI

SUNNY OAK PROTESTS

Wild Bill was gazing out across the camp dumps. His expression
suggested the contemplation of a problem of life and death, and a
personal one at that. Sandy Joyce, too, bore traces suggestive of the
weightiest moments of his life. Toby Jenks stood chewing the dirty
flesh of a stubby forefinger, while the inevitable smile on Sunny
Oak's face made one think of a bright spring morning under cover of a
yellow fog.

"How am I to see to them pore kiddies?" the latter was complaining.
"I've had to do with cattle, an' mules, an' even hogs in my time, but
I sure don't guess you ken set them bits o' mites in a brandin'
corral, nor feed 'em oats an' hay, nor even ladle 'em swill for
supper, like hogs. Fer other things, I don't guess I could bile a bean
right without a lib'ry o' cook-books, so how I'm to make 'em elegant
pap for their suppers 'ud beat the Noo York p'lice force. An' as fer
fixin' their clothes, an' bathing 'em, why, it 'ud set me feelin' that
fulish you wouldn't know me from a patient in a bug-house. It makes me
real mad, folks is allus astin' me to get busy doin' things. I'm that
sick, the sight of a ha'f-washened kid 'ud turn my stummick to bile,
an' set me cacklin' like a hen with a brood o' ducklings she can't no
ways account fer. You'se fellers are a happy lot o' Jonahs to a man as
needs rest."

"You're sure doing the cacklin' now," observed Bill contemptuously.

"Maybe he's layin' eggs," murmured Toby vaguely.

The men were standing on the veranda, gathered round the bench on
which Sunny Oak was still resting his indolent body. And the subject
of their discourse was Scipio's two children. The father had ridden
off on his search for James, and the responsibility of his twins was
weighing heavily on those left behind.

"Kind o' handy ladlin' it out to folks," said Sunny, grinning lazily.
"But, with all your brightness, I don't guess any o' you could mother
them kiddies. No, it's jest 'send Sunny along to see to 'em.' That
bein' said, you'll git right back to your poker with a righteous
feelin' which makes it come good to rob each other all you know. Psha!
You ain't no better'n them lousy birds as lays eggs sizes too big, an'
blames 'em on to some moultin' sparrer that ain't got feathers 'nuff
to make it welcome at a scratchin' bee."

Sunny's flow was a little overwhelming, and perhaps there was just
enough truth in his remarks to make it unadvisable for the others to
measure wits with him. Anyway, he received no reply. Bill continued to
gaze out at Scipio's hut in a way that suggested great absorption,
while Toby had not yet lunched sufficiently off his tattered
forefinger. Sandy was the only one of the three apparently alive to
the true exigencies of the case, and Sunny addressed himself more
exclusively to him.

"Say," he went on, his good-humored eyes smiling cunningly up into the
widower's face, "I've heerd tell that you once did some pore
unsuspicious female the dirty trick of marryin' her. Mebbe you'll sure
hev' notions 'bout kiddies an' such things. Now, if Wild Bill had come
along an' pushed a shootin'-iron into your map, an' said you'll handle
Zip's kiddies--wal, I ask you, wot 'ud you ha' done?"

"Told him to git his head cooled some," retorted Sandy promptly.

"Ah, guess you bin saved a heap o' trouble," murmured Sunny. "But if
you hadn't said that--which you said you would ha' said--an' you'd
got busy as he suggested--wal, what then?"

Sandy cleared his throat, and, in his sudden interest, Toby deferred
the rest of his meal.

"Wal, I'd ha' gone right up to the shack an' looked into things."

Sandy's first effort seemed to please him, and, hitching his moleskin
trousers up deliberately, he proceeded with some unction--

"Y'see, ther' ain't nothin' like gettin' a look around. Then you kind
o' know wher' you are. You sure need to know wher' you are 'fore you
get busy proper. It's most like everything else. If you get on the
wrong trail at the start, it's li'ble to lead you wher' you don't want
to go. What I says is, hit the right trail at the start, then you got
a chance o' gettin' thro' right, which, I take it, is an elegant way
o' doin' most things. Wal, havin' located the right trail--"

"We're talkin' o' Zip's twins," murmured Sunny gently.

"Sure, that's where I'm gettin' to--"

"By trail?" inquired Toby seriously.

"Say, you make me tired," retorted Sandy angrily.

"Best quit the trail, then," said Sunny.

"Go to blazes!" cried Sandy, and promptly relapsed into moody
silence.

At that moment Bill turned from his contemplation of the house beyond
the dumps and fixed his fierce eyes on Sunny's grinning face.

"Here, you miser'ble hoboe," he cried, "get right up out of that, and
hump across to Zip's shack. You're doin' enough gassin' fer a female
tattin' bee. Your hot air makes me want to sweat. Now, them kiddies'll
need supper. You'll jest ast Minky fer all you need, an' I pay. An'
you'll see things is fixed right for 'em."

Sunny lurched reluctantly to his feet. He knew the gambler far too
well to debate the point further. He had made his protest, which had
been utterly ineffective, so there was nothing left him but to obey
the fiercely uttered mandate.

But Sandy Joyce felt that somehow his first effort on behalf of the
children had missed fire, and it was his duty not to allow himself to
be ousted from the council. So he stayed the loafer with a word.

"Say, you'll be knowin' how to feed 'em?" he inquired gravely.

Sunny's eyes twinkled.

"Wal, mebbe you ken give me pointers," he retorted, with apparent
sincerity.

"That's how I was figgerin'," said Sandy cordially. He felt better now
about his first effort. "Y'see, Minky's stock is limited some; ther'
ain't a heap o' variety, like. An' kiddies do need variety. Y'see,
they're kind o' delicate feeders, same as high-bred hosses, an' dogs
an' things. Now, dogs need diff'rent meat every day, if you're goin'
to bring 'em up right. A friend o' mine sure once told me that meat,
good meat, was the best feed fer prize dogs, an' he was a feller that
won a heap o' prizes. He had one, Boston bull, I--"

"'ll I need to git dog-biscuit for them kiddies?" inquired Sunny
sarcastically.

"Say, you make me sick," cried Sandy, flushing angrily.

"Guess that's how you'll make them kiddies," interposed Toby.

Sandy glanced viciously from one to the other. Then, assuming
a superiority that scarcely hid his chagrin, he ignored the
interruptions.

"You best ast Minky fer some dandy canned truck," he said decisively,
deliberately turning his back on Toby Jenks. "Mebbe a can o' lobster
an' one o' them elegant tongues stewed in jelly stuff, an' set in a
glass bowl. Y'see, they kids needs nourishin', an' that orter fix
them 'bout right. I don't know 'bout them new sides o' sow-belly
Minky's jest had in. Seems to me they'll likely need teeth eatin'
that. Seein' you ain't a heap at fixin' beans right, we best cut that
line right out--though I 'lows there's elegant nourishin' stuff in 'em
for bosses. Best get a can o' crackers an' some cheese. I don't guess
they'll need onions, nor pickles. But a bit o' butter to grease the
crackers with, an' some molasses an' fancy candy, an' a pound o' his
best tea seems to me 'bout right. After that--"

"Some hoss physic," broke in Toby, recommencing the chewing of his
forefinger.

But Wild Bill's fierce eyes were on Sandy, and the erstwhile married
man felt their contempt boring into his very soul. He was held silent,
in spite of his anger against the broad-shouldered Toby, and was
possessed of a feeling that somehow his second effort had been no more
successful than his first. And forthwith the impression received
confirmation in a sudden explosion from Wild Bill.

"Jumpin' mackinaw!" he cried, with a force calculated to crush
entirely the remnants of Sandy's conceit. "You'd sure shame a crazy
sheep fer intellect." Then he added, with withering sarcasm, "Say,
don't you never leave your mouth open more'n two seconds at a time, or
you'll get the flies in it, an'--they'll start nestin'."

Then without pause he turned on Sunny and delivered his ultimatum.

"Get busy," he ordered in a tone there was no denying.

And somehow Sunny found himself stirring far more rapidly than suited
his indolent disposition.

Having thoroughly disturbed the atmosphere to his liking, Bill left
the veranda without another look in his companions' direction, and his
way took him to the barn at the back of the store.

The gambler was a man of so many and diverse peculiarities that it
would be an impossibility to catalogue them with any degree of
satisfactoriness. But, with the exception of his wholesale piratical
methods at cards--indeed, at any kind of gambling--perhaps his most
striking feature was his almost idolatrous worship for his horses. He
simply lived for their well-being, and their evident affection for
himself was something that he treasured far beyond the gold he so
loved to take from his opponents in a gamble.

He possessed six of these horses, each in its way a jewel in the
equine crown. Wherever the vagaries of his gambler's life took him his
horses bore him thither, harnessed to a light spring cart of the
speediest type. Each animal had cost him a small fortune, as the price
of horses goes, and for breed and capacity, both in harness and under
saddle, it would have been difficult to find their match anywhere in
the State of Montana. He had broken and trained them himself in
everything, and, wherever he was, whatever other claims there might be
upon him, morning, noon and evening he was at the service of his
charges. He gloried in them. He reveled in their satin coats, their
well-nourished, muscular bodies, in their affection for himself.

Now he sat on an oat-bin contemplating Gipsy's empty stall, with a
regret that took in him the form of fierce anger. It was the first
time since she had come into his possession that she had been turned
over to another, the first time another leg than his own had been
thrown across her; and he mutely upbraided himself for his folly, and
hated Scipio for having accepted her services. Why, he asked himself
again and again, had he been such an unearthly fool? Then through his
mind flashed a string of blasphemous invective against James, and with
its coming his regret at having lent Gipsy lessened.

He sat for a long time steadily chewing his tobacco. And somehow
he lost all desire to continue his poker game in the store. His
whole mind had become absorbed by thoughts of this James, and though
he, personally, had never suffered through the stage-robber's
depredations, he found himself resenting the man's very existence.
There were no ethical considerations in his mind. His inspiration
was purely personal. And though he did not attempt to reduce his
hatred to reason, nor to analyze it in any way, the truth of its
existence lay in the fact of a deadly opposition to this sudden
rise to notoriety of a man of strength, and force of character
similar, in so many respects, to his own. Perhaps it was mere
jealousy; perhaps, all unknown to himself, there was some deeper
feeling underlying it. Whatever it was, he had a strong sympathy
with Scipio, and an unconquerable desire to have a hand in the
smoothing out of the little man's troubles.

He did not leave the barn, and scarcely even took his eyes off Gipsy's
empty stall, until nearly sundown. Then, as he heard the voices of
returning prospectors, he set to work on his evening task of grooming,
feeding, watering and bedding down his children for the night.

CHAPTER VII

SUNNY OAK TRIES HIS HAND

In the meantime Sunny Oak was executing his orders with a care for
detail quite remarkable in a man of his excessive indolence. It was a
curious fact, and one that told a great deal of his own character, as
well as that of the gambler. His implicit obedience to Wild Bill's
orders was born of a deeper knowledge of that individual than was
possessed by most of his comrades in Suffering Creek. Maybe Minky, who
was Bill's most intimate friend, would have understood. But then Sunny
Oak possessed no such privilege. He knew Bill through sheer
observation, which had taught him to listen when the gambler spoke as
he would listen to a man in high authority over him--or to a man who,
without scruple, held him helpless under an irresistible threat. Which
power it was inspired his obedience he did not pause to consider. He
simply accepted the fact that when Bill ordered he preferred to
obey--it was so much easier.

"Hoboe"--the local term for one suffering from his indolent malady--as
he was, Sunny Oak was a man of some character. Originally this cloak
of indolence in which he wrapped himself had been assumed for some
subtle reason of his own. It was not the actual man. But so long had
he worn it now that he had almost forgotten the real attributes
enshrouded in its folds. As a matter of fact, he was very much a man,
and a "live" man, too. He really possessed an extraordinary energy
when he chose to exercise it. But it was generally his habit to push
his interest aside for the easier course of indifference. However, his
capacity was none the less there.

His other possessions, too, were excellent in their way, although he
had encouraged the germ of rust in a deplorable degree. His
good-nature would not be denied, and was obvious to all. But an
extremely alert mind, an infinite resource of keen, well-trained
thought, a profound love of the beautiful, a more commonplace physical
courage supported by the rarer moral courage, he contrived to keep
well hidden from the vulgar gaze.

These were some of the features so long concealed under the folds of
his cloak of indolence that even he had almost forgotten their
existence. Thus it was, in all seriousness, he cried out bitterly in
protest when an attempt was made to lift the covering and lay bare the
man beneath it. And his lamentations were perfectly genuine.

After leaving the store with a sack of provisions over his shoulder he
grumbled his way across the dumps to Scipio's house. He cursed the
weight he was forced to carry, and anathematized the man who had
driven him to so bestir himself. He lamented over this waste of his
precious energies, he consigned Scipio and his children to eternity,
and metaphorically hurled Jessie headlong to the depths of the
uttermost abyss of the nether-world. But he went on. In spite of his
foulest language and vilest epithets, it was his full intention to do
his best for the children.

What he found on entering Scipio's hut set his small eyes twinkling
again. His unclean face creased up into a grin, and, softly tiptoeing
to a far corner of the room, he deposited his sack with the greatest
care. Then he stood up, and his eyes fixed themselves on a curious
heap under the table. It was a tumbled pile of pale blue, dirty white,
with a four-legged dash of yellow. And out of the heap he made the
forms of two small sleeping children, each hugging in their arms an
extremity of a yellow cur pup, also sound asleep, in the shaft of
sunlight which flooded in through the open doorway.

Sunny rubbed his eyes and thought hard, nor did he find the process
irksome. From the miserable camp pup he glanced at the grubby face of
Jamie. Then his eyes passed on to Vada's pretty but equally dirty
features. And swift action at once followed his thought. He glanced at
the dying fire in the cookstove, and saw the small clothes hanging on
the chair in front of it. He felt them; they were quite dry. Then he
tried the kettle on the stove; it still had water in it. Then he went
to the fuel-box; yes, there was fuel.

Now with his fingers he replenished the fire, and noiselessly
re-filled the kettle. Then he removed the clothes and put the chair
aside. The children still slept on. He further investigated the
resources of Scipio's _ménage_. He found a wash-bowl and soap and a
towel, three things he rarely sought for any purposes of his own.
Then, after looking into the cupboard, he shook his head. It was
deplorably bare of all but uncleanliness. And it was the former that
caused his headshake, not the latter. With some pride he re-stocked
the shelves with the liberal purchases he had made at Bill's expense.
He had provided everything that a man's mind could conceive as being
necessary for the interior of healthy childhood. True, he had made no
provision for a yellow pup.

By this time the kettle was boiling, and it served him as a signal. In
a harsh, untuneful voice he began to chant an old coon-ditty. The
effect of his music was instantaneous as regards the more sensitive
ears of the pup. Its eyes opened, and it lifted its head alertly.
Then, with a quick wriggle, he sat up on his hind quarters, and,
throwing his lean, half-grown muzzle in the air, set up such a howl of
dismay that Sunny's melody became entirely lost in a jangle of
discords. He caught up his empty sack and flung it at the wailing
pup's head. It missed its aim, and in a moment the twins had joined in
their yellow friend's lament.

Sunny never quite understood the real cause of that dismal
protest--whether it was the sight of him, his doleful singing, or the
flinging of the sack. All he knew was that it was very dreadful, and
must be stopped as quickly as possible. So, to that end, he began to
cajole the children, while he surreptitiously let fly a kick at the
pup.

"Say, you bonny kids, you ain't scairt o' poor Sunny Oak," he cried,
while a streak of yellow flashed in the sunlight and vanished through
the door, a departure which brought with it renewed efforts from the
weeping children. "It's jest Sunny Oak wot nobody'll let rest," he
went on coaxingly. "He's come along to feed you supper. Say," he
cried, laboring hard for inspiration, "it's such a bully supper.
Ther's molasses, an' candy, an'--an' lob-ster!"

Whether it was the smacking of his lips as he dwelt on the last word,
or whether it was merely the fact that their fright was passing,
matters little; anyhow, the cries of the twins died out as suddenly as
they began, and their eyes, big and round, gazed wonderingly up at
Sunny's unkempt face.

"Who's you, ugly man?" asked Vada at last, her brain working more
quickly than her brother's.

"'Ess--ug'y man," added Jamie unmeaningly.

Sunny's hand went up to his face, and he scratched amongst his sparse
beard as though to test the accuracy of the accusation. Then he
grinned sheepishly.

"Guess I'm jest an ugly fairy that wants to be kind to two lonesome
kiddies," he beamed.

"O--oh! You'se a fairy?" said Vada doubtfully.

"'Ess," nodded Jamie, thrilling with wonderment, and eyeing him
critically.

Elated with his success, Sunny went on warmly--

"Yep. Jest a fairy, an' I bro't a heap o' good grub fer you kiddies t'
eat."

But Vada's small brain was following out its own train of thought, and
passed the food question by.

"Awful ugly," she said, half to herself.

"'Ess," muttered Jamie abstractedly.

"Mebbe," said Sunny, with a laugh. "Wal, if you crawl right out o'
there an' git around, I got things fixed so we'll hev' a bully time."

But his proposition hadn't the effect he hoped. Instead of moving,
Jamie suddenly beat his head with his little clenched fists.

"Me wants yaller pup," he cried, and forthwith howled afresh.

Again Sunny realized his helplessness, and, glancing about for further
inspiration, caught sight of an inquiring yellow head peering
furtively in through the doorway.

"Why, ther' he is," he cried, vainly hoping to pacify the child. Then
he began at once a clumsy encouragement of the dog. "Here, you yeller
feller," he cried, flicking his fingers coaxingly. "Come along! Gee,
you're a pretty feller. Hi! come along here."

But the dog made no attempt to move, and Sunny began to lose patience.
"Come along, pups," he cried, with increasing force. "Come on, you
miser'ble rat. Don't stan' ther' waggin' your fool tail like a
whisk-broom. Say, you yaller cur, I'll--" He started to fetch the
creature, but in a twinkling it had fled, to the accompaniment of a
fresh outburst from Jamie.

"I tho't you was a fairy," protested Vada. "Fairies ken do most
anything. You're jest an ugly ole man."

Sunny stood up and drew the back of his hand across his perspiring
forehead. He was worried. The fairy business was played out, and he
felt that he must begin again. Children were by no means as easy to
handle as he had thought. He racked his brains, and suddenly bethought
him of another move.

In spite of Jamie's whimpering, he went to the cupboard and produced a
tin of molasses. This he carefully opened in full view of Vada's
questioning eyes. Jamie had also become silent, watching him intently.
He dug his finger into the sticky contents and drew it out. Then he
licked his finger with tremendous enjoyment.

"Bully," he muttered, apparently ignoring the children.

Instantly Vada was on her knees, crawling from under the table,
followed closely by her faithful shadow. She came cautiously up to
Sunny's side and stood up.

"M'lasses?" she inquired, and her eyes spoke volumes.

"O-oh!" muttered Jamie, scrambling to his feet beside her holding up
one fat hand.

Sunny, without replying, allowed them to dip their fingers into the
pot and taste the molasses. He felt that the moment was critical, and
he would not risk words which might easily set them scuttling back to
their stronghold.

His strategy was successful. Up came the hands again, and he knew he
had won their confidence. He allowed them another dip into the pot,
and then began the business in hand.

"We'll save the rest fer bimeby," he said decidedly. "Meanwhiles we'll
fix things right."

"Wot things?" inquired Vada.

"M'lasses," said Jamie, with tearful eyes.

Again Sunny felt the crisis, but he carried the situation with a firm
hand.

"Bimeby, laddie," he said cheerfully. "Meanwhiles we'll jest have a
wash all round."

And forthwith he set the wash-bowl ready and filled it with warm
water. Then, after some consideration and trouble, having discovered a
rag which had been used in the household "wash-up," and a piece of
soap, he prepared to start on little Vada. But she instantly
protested.

"You first, Mister Fairy," she said cheerfully. "My poppa allus washes
first. Then we has his water."

"'Ess," agreed Jamie.

And, to his disgust, Sunny was forced to an unwilling ablution, which,
by strategy, he had hoped to escape. However, the ordeal was manfully
borne, and his reward was quite worth his trouble. Vada promptly
exclaimed when she saw his face emerge from the dirty towel, shining
with grease off the house-flannel.

"You'se a fairy, sure," she cried, clapping her hands and dancing
about gleefully. "On'y fairies can change theirselves. You'se a
pretty, pretty man--now. Now, Jamie dear. You next," she added, with
feminine assurance. And with clumsy but willing enough hands Sunny Oak
contrived to cleanse his charges.

By the time his task was accomplished perfect good-will reigned all
round, and the climax was reached when the yellow pup returned of its
own accord, and was promptly hugged to Jamie's affectionate little
bosom.

The next thing was to prepare the children's supper. This was a far
more serious matter for the loafer. But he finally achieved it, having
learnt, by the process of cross-questioning the girl, what was usual
and therefore expected. However, it was not without some difficulty
that he succeeded in providing an adequate meal, which consisted of
bread and milk, with bread and molasses as a sort of dessert. For
himself, he was forced to fare off a tin of lobster and tea. Still,
his difficulties were not of much consequence so long as the children
were satisfied. And any bother to himself was his own fault, in having
relied for a moment on Sandy Joyce's ideas of a menu.

Supper over and the table cleared, he decided on further catechizing
little Vada on points that still were a mystery to him. So, with Jamie
busy on the floor endeavoring to solve the mystery of the pup's
wagging tail, he lit his pipe and took Vada on his knee. He
endeavored to recall incidents of his own childhood; to remember
something of his own early routine. But somehow nothing was very
clear.

He had washed the children and given them food. Those things seemed to
him to be perfectly sound. Well, what next? It was a little difficult.
He glanced at the sun. Surely bed would be quite in order. Bed--ah,
yes, that was a happy thought. He remembered now, when he was young he
always used to get himself into trouble purposely so they would send
him to bed. But with this thought came the regretful recollection that
his predilection for bed was quickly discovered, and his further
penalties took the form of the buckle end of his father's waist-belt.
However, he put the proposition with much tact.

"Say, kiddies," he began, "how soon does your momma put you to bed?"

Vada shook her wise little head.

"Momma don't. Poppa does."

"And when's that?" he inquired, driving at his point deliberately.

"When momma says."

Vada was fastening and unfastening the man's dirty waistcoat with
great interest.

"An' when does your momma say it?" Sunny persisted.

"When poppa's done the chores."

"Ah!"

He felt himself on the wrong tack, and cast about for a fresh line of
argument.

"Guess you kiddies like bed some," he hazarded doubtfully.

"Me like m'lasses," piped Jamie, who had managed to get the pup's tail
over his shoulder, and was hanging on to it with both hands. Vada
shrieked as the pup began to yelp.

"Oh, look at Jamie," she cried. "He's pulling Dougal's tail right out.
You're a naughty, naughty boy."

"Not naughty," protested Jamie, pulling harder.

Sunny reached down and released the mongrel, who promptly turned round
and licked the boy's face. Jamie fought him with his little clenched
fists, and finally began to cry.

Again Sunny went to the rescue, and with some difficulty peace was
restored. Then he went back to his subject.

"Guess we'll hev to go to bed right now," he suggested, with an air of
authority.

"Momma ain't back," said Vada, her eyes round and wondering.

"She'll be right along presently," lied Sunny.

"'Ess," declared Jamie, "an'--an'--we go find 'piders an'--an' bugs."

Vada nodded.

"Lots an' lots."

"That's to-morrow," said Sunny, taking his cue wonderingly.

"Poppa ain't back neither," protested Vada.

"He's gone visitin'," said Sunny. "Maybe he'll be late. Guess he's
havin' a hand at poker down at the store."

Sunny was getting uncomfortably hot. Lies came easily enough to him in
the ordinary way, but with these poor children it was somehow
different.

"Poppa don't play poker," defended Vada. "On'y wicked men does."

"'Ess," agreed Jamie.

"That's so." Sunny felt himself on dangerous ground.

He smoked on thoughtfully for some moments. He felt that a desperate
move was required, and considered how best to make it. Finally he
resolved that he must assert his authority. So, setting Vada on the
ground, he stood up.

"Bed," he said, with a great assumption of finality.

Vada's eyes rolled ominously, and a pucker came to her little sunburnt
brow. Jamie offered no preliminary, but howled at once. And when,
after the slightest hesitation, Vada joined in his lament, Sunny's
distress became pitiable. However, he managed to ease his feelings by
several well-directed mental curses at Wild Bill's head, and all those
others concerned in reducing him to his present position. And with
this silently furious outburst there came a brain-wave of great
magnitude.

"First in bed sure gets most m'lasses," he cried, darting to the
cupboard door and holding the well-smeared pot up above his head.

The children's cries ceased, and for a second they stood staring up at
him. Then, like a pair of rabbits, they turned and ran for the
bedroom, vanishing behind the curtain amidst shrieking excitement.
Sunny followed them with the molasses and a handful of crackers.

They were both on the bed when he passed into the room, huddling down
under a couple of cotton blankets. The man glanced round him. On the
other side of the room was the big bed where their father and mother
slept. Both beds were unmade, and the room was littered with feminine
garments in a manner that suggested the mother's hasty flight.
Hardened as he was, the sight and all it suggested depressed him. But
he was not allowed much time for reflection. Two childish voices
shrieked at him at once.

"Me first!" they cried in one breath.

And Sunny ladled them out molasses and crackers to their hearts'
content. When they had eaten all he thought good for them Vada
scrambled to her knees.

"Prayers," she said, and clasped her hands before her face.

Jamie wobbled up to her side and imitated her. And Sunny stood by
listening wonderingly to something that brought back a world of
recollection to him. It brought him more. It laid before him a mental
picture of his present manhood which somehow nauseated him. But he
stood his ground till the final "Amens," then he hustled the twins
almost roughly into the blankets, and, having extracted a promise from
them not to leave the bed again until he returned, hurried out of the
room.

He stood for a moment in the living-room. He was in a doubt that
almost confused him. Mechanically he looked at the stove. The fire was
quite safe. The window was secure. Then he moved to the door. There
was a lock to it and a key. He passed out, and, locking the door
behind him, removed the key.

"Gee!" he exclaimed, drinking in a breath of the evening air, "five
minutes more o' that an' I'd 'a' bin singin' funeral hymns over my
past life. Gee!"

Ten minutes later he was in Wild Bill's hut down at the camp, and had
finished his account of his adventures.

"Say," he finished up peevishly, "ther's things a feller can do, an'
things he sure can't. I tell you right here I ain't learned how to
cluck to my chicks, an' I ain't never scratched a worm in my life. I
'low I'm too old to git busy that ways now. If you're goin' to raise
them kids fer Zip while he's away, it'll need a committee o' us
fellers. It's more'n one feller's job--much more. It needs a wummin."

Bill listened patiently until his deputy had aired his final
grievance. His fierce eyes had in them a peculiar twinkle that was
quite lost on Sunny in his present mood. However, when the injured man
had finished his tale of woe the gambler stretched his long legs out,
and lolled back in his chair with a fresh chew of tobacco in his
mouth.

"You ain't done too bad," he said judicially. "That m'lasses racket
was a heap smart. Though--say, you'll get around ther' come sun-up
to-morrer, an' you'll fix 'em right all day. Maybe Zip'll be back
later. Anyways, you'll fix 'em."

"Not on your life--" began Sunny, in fierce rebellion. But Bill cut
him short.

"You'll do it, Sunny," he cried, "an' don't you make no mistake."

The man's manner was irresistibly threatening, and Sunny was beaten
back into moody silence. But if looks could have killed, Bill's
chances of life were small indeed.

"Guess you're off duty now," the gambler went on icily. "You're off
duty till--sun-up. You're free to get drunk, or--what in hell you
like."

Sunny rose from his seat. His rebellious eyes were fiercely alight as
he regarded his master.

"May your soul rot!" he cried venomously. And with this final impotent
explosion he slouched out of the hut.

"Dessay it will," Bill called after him amiably. "But it ain't started
yet."

But his jibe was quite lost on the angry Sunny, for he had left him
with the haste of a man driven to fear of whither his anger might
carry him.

Left alone, Wild Bill chuckled. He liked Sunny, but despised his mode
of life with all the arrogant superiority of a man of great force,
even if of indifferent morals. He had no patience with a weakened
manhood. With him it was only strength that counted. Morality was only
for those who had not the courage to face a mysterious future
unflinchingly. The future concerned him not at all. He had no fears of
anybody or anything, either human or superhuman. Death offered him no
more terrors than Life. And whichever was his portion he was ready to
accept it unquestioningly, unprotestingly.

He allowed the hoboe time to get well clear of his shack. Then he
stood up and began to pace the room thoughtfully. A desperate frown
depressed his brows until they met over the bridge of his large thin
nose. Something was working swiftly, even passionately, in his brain,
and it was evident that his thoughts were more than unpleasant to
himself. As the moments passed his strides became more aggressive, and
his movements were accompanied by gesticulations of a threatening
nature with his clenched fists.

At last he paused in his walk, and dropped again into his chair. Here
he sat for a long while. Then, of a sudden, he lifted his head and
glanced swiftly about his bare room. Finally he sprang to his feet and
crushed his slouch hat on his head, and, crossing over to the oil-lamp
on the table, blew it out. Then he passed out into the night, slamming
and locking the door behind him.

The night was dark, and the moon would not rise for at least another
hour. The air was still laden with the heat of the long summer's day,
and it hummed with the music of stirring insect life. He strode along
the trail past the store. He glanced at the lighted windows longingly,
for he had an appointment for a game in there that night. But he
passed on.

As he came to the camp dumps he paused for a moment to take his
bearings. Then he continued his way with long, decided strides, and in
a few minutes the dim outline of Scipio's house loomed up before him.
He came close up, and walked slowly round it. At one window he paused,
listening. There was not a sound to be heard outside. At the window of
the bedroom he listened a long time. No, he could not even hear the
children breathing.

At last he reached the door which Sunny had locked. He cautiously
tried the handle, and the sound brought a whimper from the yellow pup
within. He cursed the animal softly under his breath and waited,
hoping the wretched creature would settle down again. He heard it
snuff at the foot of the door, and then the soft patter of its feet
died away, and he knew that the poor thing had satisfied itself that
all was well.

He smiled, and sat down at the foot of the door. And, with his knees
drawn up into his arms, he prepared for his long vigil. It was the
posting of the night sentry over Scipio's twins.

CHAPTER VIII

WILD BILL THINKS HARD--AND HEARS NEWS

Wild Bill stretched himself drowsily. It was noon. He knew that by the
position of the patch of sunlight on the floor, which he gazed at with
blinking eyes. Presently he reached out his long arms and clasped his
hands behind his head. He lay there on his stretcher bed, still very
sleepy, but with wakefulness gaining ascendancy rapidly. He had
completed two successive nights of "sentry-go" over Scipio's twins,
never reaching his blankets until well after sun-up.

For some minutes he enjoyed the delicious idleness of a still brain.
Then, at last, it stirred to an activity which once again set flowing
all the busy thought of his long night's vigil. Further rest became
impossible to a man of his temperament, and he sprang from his
blankets and plunged his face into a bucket of fresh water which stood
on an adjacent bench. In five minutes he was ready for the business of
the day.

It was to be a day of activity. He felt that. Yet he had made no
definite plans. Only all his thoughts of the previous night warned him
that something must be done, and that it was "up to him to get busy."

A long wakeful night is apt to distort many things of paramount
interest. But the morning light generally reduces them to their proper
focus. Thus it is with people who are considered temperamental. But
Bill had no such claims. He was hard, unimaginative, and of keen
decision. And overnight he had arrived at one considerable decision.
How he had arrived at it he hardly knew. Perhaps it was one of those
decisions that cannot be helped. Certain it was that it had been
arrived at through no definite course of reasoning. It had simply
occurred to him and received his approval at once. An approval, which,
once given, was rarely, if ever, rescinded. This was the man.

He had first thought a great deal about Scipio. He felt that the time
had come when his fate must be closely inquired into. The blundering
efforts of Sunny Oak were so hopelessly inadequate in the care of the
children, that only the return of their father could save them from
some dire domestic catastrophe.

Sunny apparently meant well by them. But Bill hated well-meaning
people who disguised their incompetence under the excellence of their
intentions. Besides, in this case it was so useless. These two
children were a nuisance, he admitted, but they must not be allowed to
suffer through Sunny's incompetence. No, their father must be found.

Then there was his mare, Gipsy; and when he thought of her he went hot
with an alarm which no threat to himself could have inspired. This
turn of thought brought James into his focus. That personage was
rarely far from it, and he needed very little prompting to bring the
outlaw into the full glare of his mental limelight. He hated James. He
had seen him rarely, and spoken to him perhaps only a dozen times,
when he first appeared on Suffering Creek. But he hated him as though
he were his most bitter personal enemy.

He had no reason to offer for this hatred, beyond the outlaw's known
depredations and the constant threat of his presence in the district.
At least no reason he would have admitted publicly. But then Wild Bill
was not a man to bother with reasons much at any time. And it was the
venomous hatred of the man which now drove him to a decision of the
first importance. And such was his satisfaction in the interest of his
decision, that, for the time being, at least, poker was robbed of its
charm, faro had become a game of no consequence whatever, and gambling
generally, with all its subtleties as he understood them, was no
longer worth while. He had decided upon a game with a higher stake
than any United States currency could afford. It was a game of life
and death. James, "Lord" James, as he contemptuously declared, must
go. There was no room for him in the same district as Wild Bill of
Abilene.

It would be useless to seek the method by which this decision was
reached. In a man such as Bill the subtleties of his motives were far
too involved and deeply hidden. The only possible chance of estimating
the truth would be to question his associates as to their opinion. And
even then such opinions would be biased by personal understanding of
the man, and so would be of but small account.

Thus Minky would probably have declared that his decision was the
result of his desire for the welfare of the community in which he
claimed his best friends. Sandy Joyce would likely have shaken his
head, and declared it was the possibility of something having happened
to his mare Gipsy. Toby Jenks might have had a wild idea that Bill had
made his "pile" on the "crook" and was "gettin' religion." Sunny Oak,
whose shrewd mind spent most of its time in studying the peculiarities
of his fellows, might have whispered an opinion to himself, when no
one was about, to the effect that Bill couldn't stand for a rival
"boss" around Suffering Creek.

Any of these opinions might have been right, just as any of them might
have been very wide of the mark. Anyhow, certain it is that no citizen
of Suffering Creek would, even when thoroughly drunk, have accused
Bill of any leaning towards sentimentalism or chivalry. The idea that
he cared two cents for what became of Scipio, or his wife, or his
children, it would have been impossible to have driven into their
heads with a sledge-hammer. And maybe they would have been right. Who
could tell?

His decision was taken without any definite argument, without any
heroics. He frankly declared to himself that James must go. And having
decided, he, equally frankly, declared that "the proposition was up to
him." This was his silent ultimatum, and, having delivered it, there
was no turning back. He would carry it out with as little mercy to
himself as he would show to any other concerned.

The men of Suffering Creek thought they knew this man. But it is
doubtful if anybody, even the man himself, knew Wild Bill. Probably
the nearest approach to a fair estimate of him would have been to
describe him as a sort of driving force to a keen brain and hot,
passionate heart. Whether he possessed any of the gentler human
feelings only his acts could show, for so hard and unyielding was his
manner, so ruthless his purpose when his mind was made up, that it
left little room for the ordinary observer to pack in a belief of the
softer side to the man.

Ten minutes after performing his primitive ablutions Wild Bill was
eating breakfast in the dining-room at the store, with Minky sitting
opposite to him. The storekeeper was telling him of something that
happened the night before, with a troubled expression in his honest
eyes.

"I was wonderin' when you'd get around," he said, as soon as Birdie
Mason had withdrawn to the kitchen. "I'd have given a deal for you to
have been playin' last night. I would sure. There was three fellers,
strangers, lookin' for a hand at poker. They'd got a fine wad o'
money, too, and were ready for a tall game. They got one with Irish
O'Brien, an' Slade o' Kentucky, but they ain't fliers, an' the
strangers hit 'em good an' plenty. Guess they must ha' took five
hundred dollars out of 'em."

Bill's sharp eyes were suddenly lifted from his plate. He was eating
noisily.

"Did you locate 'em--the strangers?" he grated.

"That's sure the pinch," said Minky, wiping his broad forehead with a
colored handkerchief. The heat in the dining-room was oppressive.
"I've never see 'em before, an' they didn't seem like talkin' a heap.
They were all three hard-lookin' citizens, an'--might ha' been
anything from bum cowpunchers to--"

"Sharps," put in Bill, between noisy sips at his coffee.

"Yes."

Minky watched a number of flies settle on a greasy patch on the bare
table.

"Y'see," he went on, after a thoughtful pause, "I don't like strangers
who don't seem ready tongued--none of us do, since the stage-robbin'
set in."

"You mean--" Bill set his cup down.

Minky nodded.

"We ain't sent out a parcel of gold for months, an' I'm kind o' full
up with dust about now. Y'see, the boys has got to cash their stuff,
and I'm here to make trade, so--wal, I jest got to fill myself with
gold-dust, an' take my chances. I'm mighty full just now--an'
strangers worry me some."

"You're weakenin'," said Bill sharply, but his eyes were serious, and
suggested a deep train of swift thought. Presently he reached a piece
of bread and spread molasses on it.

"Guess you're figgerin' it 'ud be safer to empty out."

Minky nodded.

"And these strangers?" Bill went on.

"They've lit out," said Minky ruefully. "I ast a few questions of the
boys. They rode out at sun-up."

"Where did they sleep?"

"Don't know. Nobody seems to know."

Minky sighed audibly. And Bill went on eating.

"Ain't heerd nothing o' Zip?" the storekeeper inquired presently.

"No."

"'Bout that mare o' yours?"

Bill's face suddenly flushed, and his fierce brows drew together in an
ominous frown, but he made no answer. Minky saw the change and edged
off.

"It's time he was gettin' around."

Bill nodded.

"I was kind of wonderin'," Minky went on thoughtfully, "if he don't
turn up--wot's to happen with them kids?"

"I ain't figgered."

Bill's interest was apparently wandering.

"He'll need to be gettin' around or--somethin's got to be done," Minky
drifted on vaguely.

"Sure."

"Y'see, Sunny's jest a hoboe."

"Sure."

"Don't guess Zip's claim amounts to pea-shucks neither," the
storekeeper went on, his mind leaning towards the financial side of
the matter.

"No."

"Them kids'll cost money, too."

Bill nodded, but no one could have detected any interest in his
movement.

"How'd it be to get that claim worked for him--while he's away?"

Bill shrugged.

"Mebbe Zip'll be gettin' back," he said.

"An' if he don't."

"You mean?"

There was interest enough in Bill now. His interrogation was full of
suppressed force.

"Yes. James."

Bill sprang to his feet and kicked back his chair. The sudden rage in
his eyes was startling, even to Minky, who was used to the man.
However, he waited, and in a moment or two his friend was talking
again in his usually cold tone.

"I'll jest git around an' see how Sunny's doin'," he said.

Then he drew out a pipe and began to cut flakes of tobacco from a
black plug.

"See here, Minky," he went on, after a moment's pause. "You need to do
some thinkin'. How much dust have you got in the store?"

"'Bout twenty thousand dollars."

"Whew!" Bill whistled softly as he packed the tobacco in his pipe. "An
elegant parcel for strangers to handle."

The storekeeper's face became further troubled.

"It sure is--if they handle it."

"Jest so."

Bill's pipe was alight now, and he puffed at it vigorously, speaking
between the puffs.

"Y'see, this feller James plays a big game. Cattle duffin' and
ord'n'ry stage-robbin' ain't good enough, nor big enough, to run his
gang on. He needs gold stages, and we ain't sendin' gold stages out.
Wal, wot's the conclusion? I ast you?"

"He'll hev to light out, or--"

"Jest so. Or he'll get around here to--look into things. Those
strangers last night were mebbe 'lookin' into things.' You'll need to
stow that dust where the rats can't gnaw it. Later we'll think things
out. Meanwhile there's one thing sure, we don't need strangers on
Suffering Creek. There's enough o' the boys around to work the gold,
an' when they get it they mostly know what to do with it. Guess I'll
get on up to Zip's shack."

The two men walked out into the store. Minky in a pessimistic mood
passed in behind his counter. This question of gold had bothered him
for some weeks. Since the first stage-robbing, and James' name had
become a "terror" in the district, he had opened a sort of banking
business for the prospectors. Commercially it appealed to him
enormously. The profits under his primitive methods of dealing with
the matter were dazzlingly large, and, in consequence, the business
became a dominant portion of his trade. Nor was it until the quantity
of gold he bought began to grow, and mount into thousands of dollars'
worth, that the difficulties of his traffic began to force themselves
upon him. Then it was that he realized that if it was insecure to
dispatch a gold stage laden with the property of the prospectors, how
was he to be able to hold his stock at the store with any greater
degree of security.

The more he thought of the matter the greater the difficulties
appeared. Of course he saw possibilities, but none of them offered the
security he needed. Then worry set in. History might easily repeat
itself on Suffering Creek. James' gang was reported to be a large one.
Well, what if he chose to sweep down upon the camp, and clean the
place out. Herein lay the trouble. And in consequence his days and
nights were none too easy.

He had never spoken of the matter before. It was not a subject to be
discussed with anybody. But Bill was different from the rest, and, for
several days, Minky had sought an opportunity of unburdening himself
to his friend. Now, at last, he had done so, and, in return, had
received small enough comfort. Still he felt he had done the best
thing.

CHAPTER IX

THE FORERUNNER OF THE TRUST

Bill passed straight through the store and set out across the town
dumps. And it would have been impossible to guess how far he was
affected by Minky's plaint. His face might have been a stone wall for
all expression it had of what was passing behind it. His cold eyes
were fixed upon the hut ahead of him without apparent interest or
meaning. His thoughts were his own at all times.

As he drew near he heard Sunny's voice raised in song, and he listened
intently, wondering the while if the loafer had any idea of its
quality. It was harsh, nasal and possessed as much tune as a freshly
sharpened "buzz-saw." But his words were distinct. Far too distinct
Bill thought with some irritation.

  "A farmer ast the other day if we wanted work.
  Sez we, 'Ol' man, the labour?' Sez he, 'It's binding wheat.'
  Sez we, 'Ol' man, the figger?' 'A dollar an' a ha'f the sum.'
  Sez we, 'Ol' man, go an' tickle yerself, we'd a durned sight sooner
        bum!'

  'Anythin' at all, marm, we're nearly starvin',
  Anything to hel-l-lp the bummers on their wa-ay,
  We are three bums an' jolly good chums,
  An' we live like Royal Turks,
  An' with good luck we bum our chuck,
  An' it's a fool of a man wot works.'"

Just as Sunny was about to begin the next verse Bill appeared in the
doorway, and the vocalist was reduced to a pained silence by his harsh
criticism.

"You'd orter be rootin' kebbeges on a hog ranch wi' that voice," he
said icily. "You're sure the worst singer in America."

Then he glanced round for the children. They were nowhere to be seen.
Sunny was at the cookstove boiling milk in a tin "billy." His face was
greasy with perspiration, and, even to Bill's accustomed eyes, he
looked dirtier than ever. He stood now with a spoon poised, just as he
had lifted it out of the pot at the moment of the other's entrance.

"Where's the kids?" the latter demanded sharply.

Sunny shifted his feet a little uneasily and glanced round the dirty
room. The place looked as though it hadn't been cleaned for a month.
There was a hideous accumulation of unwashed utensils scattered
everywhere. The floor was unswept, let alone unwashed. And the smell
of stale food and general mustiness helped to add to the keenness of
the visitor's nervous edge as he waited for the man's reply.

"Guess they're out on the dumps playin' at findin' gold," Sunny said,
with a slightly forced laugh. "Y'see, little Vada's staked out a claim
on a patch of elegant garbage, an' is digging fer worms. Them's the
gold. An' Jamie's playin' 'bad man' an' swoopin' down on her and
sneakin' her worms. It's a new game. Y'see, I thought it out and
taught 'em how to play it. They're a heap struck on it, too. I--"

But words somehow failed him under the baleful stare of the other's
eyes. And turning back to the milk he fell into a stupid silence.

"You'll get right out an' huyk them kiddies off'n those dumps," cried
Bill sharply. "You got no more sense in your idjot head than to slep
when your eyes shut. Diggin' worms on the dumps! Gee! Say, if it ain't
enough to give 'em bile and measles, an'--an' spots, then I don't know
a 'deuce-spot' from a hay-rake. Git right out, you loafin' bum, an'
fetch 'em in, an' then get the muck off'n your face, an' clean this
doggone shack up. I'd sure say you was a travelin' hospital o' disease
by the look of you. I'm payin' you a wage and a heap good one, so git
out--an' I'll see to that darn milk."

Argument was out of the question, so Sunny adopted the easier course
of obedience to his employer's orders. He dropped the spoon into the
milk with a suddenness that suggested resentment, and shuffled out,
muttering. But Bill followed him to the door.

"How?" he inquired threateningly.

"I didn't say nothin'," lied Sunny.

"I didn't jest guess you did," retorted Bill sarcastically. And he
watched his man hurry out into the sunlight with eyes that had somehow
become less severe.

He waited where he was for some moments. Then he turned back into the
room and stared disgustedly about him.

"If a feller can't fix two kiddies right an' cook 'em pap without
mussin' things till you feel like dying o' colic at the sight, he
ain't fit to rob hogs of rootin' space," he muttered. "I'd--Gee-whiz!
Ther's that doggone milk raising blue murder wi'--"

He rushed to the stove where the boiling milk was pouring over the
sides of the pot in a hissing, bubbling stream. He clutched at the
"billy," scalding his fingers badly, jerked it off the stove, upset
the contents on the floor and flung the pot itself across the room,
where it fell with a clatter upon a pile of dirty tin plates and
pannikins. He swore violently and sucked his injured fingers,
while, in angry dismay, he contemplated the additional mess his
carelessness had caused. And at that moment Sunny returned, leading
two grubby-faced infants by the hand.

"I got 'em back," he cried cheerfully. Then his shrewd eyes took in
the situation at a glance, and they sparkled with malicious glee.

"Gee," he cried, releasing the youngsters and pointing at the mess on
the stove and floor. "Now ain't that a real pity? Say, how d'you come
to do that? It sure ain't a heap of trouble heatin' a drop o' milk.
Most any fule ken do that. I tho't you savvied that, I sure did, or
I'd ha' put you wise. Y'see, you should jest let it ha' come to the
bile, an' then whip it off quick. My, but it's real foolish! Ten cents
o' milk wasted for want of a little sense."

"Our dinner milk," cried Vada in consternation. "All gone."

"All dorn," echoed Jamie, flinging himself on the floor and dipping
his fingers into the mess and licking them with grave appreciation.

In a moment he was joined by the inevitable yellow pup, which burnt
its tongue and set up a howl. Vada ran to the animal's assistance,
fell over Jamie's sprawling legs and rolled heavily in the mess.

For some seconds confusion reigned. Sunny darted to Vada's rescue,
sent the pup flying with a well-directed kick, picked the weeping girl
up, and tried to shake some of the milk from her dirty clothing. While
Bill grabbed Jamie out of the way of any further mischief. The boy
struggled furiously to free himself.

"Me want dinner milk," he shouted, and beat the gambler's chest with
both his little fists.

"You kicked Dougal!" wailed Vada, from under Sunny's arm.

And at that moment a mild voice reached them from the open doorway--

"Why, what's happenin'?"

Bill and Sunny turned at once. And the next instant the children were
shrieking in quite a different tone.

"Pop-pa," they shouted, with all the power of their childish lungs.
The men released them, and, with a rush, they hurled themselves upon
the small person of their father.

Scipio set a bundle he was carrying upon the floor and scrambled Jamie
into his arms and kissed him. Then he kissed Vada. After that he stood
up, and, in a peculiarly dazed fashion gazed about him, out of a pair
of blackened and bloodshot eyes, while the children continued to cling
to him.

The two onlookers never took their eyes off him. Sunny Oak gazed with
unfeigned astonishment and alarm, but Bill merely stared. The little
man was a pitiable object. His clothes were tattered. His face was
bruised and cut, and dry blood was smeared all round his mouth. Both
eyes were black, and in one of them the white was changed to a bright
scarlet.

James' men had done their work all too well. They had handled their
victim with the brutality of the savages they were.

Scipio let his eyes rest on Bill, and, after a moment's hesitation, as
though gathering together his still scattered wits, spoke his
gratitude.

"It was real kind of you lendin' me Gipsy. I set her back in the barn.
She's come to no harm. She ain't got saddle-sore, nor--nor nothin'.
Maybe she's a bit tuckered, but she's none the worse, sure."

Bill clicked his tongue, but made no other response. At that moment it
would have been impossible for him to have expressed the thoughts
passing through his fierce mind. Sunny, however, was more superficial.
Words were bursting from his lips. And when he spoke his first remark
was a hopeless inanity.

"You got back?" he questioned.

Scipio's poor face worked into the ghost of a smile.

"Yes," he said. And the awkwardness of the meeting drove him to
silently caressing his children.

Presently Sunny, who was not delicate-minded, pointed at his face.

"You--you had a fall?"

Scipio shook his head.

"You see, I found him and--his boys got rough," he explained simply.

"Gee!"

There was no mistaking Sunny's anger. He forgot his usual lazy
indifference. For once he was stirred to a rage that was as active and
volcanic as one of Wild Bill's sudden passions.

But the gambler at last found his tongue, and Sunny was given no
further opportunity.

"What you got there?" he asked, pointing at the parcel Scipio had
deposited on the floor.

The little man glanced down at it.

"That?" he said hazily. "Oh, that's bacon an' things. I got 'em from
Minky on my way up. He told me you'd sure got grub up here, an' I
didn't need to get things. But I guessed I couldn't let you do all
this now I'm back. Say," he added, becoming more alert. "I want to
thank you both, you bin real good helping me out."

Bill swallowed some tobacco juice, and coughed violently. Sunny was
eaten up with a rage he could scarcely restrain. But Scipio turned to
the children, who were now clinging silently to his moleskin
trousers.

"Guess we'll get busy an' fix things up," he said, laying caressing
hands upon them. "You'll need your dinners, sure. Poppa's got nice
bacon. How's that?"

"Bully," cried Vada promptly. Now that she had her father again
everything was "bully." But Jamie was silently staring up at the man's
distorted features. He didn't understand.

Wild Bill recovered from his coughing, suddenly bestirred himself.

"Guess we'd best git goin', Sunny," he said quietly. "Zip'll likely
need to fix things up some. Y'see, Zip," he went on, turning to the
father, "Sunny's done his best to kep things goin' right. He's fed the
kiddies, which was the most ne'ssary thing. As for keppin' the place
clean,"--he pointed at the small sea of milk which still stood in
pools on the floor--"I don't guess he's much when it comes to cleanin'
anything--not even hisself. I 'low he's wrecked things some. Ther's a
heap of milk wasted. Howsum--"

"Say!" cried the outraged Sunny. But Bill would allow no interruption.

"We'll git goin'," he said, with biting coldness. "Come right along.
So long, Zip," he added, with an unusual touch of gentleness. "I'll be
along to see you later. We need to talk some."

He moved over to Sunny's side, and his hand closed upon his arm. And
somehow his grip kept the loafer silent until they passed out of the
hut. Once outside the gambler threw his shoulders back and breathed
freely. But he offered no word. Only Sunny was inclined to talk.

"Say, he's had a desprit bad time," he said, with eyes ablaze.

But Bill still remained silent. Nor did another word pass between them
until they reached Minky's store.

The moment they had departed Scipio glanced forlornly round his home.
It was a terrible home-coming. Three days ago in spite of all
set-backs and shortcomings, hope had run high in his heart. Now--He
left the twins standing and walked to the bedroom door. He looked in.
But the curtains dropped from his nerveless fingers and he turned back
to the living room, sick in mind and heart. For one moment his eyes
stared unmeaningly at the children. Then he sat down on the chair
nearest the table and beckoned them over to him. They came, thrilled
with awe in their small wondering minds. Their father's distorted
features fascinated yet horrified them.

Jamie scrambled to one knee and Vada hugged one of the little man's
arms.

"We'll have to have dinner, kiddies," he said, with attempted
lightness.

"Ess," said Jamie absently. Then he reached up to the wound on his
father's right cheek, and touched it gently with one small finger. It
was so sore that the man flinched, and the child's hand was withdrawn
instantly.

"Oose's hurted," he exclaimed.

"Pore poppa's all hurt up," added Vada tearfully.

"Not hurt proper," said Scipio, with a wan smile. "Y'see, it was jest
a game, an'--an' the boys were rough. Now we'll git dinner."

But Vada's mind was running on with swift childish curiosity, and she
put a sudden question.

"When's momma comin' back?" she demanded.

The man's eyes shifted to the open doorway. The golden sunlight beyond
was shining with all the splendor of a summer noon. But for all his
blackened eyes saw there might have been a gray fog of winter
outside.

"Momma?" he echoed blankly.

"Ess, momma," cried Jamie. "When she comin'?"

Scipio shook his head and sighed.

"When she comin'?" insisted Vada.

The man lowered his eyes till they focused themselves upon the yellow
pup, now hungrily licking up the cold milk.

"She won't come back," he said at last, in a low voice. Then with a
despairing gesture, he added: "Never! never!" And his head dropped
upon Jamie's little shoulder while he hugged Vada more closely to his
side as though he feared to lose her too.

CHAPTER X

THE TRUST

It was a blazing afternoon of the "stewing" type. The flies in the
store kept up a sickening hum, and tortured suffering humanity--in the
form of the solitary Minky--with their persistent efforts to alight on
his perspiring face and bare arms. The storekeeper, with excellent
forethought, had showered sticky papers, spread with molasses and
mucilage, broadcast about the shelves, to ensnare the unwary pests.
But though hundreds were lured to their death by sirupy drowning, the
attacking host remained undiminished, and the death-traps only
succeeded in adding disgusting odors to the already laden atmosphere.
Fortunately, noses on Suffering Creek were not over-sensitive, and the
fly, with all his native unpleasantness, was a small matter in the
scheme of the frontiersman's life, and, like all other obstructions,
was brushed aside physically as well as mentally.

The afternoon quiet had set in. The noon rush had passed, nor would
the re-awakening of the camp occur until evening. Ordinarily the quiet
of the long afternoon would have been pleasant enough to the
hard-working storekeeper. For surely there is something approaching
delight in the leisure moments of a day's hard and prosperous work.
But just now Minky had little ease of mind. And these long hours, when
the camp was practically deserted, had become a sort of nightmare to
him. The gold-dust stored in the dim recesses of his cellars haunted
him. The outlaw, James, was a constant dread. For he felt that his
store held a bait which might well be irresistible to that individual.
Experienced as he was in the ways of frontier life, the advent of the
strangers of the night before had started a train of alarm which
threatened quickly to grow into panic.

He was pondering this matter when Sunny Oak, accompanied by the
careless Toby Jenks, lounged into the store. With a quick, almost
furtive eye the storekeeper glanced up to ascertain the identity of
the newcomers. And, when he recognized them, such was the hold his
alarm had upon him, that his first thought was as to their fitness to
help in case of his own emergency. But his fleeting hope received a
prompt negative. Sunny was useless, he decided. And Toby--well, Toby
was so far an unknown quantity in all things except his power of
spending on drink the money he had never earned.

"Ain't out on your claim?" he greeted the remittance man casually.

"Too blamed hot," Toby retorted, winking heavily.

Then he mopped his face and ordered two whiskies.

"That stuff won't cool you down any," observed Minky, passing behind
his counter.

"No," Toby admitted doubtfully. Then with a bright look of intelligence.
"But it'll buck a feller so it don't seem so bad--the heat, I mean."
His afterthought set Sunny grinning.

Minky set out two glasses and passed the bottle. The men helped
themselves, and with a simultaneous "How!" gulped their drinks down
thirstily.

Minky re-corked the bottle and wiped a few drops of water from the
counter.

"So Zip's around," he said, as the glasses were returned to the
counter. And instantly Sunny's face became unusually serious.

"Say," he cried, with a hard look in his good-natured eyes. "D'you
ever feel real mad about things? So mad, I mean, you want to get right
out an' hurt somebody or somethin'? So mad, folks is likely to git
busy an' string you up with a rawhide? I'm sure mostly dead easy as a
man, but I feel that away jest about now. I've sed to myself I'd do
best settin' my head in your wash-trough. I've said it more'n oncet in
the last half-hour. But I don't guess it's any sort o' use. So--so,
I'll cut out the wash-trough."

"You most generally do," said Toby pleasantly.

"You ain't comic--'cep' when you're feedin'," retorted Sunny, nettled.
Then he turned to Minky, just as the doorway of the store was darkened
by the advent of Sandy Joyce. But he glanced back in the newcomer's
direction and nodded. Then he went on immediately with his talk.

"Say, have you seen him?" he demanded of anybody. "I'm talkin' o'
Zip," he added, for Sandy's enlightenment. "He found James. Located
his ranch, an'--an' nigh got hammered to death for his pains. Gee!"

"We see him," said Minky, after an awed pause. "But he never said a
word. He jest set Bill's mare back in the barn, an' bo't bacon, and
hit off to hum."

"I didn't see him," Sandy admitted. "How was he?"

"Battered nigh to death, I said," cried Sunny, with startling
violence. "His eyes are blackened, an' his pore mean face is cut
about, an' bruised ter'ble. His clothes is torn nigh to rags, an'--"

"Was it the James outfit did it?" inquired Minky incredulously.

"They did that surely," cried Sunny vehemently. "You ain't seen Bill,
have you? He's that mad you can't git a word out o' him. I tell you
right here somethin's goin' to happen. Somethin's got to happen," he
added, with a fresh burst of rage. "That gang needs cleanin' out. They
need shootin' up like vermin, an'--"

"You're goin' to do it?" inquired Sandy sarcastically.

Sunny turned on him in a flash.

"I'll take my share in it," he cried, "an' it'll need to be a big
share to satisfy me," he added, with such evident sincerity and fiery
determination that his companions stared at him in wonder.

"Guess Sunny's had his rest broke," observed Toby, with a grin.

"I have that sure. An'--an' it makes me mad to git busy," the loafer
declared. "Have you seen that pore feller with his face all mussed?
Gee! Say, Zip wouldn't hurt a louse; he's that gentle-natured I'd say
if ther' was only a baulky mule between him an' starvation he'd hate
to live. He ain't no more savvee than a fool cat motherin' a china
dog, but he's got the grit o' ten men. He's hunted out James with no
more thought than he'd use firin' a cracker on the 4th o' July. He
goes after him to claim his right, as calm an' foolish as a sheep in a
butcherin' yard. An' I'd say right here ther' ain't one of us in this
store would have had the grit chasin' for his wife wher' Zip's bin
chasin'--"

"Not for a wife, sure," interjected Sandy.

Toby smothered a laugh, but became serious under Sunny's contemptuous
eye.

"That's like you, Sandy," he cried. "It's sure like you. But I tell
you Zip's a man, an' a great big man to the marrer of his small
backbone. His luck's rotten. Rotten every ways. He's stuck on his
wife, an' she's gone off with a tough like James. He works so he comes
nigh shamin' even me, who hates work, on a claim that couldn't show
the color o' gold on it, if ther' wa'an't nothin' to the earth but
gold. He's jest got two notions in his silly head. It's his kids an'
his wife. Mackinaw! It makes me sick. It does sure. Here's us fellers
without a care to our souls, while that pore sucker's jest strugglin'
an' strugglin' an' everythin's wrong with him--wrong as--oh, hell!"

For once Sandy forgot his malicious jibe at the loafer's expense. And
Toby, too, forgot his pleasantry. Sunny's outburst of feeling had
struck home, and each man stood staring thoughtfully at the mental
picture he had conjured for them. Each admitted to himself in his own
way the pity the other's words had stirred, but none of them had
anything to add at the moment.

Sunny glanced from one to the other. His look was half questioning and
wholly angry. He glanced across at the window and thrust his hands in
his ragged trousers pockets.

And presently as he began to tap the floor with his foot a fresh rush
of fiery anger was mounting to his head. He opened his lips as though
about to continue his tirade, but apparently changed his mind. And,
instead, he drew a dollar bill from his pocket, and flung it on the
counter.

"Three more drinks," he demanded roughly.

Minky in unfeigned surprise produced the glasses. Sandy leant over,
and, with face thrust forward, inspected the bill. Toby contented
himself with a low whistle of astonishment.

Sunny glared at them contemptuously.

"Yes," he said roughly, "I've earned it. I've worked for it, do you
understand? Wild Bill set me to look after Zip's kids, an' he's paid
me for it. But--but that money burns--burns like hell, an' I want to
be quit of it. Oh, I ain't bug on no sort o' charity racket, I'm jest
about as soft as my back teeth. But I'm mad--mad to git busy doin'
anythin' so we ken git Zip level with that low-down skunk, James. An'
if ther's fi' cents' worth o' grit in you, Mister Sandy Joyce, an' an
atom o' savvee in your fool brain, Toby, you'll take a hand in the
game."

Minky looked on in silent approval. Anything directed against James
was bound to meet with his approval just now. But Sandy cleared his
throat, and lounged with his back against the counter.

"An' wot, I'd ast, is goin' to hurt this tough?" he inquired, with a
dash of his usual sarcasm.

Sunny flew at his drink and gulped it down.

"How do I know?" he cried scornfully.

"Jest so."

Toby grinned.

"You're a bright one, Sunny. You're so bright, you dazzle my eyes," he
cried.

But Sunny was absorbed in a thought that was hazily hovering in the
back of his brain, and let the insult pass.

"How ken I tell jest wot we're goin' to do," he cried. "Wot we want to
do is to kind o' help that pore crittur Zip out first. Ther' he is wi'
two kids to see to, which is sure more than one man's work, an' at the
same time he's got to dig up that mudbank claim of his. He don't see
the thing's impossible, 'cos he's that big in mind he can't see small
things like that. But I ain't big that aways, an' I ken see. If he
goes on diggin' wot's his kids goin' to do, an' if he don't dig wot's
they goin' to do anyways. We'll hev to form a committee--"

"Sort o' trust," grinned Toby.

But Sunny passed over his levity and seized upon his suggestion.

"I 'lows your fool head's tho't somethin' wiser than it guessed," he
said. "That's just wot we need. Ther' should be a trust to see after
him. An' after it's got his kids fixed right--"

Sunny broke off as the tall figure of Wild Bill threw its shadow
across the window of the store. The next moment the man himself
entered the room.

He nodded silently, and was about to fling himself into one of the
chairs, when Toby, in jocular anticipation, threw Sunny's proposition
at him.

"Say, Sunny's woke up an' bin thinkin'," he cried. "I allow his brain
is shockin' wonderful. Guess he's got sick o' restin' an' reckons he
got a notion for makin' a trust lay-out."

"The Zip Trust," added Sandy, with a laugh, in which Toby joined
heartily.

"Yes. He guesses Zip needs lookin' after," declared the remittance man
in the midst of his mirth, glancing round for appreciation of the
joke.

But the encouragement he received fell short of his expectations, and
his laugh died out quite abruptly. There was no responsive smile on
Minky's face. Sunny was glowering sulkily; while Bill's fierce brows
were drawn together in an angry frown, and his gimlet eyes seemed to
bore their way into the speaker's face.

"Wal?" he demanded coldly.

"Wal, I think he's--"

But Bill cut him short in his coldest manner.

"Do you?" he observed icily. "Wal, I'd say you best think ag'in. An'
when you done thinkin' jest start right over ag'in. An' mebbe some day
you'll get wise--if you don't get took meanwhiles."

Bill flung himself into the chair and crossed his long legs.

"Sunny's on the right lay," he went on. "Ther' ain't many men on
Sufferin' Creek, but Zip's one of 'em. Say, Toby, would you ride out
to James' outfit to call him all you think of the feller whose stole
your wife?"

"Not by a sight," replied Toby seriously.

"Wal, Zip did. He's big," went on Bill in cold, harsh tones. Then he
paused in thought. But he went on almost immediately. "We got to help
him. I'm sure with Sunny." He turned on the loafer with a wintry
smile. "You best organize right away, an'--count me in."

Sunny's eyes glowed with triumph. He had feared the man's ridicule. He
had expected to see his lean shoulders go up in silent contempt. And
then, he knew, would have followed a storm of sarcasm and "jollying"
from Sandy and the others. With quick wit he seized his opportunity,
bent on using Bill's influence to its utmost. He turned on Minky with
a well calculated abruptness.

"You'll help this thing out--too?" he challenged him.

And he got his answer on the instant--

"I sure will--to any extent."

Sandy and Toby looked at the storekeeper in some doubt. Bill was
watching them with a curious intentness. And before Sunny could
challenge the two scoffers, his harsh voice filled the room again.

"I don't know we'll need any more," he said, abruptly turning his gaze
upon the open window, "otherwise we'd likely hev ast you two fellers.
Y'see, we'll need folks as ken do things--"

"Wot sort o' things?" demanded Sandy, with a sudden interest.

"Wal, that ain't easy to say right now, but--"

"I ain't much seein' to kids," cried Sandy, "but I ken do most
anythin' else."

A flicker of a smile crept into Bill's averted eyes, while Sunny
grinned broadly to see the way the man was now literally falling over
himself to follow the leadership of Wild Bill.

"Wal, it ain't no use in saying things yet, but if you're dead set on
joining this Zip Trust, I guess you can. But get this, what you're
called upon to do you'll need to do good an' hard, an'--without
argument."

Sandy nodded.

"I'm in," he cried, as though a great privilege had been bestowed upon
him.

And at once Toby became anxious.

"Guess you ain't no use for me, Bill?" he hazarded, almost diffidently.

Bill turned his steely eyes on him in cold contemplation. Minky had
joined in Sunny's grin at the other men's expense. Sandy, too, now
that he was accepted as an active member of the trust, was indulging
in a superior smile.

"I don't allow I have," Bill said slowly. "Y'see, you ain't much else
than a 'remittance' man, an' they ain't no sort o' trash anyway."

"But," protested Toby, "I can't help it if my folks hand me money?"

"Mebbe you can't." Bill was actually smiling. And this fact so far
influenced the other members of the trust that an audible titter went
round the room. Then the gambler suddenly sat forward, and the old
fierce gleam shone once more in his cold eyes. "Say," he cried
suddenly. "If a feller got the 'drop' on you with six bar'ls of a gun
well-loaded, an'--guessed you'd best squeal, wot 'ud you do?"

"Squeal," responded the puzzled Toby, with alacrity.

"You ken join the Trust. You sure got more savvee than I tho't."

Bill sat back grinning, while a roar of laughter concluded the
founding of the Zip Trust.

But like all ceremonials, the matter had to be prolonged and
surrounded with the frills of officialdom. Sunny called it organization,
and herein only copied people of greater degree and self-importance.
He plunged into his task with whole-hearted enthusiasm, and, with
every word he uttered, preened himself in the belief that he was
rapidly ascending in the opinion of Wild Bill, the only man on
Suffering Creek for whose opinion he cared a jot.

He explained to his comrades, with all the vanity of a man whose
inspiration has met with public approval, that in forming such a
combine as theirs, it would be necessary to allot certain work, which
he called "departments," to certain individuals. He assured his
fellow-members that such was always done in "way-up concerns." It
saved confusion, and ensured the work being adequately performed.

"Sort o' like a noo elected gover'ment," suggested Sandy sapiently.

"Wal, I won't say that," said Sunny. "Them fellers traipse around wi'
portyfolios hangin' to 'em. I don't guess we need them things. It's
too hot doin' stunts like that."

"Portfolios?" questioned Toby artlessly. "Wot's them for?"

"Oh, jest nuthin' o' consequence. Guess it's to make folks guess
they're doin' a heap o' work. No, what we need is to set each man his
work this aways. Now Bill here needs to be president sure. Y'see, we
must hev a 'pres.' Most everything needs a 'pres.' He's got to sit on
top, so if any one o' the members gits gay he ken hand 'em a daisy
wot'll send 'em squealin' an' huntin' their holes like gophers. Wal,
Bill needs to be our 'pres.' Then there's the 'general manager.' He's
the feller wot sets around an' blames most everybody fer everything
anyway, an' writes to the noospapers. He's got to have savvee, an' an
elegant way o' shiftin' the responsibility o' things on them as can't
git back at him. He's got to be a bright lad--"

"That's Sunny, sure," exclaimed Toby. "He's a dandy at gettin' out o'
things an' leaving others in. Say--"

"Here, half-a-tick," cried Joyce, with sudden inspiration. "Who's
goin' to be 'fightin' editor'?"

"Gee, what a brain!" cried Sunny derisively. "Say, we ain't runnin' a
mornin' noos sheet. This is a trust. Sandy, my boy, you need
educatin'. A trust's a corporation of folks wot is so crooked, they
got to git together, an' pool their cash, so's to git enough dollars
to kep 'em out o' penitentiary. That's how they start. Later on, if
they kep clear o' the penitentiary, they start in to fake the market
till the Gover'ment butts in. Then they git gay, buy up a vote in
Congress, an' fake the laws so they're fixed right fer themselves.
After that some of them git religion, some of 'em give trick feeds to
their friends, some of 'em start in to hang jewels on stage females.
Some of 'em have been known to shoot theirselves or git divorced. It
ain't no sort o' matter wot they do, pervided they're civil to the
noospaper folk. That's a trust, Sandy, an' I don't say but what the
feller as tho't o' that name must o' bin a tarnation amusin' feller."

"Say, you orter bin in a cirkis," sneered Sandy, as the loafer
finished his disquisition.

"Wal, I'd say that's better'n a museum," retorted Sunny.

But Toby was impatient to hear how Sunny intended to dispose of him.

"Wher' do I figger in this lay-out?" he demanded.

"You?" Sunny's eyes twinkled. "Don't guess we'll need to give you hard
work. You best be boss o' the workin' staff."

"But ther' ain't no workin' staff," protested Toby.

"Jest so. That's why you'll be boss of it." Then Sunny turned to
Sandy.

"We'll need your experience as a married man, tho'," he said slyly.
"So you best be head o' the advisory board. You'll need to kep us wise
to the general principles of vittlin' a family of three, when the
woman's missin'. Then we'll need a treasurer." Sunny turned to Minky,
and his twinkling eyes asked the question.

"Sure," said Minky promptly, "I'll be treasurer. Seems to me I'll be
safer that ways."

"Good," cried Sunny, "that's all fixed." He turned to Bill. "Say,
pres," he went on, "I'd like to pass a vote o' thanks fer the way you
conducted this yer meetin', an' put it to the vote, that we accept the
treasurer's invitation to take wine. All in favor will--"

"Mine's rye," cried Sandy promptly.

"An' mine," added Toby.

"Rye for me," nodded Sunny at Minky's grinning face. "Bill--?"

But Bill shook his head.

"Too early for me," he said, "you fellers can git all you need into
you though. But see here, folks," he went on, with a quietness of
purpose that promptly reduced every eye to seriousness. "This ain't no
play game as Sunny may ha' made you think. It's a proposition that
needs to go thro', an'--I'm goin' to see it thro'. Zip's kids is our
first trouble. They ain't easy handlin'. They got to be bro't up
reg'lar, an' their stummicks ain't to be pizened with no wrong sort o'
vittles. Ther's such a heap o' things to kids o' that age it makes me
nigh sweat at the tho't. Howsum, Zip's down an' out, an' we got to see
him right someways. As 'pres' of this lay-out, I tell you right here,
every mother's son of us had best git out an' learn all we ken about
fixin' kids right. How to feed 'em, how to set their pretties on
right, how to clean 'em, how to--well, jest how to raise 'em. If any
o' you got leddy friends I'd say git busy askin' 'em. So--"

At that moment the sound of footsteps on the veranda came in through
the window, and Bill looked round. The next instant he spoke more
rapidly, and with greater authority.

"Git goin'," he cried, "an' we'll meet after supper."

There was no doubt of this man's rule. Without a word the men
filed out of the store, each one with his thoughts bent upon the
possibilities of acquiring the knowledge necessary.

CHAPTER XI

STRANGERS IN SUFFERING CREEK

Bill watched the men depart. The stolid Minky, too, followed them with
his eyes. But as they disappeared through the doorway he turned to the
gambler, and, in surprise, discovered that he was reclining in a
chair, stretched out in an attitude of repose, with his shrewd eyes
tightly closed. He was about to speak when the swing-doors opened, and
two strangers strolled in.

Minky greeted them, "Howdy?" and received an amiable response. The
newcomers were ordinary enough to satisfy even the suspicious
storekeeper. In fact, they looked like men from some city, who had
possibly come to Suffering Creek with the purpose of ascertaining the
possibilities of the camp as a place in which to try their fortunes.
Both were clad in store clothes of fair quality, wearing hats of the
black prairie type, and only the extreme tanning of their somewhat
genial faces belied the city theory.

Minky noted all these things while he served them the drinks they
called for, and, in the most approvedly casual manner, put the usual
question to them.

"Wher' you from?" he inquired, as though the matter were not of the
least consequence.

He was told Spawn City without hesitation, and in response to his
remark that they had "come quite a piece," they equally amiably
assured him that they had.

Then one of the men addressed his companion.

"Say, Joe," he said, "mebbe this guy ken put us wise to things."

And Joe nodded and turned to the storekeeper.

"Say, boss," he began, "we've heerd tell this lay-out is a dead gut
bonanza. There's folks in Spawn City says ther's gold enough here to
drown the United States Treasury department. Guess we come along to
gather some." He grinned in an ingratiating manner.

Minky thought before answering.

"Ther' sure is a heap o' gold around. But it ain't easy. I don't guess
you'd gather much in a shovel. You'll get pay dirt that aways, but--"

"Ah! Needs cap'tal," suggested Joe.

"That's jest how we figgered," put in the other quietly.

Minky nodded. Many things were traveling swiftly through his mind.

"Drove in?" he inquired.

"Sure," replied Joe. "Unhooked down the trail a piece."

Bill's eyes opened and closed again. Then he shifted noisily in his
chair. The men turned round and eyed him with interest. Then the man
called Joe called back to the storekeeper.

"My name's Joe Manton," he said, by way of introduction. "An' my
friend's called Sim Longley. Say," he went on, with a backward jerk of
the head, "mebbe your friend'll take something?"

Minky glanced over at Wild Bill. The gambler drowsily opened his eyes
and bestirred himself.

"I sure will," he said, rearing his great length up, and moving across
to the counter. "I'll take Rye, mister, an' thank you. This is Mr.
Minky, gents. My name's Bill."

The introduction acknowledged, talk flowed freely. Wild Bill, in
carefully toned down manner, engaged the strangers in polite talk,
answering their questions about the gold prospects of the place, which
were often pointed, in the most genial and even loquacious manner. He
told them a great deal of the history of the place, warned them that
Suffering Creek was not the sinecure the outside world had been told,
endorsed Minky's story that what Suffering Creek really needed was
capital to reach the true wealth of the place. And, in the course of
the talk, drink flowed freely.

Bill was always supplied with his drink from a different bottle to
that out of which the strangers were served. As a matter of fact, he
was probably the most temperate man on Suffering Creek, and, by an
arrangement with Minky, so as not to spoil trade, drank from a bottle
of colored water when the necessity for refreshment arose. But just
now his manner suggested that he had drunk quite as much whisky as the
strangers. His spirits rose with theirs, and his jocularity and levity
matched theirs, step by step, as they went on talking.

The man Longley had spoken of the settlement as being "one-horsed,"
and Billy promptly agreed.

"It sure is," he cried. "We ain't got nothing but this yer canteen,
with ol' Minky doin' his best to pizen us. Still, we get along in a
ways. Mebbe we could do wi' a dancin'-hall--if we had females around.
Then I'd say a bank would be an elegant addition to things. Y'see, we
hev to ship our gold outside. Leastways, that's wot we used to do,
I've heard. Y'see, I ain't in the minin' business," he added, by way
of accounting for his lack of personal knowledge.

"Ah!" said Joe. "Maybe you're 'commercial'?"

Bill laughed so genially that the others joined in it.

"In a ways, mebbe I am. You see, I mostly sit around, an' when
anything promisin' comes along, why, I ain't above plankin' a few
dollars by way of--speculation."

Joe grinned broadly.

"A few shares in a poker hand, eh?" he suggested shrewdly.

"You're kind o' quick, mister," Bill laughed. "I'm stuck on 'draw'
some."

Then the talk drifted suddenly. It was Longley who presently harked
back to the commercial side of Suffering Creek.

"You was sayin' ther' wasn't no bank on Suffering Creek," he said
interestedly. "What do folks do with their dust now, then?"

A quick but almost imperceptible glance passed between Bill and the
storekeeper. And Bill's answer came at once.

"Wal, as I sed, we used to pass it out by stage. But--"

Longley caught him up just a shade too quickly.

"Yes--but?"

"Wal," drawled Bill thoughtfully, "y'see, we ain't shipped dust out
for some time on account of a gang that's settin' around waitin'. You
comin' from Spawn City'll likely have heard of this feller James an'
his gang. A most ter'ble tough is James. I'll allow he's got us mighty
nigh wher' he wants us--scairt to death. No, we ain't sent out no gold
stage lately, but we're goin' to right soon. We'll hev to. We've ast
for an escort o' Gover'ment troops, but I guess Sufferin' Creek ain't
on the map. The Gover'ment don't guess they've any call to worry."

"Then what you goin' to do?" inquired Longley, profoundly interested.

"Can't say. The stage'll hev to take its chances."

"An' when--" began Longley. But his comrade cut him short.

"Say, I'll allow the gold racket's mighty int'restin', but it makes me
tired this weather. You was speakin' 'draw'--"

"Sure," responded Bill amiably. "We're four here, if you fancy a hand.
Minky?"

The storekeeper nodded, and promptly produced cards and 'chips.' And
in five minutes the game was in progress. Used as he was to the
vagaries of his gambling friend, Minky was puzzled at the way he was
discussing Suffering Creek with these strangers. His talk about James
and the gold-stage was too rankly absurd for anything, and yet he knew
that some subtle purpose must be underlying his talk. However, it was
no time to question or contradict now, so he accepted the situation
and his share in the game.

And here again astonishment awaited him. Bill lost steadily, if not
heavily. He watched the men closely, but could discover none of the
known tricks common to the game when sharps are at work. They not only
seemed to be playing straight, but badly. They were not good poker
players. Yet they got the hands and won. For himself, he kept fairly
level. It was only Bill who lost.

And all through the game the gambler allowed himself to be drawn into
talking of Suffering Creek by the interested Longley, until it would
have been obvious to the veriest greenhorn that the stranger was
pumping him.

The newcomers seemed to be enjoying themselves enormously, and the
greatest good-will prevailed. Nor was it until nearly supper-time that
Bill suddenly stood up and declared he had had enough. He was a loser
to the extent of nearly a hundred dollars.

So the party broke up. And at Minky's suggestion the men departed to
put their horses in the barn, while they partook of supper under his
roof. It was the moment they had gone that the storekeeper turned on
his friend.

"Say, I ain't got you, Bill. Wot's your game?" he demanded, with some
asperity.

But the gambler was quite undisturbed by his annoyance. He only
chuckled.

"Say," he countered, "ever heerd tell of Swanny Long, the biggest
tough in Idaho?"

"Sure. But--"

"That's him--that feller Sim Longley."

The storekeeper stared.

"You sure?"

"Sure? Gee! I was after him fer nigh three--Say," he broke off--it was
not his way to indulge in reminiscence--"I guess he's workin' with
James." Then he laughed. "Gee! I allow he was rigged elegant--most
like some Bible-smashin' sky-pilot."

Minky was still laboring hard to understand.

"But all that yarn of the gold-stage?" he said sharply.

"That?" Bill at once became serious. "Wal, that's pretty near right.
You ain't yearnin' fer that gang to come snoopin' around Suffering
Creek. So I'm guessin' we'll hev to pass a gold-stage out o' her some
time."

"You're mad," cried Minky in consternation.

"That's as may be," retorted Bill, quite unruffled. "Anyways, I guess
I spent a hundred dollars in a mighty good deal this day--if it was
rotten bad poker."

And he turned away to talk to Slade of Kentucky, who entered the store
at that moment with his friend O'Brien.

CHAPTER XII

THE WOMAN

The woman turned from the window at the sound of footsteps somewhere
behind her. That was her way now. She started at each fresh sound that
suggested anyone approaching. Her nerves were on edge for some reason
she could never have put into words. She did not fear, yet a curious
nervousness was hers which made her listen acutely at every footstep,
and breathe her relief if the sound died away without further
intrusion upon her privacy.

Presently she turned back to the window with just such relief. The
footstep had passed. She drew her feet up into the ample seat of the
rocking-chair, and, with her elbow resting upon its arm, heavily
pressed her chin into the palm of her hand, and again stared at the
rampart of mountains beyond.

Nor had all the beauties spread out before her yearning gaze the least
appeal for her. How should they? Her thoughts were roaming in a world
of her own, and her eyes were occupied in gazing upon her woman's
pictures as she saw them in her mind. The wonders of that scene of
natural splendor laid out before her had no power to penetrate the
armor of her preoccupation. All her mind and heart were stirred and
torn by emotions such as only a woman can understand, only a woman can
feel. The ancient battle of titanic forces, which had brought into
existence that world of stupendous might upon which her unseeing eyes
gazed, was as nothing, it seemed, to the passionate struggle going on
in her torn heart. To her there was nothing beyond her own regretful
misery, her own dread of the future, her passionate revulsion at
thoughts of the past.

The truth was, she had not yet found the happiness she had promised
herself, that had been promised to her. She had left behind her all
that life which, when it had been hers, she had hated. Her passionate
nature had drawn her whither its stormy waves listed. And now that the
tempest was passed, and the driving forces had ceased to urge, leaving
her in a rock-bound pool of reflection, she saw the enormity of the
step she had taken, she realized the strength of Nature's tendrils
which still bound her no less surely.

The mild face of Scipio haunted her. She saw in her remorseful fancy
his wondering blue eyes filled with the stricken look of a man
powerless to resent, powerless to resist. She read into her thought
the feelings of his simple heart which she had so wantonly crushed.
For she knew his love as only a woman can. She had probed its depth
and found it fathomless--fathomless in its devotion to herself. And
now she had thrown him and his love, the great legitimate love of the
father of her children, headlong out of her life.

A dozen times she bolstered her actions with the assurance that she
did not want his love, that he was not the man she had ever cared
for seriously, could ever care for. She told herself that the
insignificance of his character, his personality, were beneath
contempt. She desired a man of strength for her partner, a man who
could make himself of some account in the world which was theirs.

No, she did not want Scipio. He was useless in the scheme of life, and
she did not wish to have to "mother" her husband. Far rather would she
be the slave of a man whose ruthless domination extended even to
herself. And yet Scipio's mild eyes haunted her, and stirred something
in her heart that maddened her, and robbed her of all satisfaction in
the step she had taken.

But this was only a small part of the cause of her present mood. She
had not at first had the vaguest understanding of the bonds which
really fettered her, holding her fast to the life that had been hers
for so long. Now she knew. And the knowledge brought with it its
bitter cost. Some forewarning had been hers when she appealed to her
lover for the possession of her children. But although her mother's
instinct had been stirred to alarm at parting, she had not, at that
time, experienced the real horror of what she was doing in abandoning
her children.

She was inconsolable now. With all her mind and heart she was crying
out for the warm, moist pressure of infant lips. Her whole body
yearned for those who were flesh of her flesh, for the gentle beating
hearts to which her body had given life. They were hers--hers, and of
her own action she had put them out of her life. They were hers, and
she was maddened at the thought that she had left them to another.
They were hers, and--yes, she must have them. Whatever happened, they
must be restored to her. Life would be intolerable without them.

She was in a wholly unreasoning state of mind. All the mother in her
was uppermost, craving, yearning, panting for her own. For the time,
at least, all else was lost in an overwhelming regret, and such a
power of love for her offspring, that she had no room for the man who
had brought about the separation.

She was a selfish woman, and had always craved for the best that life
could give her, but now that her mother-love was truly roused her
selfishness knew no bounds. She had no thought for anybody, no
consideration. She could have none until her desire was satisfied.

Her tortured heart grew angry against Scipio. She was driven to fury
against James. What mattered it that her lover had so far fulfilled
all his other promises to her, if he did not procure the children and
return them to her arms? What mattered it that she was surrounded
with luxury uncommon on the prairie, a luxury she had not known for so
many years?

She had her own rooms, where no one intruded without her consent. The
spacious house had been ransacked to make them all that she could
desire. All the outlaw's associates were herded into the background,
lest their presence should offend her. Even James himself had
refrained from forcing his attentions upon her, lest, in the first
rush of feeling at her breaking with the old life, they should be
unwelcome. His patience and restraint were wonderful in a man of his
peculiar savagery. And surely it pointed his love for her. Had it been
simply the momentary passion of an untamed nature, he would have
waited for nothing, when once she had become his possession.

It was a curious anachronism that she should be the mistress of the
situation with such a man as James. Yet so far she was mistress of the
situation. The question was, how long would she remain so? It is
possible that she had no understanding of this at first. It is
possible that she would have resented such a question, had it occurred
to her when she first consented to break away from her old life.

But now it was different. Now that she began to understand all she had
flung away for this man, when the mother in her was at last fully
aroused, and all her wits were driven headlong to discover a way by
which to satisfy her all-consuming desire for her children, now the
native cunning of the woman asserted itself. She saw in one revealing
flash her position, she saw where lay her power at the moment, and she
clung to it desperately, determined to play the man while she could to
gain her ends.

Thus it was she was nervous, apprehensive, every time she thought it
likely that her lover was about to visit her. She dreaded what might
transpire. She dreaded lest her power should be weakened before she
had accomplished her end. It was difficult; it was nerve-racking. She
must keep his love at fever-heat. It was her one chance.

Again she started. It was the sound of a fresh footstep beyond the
door. She glanced at the door with half-startled eyes and sat
listening. Then her lips closed decidedly and a look of purpose crept
into her eyes. A moment later she stood up. She was pale, but full of
purpose.

"Is that you, Jim?" she called.

"Sure," came the ready response.

The next instant the door was flung open and the man came in.

His bronzed face was smiling, and the savage in him was hidden deep
down out of sight. His handsome face was good to look upon, and as the
woman's eyes surveyed his carefully clad slim figure she felt a thrill
of triumph at the thought that he was hers at the raising of her
finger.

But she faced him without any responsive smile. She had summoned him
with a very definite purpose in her mind, and no display of anything
that could be interpreted into weakness must be made.

"I want to talk to you," she said, pointing at the rocking-chair she
had just vacated.

James glanced at the chair. Then his eyes turned back to her with a
question in them. Finally he shrugged his shoulders and flung himself
into the seat, and stretched out his long legs luxuriously.

Apparently Jessie had not noticed the shrug. It would have been better
had she done so. She might then have understood more fully the man she
was dealing with. However, she turned to the window and spoke with her
back to him.

"It's about--things," she said a little lamely.

The man's smile was something ironical, as his eyes greedily devoured
the beauty of her figure.

"I'm glad," he said in a non-committing way. Then, as no reply was
immediately forthcoming, he added, "Get going."

But Jessie made no answer. She was thinking hard, and somehow her
thoughts had an uneasy confusion in them. She was trying hard to find
the best way to begin that which she had to say, but every opening
seemed inadequate. She must not appeal, she must not dictate. She must
adopt some middle course. These things she felt instinctively.

The man shifted his position and glanced round the room.

"Kind of snug here," he said pleasantly, running his eyes appreciatively
over the simple decorations, the cheap bric-à-brac which lined the
walls and, in a world where all decoration was chiefly conspicuous
by its absence, gave to the place a suggestion of richness. The red
pine walls looked warm, and the carpeted floor was so unusual as to
give one a feeling of extraordinary refinement. Then, too, the chairs,
scattered about, spoke of a strain after civilized luxury. The whole
ranch-house had been turned inside out to make Jessie's quarters all
she could desire them.

"Yes," he muttered, "it's sure snug." Then his eyes came back to the
woman. "Maybe there's something I've forgotten. Guess you've just got
to fix a name to it."

Jessie turned instantly. Her beautiful eyes were shining with a sudden
hope, but her face was pale with a hardly controlled emotion.

"That's easy," she said. "I want my children. I want little Vada. I--I
must have her. You promised I should. If you hadn't, I should never
have left. I must have her." She spoke breathlessly, and broke off
with a sort of nervous jolt.

In the pause that followed James' expression underwent a subtle
change. It was not that there was any definite movement of a single
muscle. His smile remained, but, somehow, through it peeped a hard
look which had not been there before.

"So you want--the kids," he said at last, and a curious metallic
quality was in his voice. "Say," he added thoughtfully, "you women are
queer ones."

"Maybe we are," retorted Jessie. She tried to laugh as she spoke, but
it was a dismal failure. Then she hurried on. "Yes," she cried a
little shrilly, "it was part of our bargain, and--so far you have not
carried it out."

"Bargain?" The man's brows went up.

"Yes, bargain."

"I don't remember a--bargain." James' eyes had in them an ominous
glitter.

"Then you've got a bad memory."

"I sure haven't, Jess. I sure haven't that. I generally remember good.
And what I remember now is that I promised you those kids if you
needed them. I swore that you should have 'em. But I made no bargain.
Guess women don't see things dead right. This is the first time you've
spoken to me of this, and you say I haven't fulfilled my bargain. When
I refuse to give you them kiddies, it's time to take that tone. You
want them kids. Well--go on."

The change in her lover's manner warned Jessie that danger lay ahead.
In the brief time she had spent under his roof she had already learned
that, as yet, she had only seen the gentlest side of the man, and that
the other side was always perilously near the surface.

In the beginning this had been rather a delight to her to think that
she, of all people, was privileged to bask in the sunny side of a man
who habitually displayed the storm clouds of his fiercer side to the
world in general. But since that time a change, which she neither knew
nor understood, had come over her, and, instead of rejoicing that he
possessed that harsher nature, she rather feared it, feared that it
might be turned upon her.

It was this change that had helped to bring her woman's cunning into
play. It was this change which had brought her her haunting visions of
the old life. It was this change which had prompted her that she must
keep her lover at arm's length--as yet. It was this change, had she
paused to analyze it, which might have told her of the hideous mistake
she had made. That the passion which she had believed to be an
absorbing love for the man was merely a passion, a base human passion,
inspired in a weak, discontented woman. But as yet she understood
nothing of this. The glamour of the man's personality still had power
to sway her, and she acknowledged it in her next words.

"Don't be angry, Jim dear," she said, with a smile of seductive
sweetness which had immediate effect upon the man. "You don't
understand us women. We're sure unreasonable where our love is
concerned."

Then a flush spread itself slowly over her handsome face, and passion
lit her eyes.

"But I must have my children," she broke out suddenly. "One of them,
anyhow--little Vada. You--you can't understand all it means to be away
from them. They are mine. They are part of me. I--I feel I could kill
anyone who keeps them from me. You promised, Jim, you sure did. Get
her for me. My little girl--my little Vada."

The man had risen from his chair and moved to the window. He sat on
the rough sill facing her. His eyes were hot with passion, too, but it
was passion of a very different sort.

"And if I do?" he questioned subtly.

"If you do?" Jessie's eyes widened with a world of cunning simplicity.

"Yes, if I do?" The man's face was nearer.

"You'll have fulfilled your promise."

Jessie had turned again to the window, and her eyes were cold.

The man's brows drew together sharply, and his dark eyes watched the
perfect outline of her oval cheek. Then he drew a sharp breath, and
biting words leapt to his lips. But he held them back with a sudden
grip that was perilously near breaking. Jessie's power was still
enormous with him. But this very power was maddening to a man of his
nature, and the two must not come into too frequent conflict.

He suddenly laughed, and the woman turned in alarm at the note that
sounded in it.

"Yes," he said tensely. "I'll fulfill my promise. It'll amuse me,
sure, getting back at that Sufferin' Creek lay-out. I owe them
something for keepin' back the gold-stages. You shall have Vada,
sure."

He broke off for an instant and drew nearer. He leant forward, and
one arm reached out to encircle her waist. But with an almost
imperceptible movement the woman stood beyond his reach.

"And--and after?" he questioned, his arm still outstretched to embrace
her.

The woman made no answer.

"And after?"

There was a hot glow in his tone. He waited. Then he went on.

"Then I'll have done everything," he said--"all that a man can do to
make you happy. I'll have fulfilled all my promises. I'll--And you?"
he went on, coming close up to her.

This time she did not repulse him. Instinct told her that she must
not. Before all things she wanted Vada. So his arms closed about her,
and a shower of hot, passionate kisses fell upon her face, her hair,
her lips.

At last she pushed him gently away. For the moment all the old passion
had been stirred, but now, as she released herself, an odd shiver
passed through her body, and a great relief came to her as she stood
out of his reach. It was the first real, definite feeling of
repulsion she had had, and as she realized it a sudden fear gripped
her heart, and she longed to rush from his presence. But, even so, she
did not fully understand the change that was taking place in her. Her
predominating thought was for the possession of little Vada, and she
urged him with all the intensity of her longing.

"You'll get her for me?" she cried, with an excitement that
transfigured her. "You will. Oh, Jim, I can never thank you
sufficiently. You are good to me. And when will you get her--now? Oh,
Jim, don't wait. You must do it now. I want her so badly. I wonder how
you'll do it. Will you take her? Or will you ask Zip for her? I--I
believe he would give her up. He's such a queer fellow. I believe he'd
do anything I asked him. I sure do. How are you going to get her?"

The man was watching her with all the fire of his love in his eyes. It
was a greedy, devouring gaze of which Jessie must have been aware had
she only been thinking less of her child. Nor did he answer at once.
Then slowly the passionate light died out of his eyes, and they became
thoughtful.

"Tell me," the woman urged him.

Suddenly he looked into her face with a cruel grin.

"Sit down, Jess," he said sharply, "and write a letter to Zip asking
him, in your best lingo, to let you have your kid. An' when you done
that I'll see he gets it, an'--I'll see you get the kid. But make the
letter good an' hot. Pile up the agony biz. I'll fix the rest."

For a moment the woman looked into his face, now lit with such a cruel
grin. Something in her heart gave her pause. Somehow she felt that
what she was called upon to do was intended to hurt Zip in some subtle
way, and the thought was not pleasant. She didn't want to hurt Zip.
She tried in those few seconds to probe this man's purpose. But her
mind was not equal to the task. Surely a letter appealing to Zip
could not really hurt him. And she wanted little Vada so much. It was
this last thought that decided her. No, nothing should stand in her
way. She steeled her heart against her better feelings, but with some
misgivings, and sat down to write.

James watched her. She procured paper and pen, and he watched her
bending over the table. No detail of her face and figure escaped his
greedy eyes. She was very beautiful, so beautiful to him that he
stirred restlessly, chafing irritably under the restraint he was
putting upon himself. Again and again he asked himself why he was fool
enough to do as he was doing. She was his. There was no one to stop
him, no one but--her.

Ah! There was the trouble. Such was the man's temper that nothing
could satisfy him that gave him no difficulty of attaining. His was
the appetite of an epicure in all things. Everything in its way must
be of the best, and to be of the best to him it must be the most
difficult of achievement.

He waited with what patience he could until the letter was written.
Then he watched Jessie seal and address it. Then she rose and stood
staring down at the cruel missive. She knew it was cruel now, for,
trading on the knowledge of the man who was to receive it, she had
appealed through the channel of her woman's weakness to all that great
spirit which she knew to abide in her little husband's heart.

James understood something of what was passing in her mind. And it
pleased him to think of what he had forced her to do--pleased him as
cruelty ever pleases the truly vicious.

At last she held the missive out to him.

"There it is," she said. And as his hand closed upon it her own was
drawn sharply away, as though to avoid contact with his.

"Good," he said, with a peculiar grin.

For a moment the silence remained unbroken. Then the woman raised
appealing eyes to his face.

"You won't hurt Zip?" she said in a voice that would surely have
heartened the object of her solicitude had he heard it.

The man shook his head. His jaws were set, and his smile was
unpleasing.

"Guess any hurtin' Zip gets'll be done by you."

"Ah, no, no!"

The woman reached out wildly for the letter, but James had passed
swiftly out of the room.

CHAPTER XIII

BIRDIE AND THE BOYS

The derelicts of a mining camp must ever be interesting to the student
of human nature, so wide is the field for study. But it were better to
be a student, simply, when probing amongst the refuse heaps of life's
débris. A sentimentalist, a man of heart, would quickly have it broken
with the pity of it all. A city's tragedies often require search to
reveal them, but upon the frontier tragedy stalks unsepulchered in the
background of nearly every life, ready to leap out in all its naked
horror and settle itself leech-like upon the sympathetic heart,
stifling it with the burden of its misery.

No, it is not good to delve into the dark pages of such folks' lives
too closely, unless armored with impenetrable callousness. But one
cannot help wondering whence all those living tragedies come. Look at
the men. For the most part strong, able creatures, apparently capable
of fighting the lusty battle of life with undiminished ardor. Look at
the women. They are for the most part thinking women, healthy,
capable. And yet--well, nine-tenths of them are not so cut off from
their home cities, their friends and relatives, without some more than
ordinary reason.

It is a sad sight to see the women plunged headlong into the fight for
existence in such places, to witness the cruel iron thrust upon them
its searing brand, to watch all the natural softness of their sex
harden to the necessary degree for a successful issue to the battle,
to witness their frequent unsexing and ultimate degradation. Such
results are common enough when a woman enters the lists. It is so
often a mere question of time. And when the end is achieved, how
awful, how revolting, but how natural.

How Birdie Mason came to find herself the one woman on Suffering
Creek--leaving out the later advent of Scipio's wife--it is not for us
to ask. Whatever her little tragedy it is hers alone, and does not
concern us. All that we need think of is her future, and the pity that
so well-favored a woman has not found her lot cast in places where her
womanhood has its best chances. However, she is there, living the life
of all such hired "helps," drudging from morning till night in one
long round of sordid labor, in an atmosphere stinking with the fetid
breath of debased humanity.

But as yet the life has made no inroads upon her moral health. Her
sunny good nature sets her singing over the most grinding labors. Her
smiling face, and ready tongue, give her an air of happiness and joy
of life which seems well-nigh invincible. And her popularity contrives
her many thrilling moments and advantages which she is too much a
woman and a child to deny herself.

Her day's work ends with the after supper "wash up," a dreary routine
which might well crush the most ardent spirit. Yet she bends over her
tubs full of crockery dreaming her sunny dreams, building her little
castles to the clink of enameled tin cups, weaving her romances to the
clatter of cutlery, smiling upon the mentally conjured faces of her
boys amidst the steaming odors of greasy, lukewarm water. The one blot
upon her existence is perhaps the Chinese cook, with whom she has
perforce to associate. She dislikes him for no other reason than that
he is a "yaller-faced doper that ought to been set to herd with a
menagerie of measly skunks." But even this annoyance cannot seriously
damp her buoyancy, and, with wonderful feminine philosophy, she puts
him out of her mind as a "no account feller, anyway."

She was putting the finishing touches to the long dining-table, making
it ready for the next day's breakfast. It was not an elaborate
preparation. She "dumped" a box of knives and forks at each end of it,
and then proceeded to chase any odd bits of débris from the last meal
on to the floor with a duster. Then, with a hand-broom and pan, she
took these up and with them any other rubbish that might be lying
about. Finally, she set jugs of drinking water at intervals down the
center of the table, and her work was done.

She looked about her, patting her fair hair with that eminently
feminine touch which is to be seen in every woman from the millionaire's
wife down to the poorest emigrant. Then, with less delicacy, she
lifted her apron and wiped the moisture from her round young face.

"Guess that's 'most everything," she murmured, her eyes brightening at
the contemplation of her completed task. "I'll just cut out them--"

She went to a cupboard and drew out a parcel of white lawn and paper
patterns, which she carefully spread out on the table. And, in a few
moments, she was bending absorbedly over the stuff, lost in the
intricacies of hewing out an embryonic garment for her personal
adornment.

It was at this task that Toby Jenks found her. He was worried to death
at the thought that, as a member of the newly formed Zip Trust, it was
his duty to gather information concerning the management of children.
However, in the midst of his trouble he hit on the brilliant idea of
consulting the only woman of his acquaintance.

Toby wanted to do something startling in the interests of the Trust.
He felt that his membership had been conferred in a rather grudging
spirit. And, to his mildly resentful way of thinking, it seemed it
would be a good thing if he could surprise his friends with the
excellence of his services in the general interests of the concern.

Birdie heard the door open, and raised a pair of startled eyes at the
intruder. It was not that such visits were out of order, or even
uncommon, but they generally occurred after pre-arrangement, which
gave her the opportunity of "fixing herself right."

With a wild grab she scrambled her material, and the pattern, so that
its identification would be quite impossible to male eyes, and hugged
it in her arms. Turning swiftly she thrust it into the cupboard, and
slammed the door. But she had no resentment at the interruption. Toby
was quite a new visitor, and, well--the more the merrier.

She turned to him all smiles, and Toby returned her welcome something
sheepishly. He cut a quaint figure with his broad, ungainly shoulders
supporting his rather pumpkin face. Then his arms were a little too
long and terminated in two "leg-of-mutton" hands.

"Evenin', Birdie," he said bashfully. "Guess you were sewin'?"

"Guess again," cried the girl readily, her eyes dancing at the
contemplation of a few moments' badinage with a new candidate for her
favors.

"Well, you wa'an't playin' the pianner."

But Birdie was quite equal to the best efforts of her candidates.

"My, but ain't you slick?" she cried, allowing her smiling gaze to
remain looking straight into his face in a way she knew never failed
to confuse her admirers on Suffering Creek. She watched till the
sturdy man's eyes turned away, and knew that he was groping for an
adequate retort. This effect was the result of practice with her, a
practice she thoroughly enjoyed.

The "leg-of-mutton" hands fumbled their way into the tops of Toby's
trousers, and, with a sudden self-assertion, which fitted him badly,
he lurched over to the table, beyond which Birdie was standing. It was
his intention to seat himself thereon, but his tormentor had not yet
reached the point where she could allow such intimacy.

"Say, I ain't ast you to sit around," she said, with an alluring pout.
"Men-folk don't sit around in a lady's' parlor till they're ast.
'Sides, the table's fixed fer breakfast. And anyway it ain't for
settin' on."

Toby moved away quickly, his attempt at ease deserting him with
ludicrous suddenness. At sight of his blushing face Birdie relaxed her
austerity.

"Say, ain't you soft?" she declared, with a demure lowering of her
lids. "I've allus heerd say, you only got to tell a feller don't, an'
he sure does it quick. Men-folk is that contrary. Now--"

The encouragement brought its reward. Toby promptly sat himself on the
table and set it creaking.

"Well, I do declare!" cried Birdie, in pretended indignation. "And I
never ast you, neither. I don't know, I'm sure. Some folks has
nerve."

But this time Toby was not to be intimidated. Perhaps it was the
girl's bright smile. Perhaps, with marvelous inspiration, he saw
through her flirtatious methods. Anyway, he remained where he was,
grinning sheepishly up into her face.

"Guess you best push me off. I ain't heavy," he dared her clumsily.

"I sure wouldn't demean myself that way," she retorted. "Gee, me
settin' hands on a feller like you. It would need a prize-fighter."

The acknowledgment of his size and strength was a subtle tribute which
pleased the man, as it was intended to. He preened himself and drew
his knees up into his arms, in an attitude intended to be one of
perfect ease and to show his confidence.

"I sure ain't much of a feller for strength," he said modestly, eyeing
his enormous arms and hands affectionately. "You ought to see Wild
Bill. He--he could eat me, an' never worry his digestion."

Birdie laughed happily. She was always ready to laugh at a man's
attempt at humor. That was her way.

"You are a queer one," she said, seating herself on the opposite edge
of the table, so that she was sufficiently adjacent, and at the
requisite angle at which to carry on her flirtation satisfactorily.
"Say," she went on, with a down drooping of her eyelids, "why ain't
you in there playin' poker? Guess you're missin' heaps o' fun. I wish
I was a 'boy.' I wouldn't miss such fun by sitting around in here."

"Wouldn't you?" Toby grinned, while his brains struggled to find a
happy reply. "Well, you see," he hazarded at last, "poker an' whisky
ain't to be compared to talkin' to a dandy fine gal with yaller hair
an' elegant blue eyes."

He passed one of his great hands across his forehead as though his
attempt had made him perspire. But he had his reward. Birdie contrived
a blush of pleasure, and edged a little nearer to him.

"Gee, you can talk pretty," she declared, her lips parted in an
admiring smile. "It makes me kind o' wonder how you fellers learn it."
Then she added demurely, "But I ain't pretty, nor nothing like you
fellers try to make out. I'm jest an ord'nary sort of girl."