The girl smiled.

"If I could tell you that, I wouldn't have to see her."

He rubbed his chin with his knuckles, staring at the floor of the veranda, and now and then raising quick glances at her. Plainly he was suspicious. Plainly, also, he was tempted in some manner.

"Something he's done, eh? Some yarn about Terry?"

It was quite plain that this man actually wanted her to have something unpleasant to say about Terry. Instantly she suited herself to his mood; for he was the door through which she must pa.s.s to see Elizabeth Cornish.

"Bad?" she said, hardening her expression as much as possible. "Well, bad enough. A killing to begin with."

There was a gleam in his eyes--a gleam of positive joy, she was sure, though he banished it at once and shook his head in deprecation.

"Well, well! As bad as that? I suppose you may see my sister. For a moment. Just a moment. She is not well. I wish I could understand your purpose!"

The last was more to himself than to her. But she was already off her horse. The man with the blueprint glared at her, and she pa.s.sed across the veranda and into the house, where Vance showed her up the big stairs.

At the door of his sister's room he paused again and scrutinized.

"A killing--by Jove!" he murmured to himself, and then knocked.

A dull voice called from within, and he opened. Kate found herself in a big, solemn room, in one corner of which sat an old woman wrapped to the chin in a shawl. The face was thin and bleak, and the eyes that looked at Kate were dull.

"This girl--" said Vance. "By Jove, I haven't asked your name, I'm afraid."

"Kate Pollard."

"Miss Pollard has some news of Terry. I thought it might--interest you, Elizabeth."

Kate saw the brief struggle on the face of the old woman. When it pa.s.sed, her eyes were as dull as ever, but her voice had become husky.

"I'm surprised, Vance. I thought you understood--his name is not to be spoken, if you please."

"Of course not. Yet I thought--never mind. If you'll step downstairs with me, Miss Pollard, and tell me what--"

"Not a step," answered the girl firmly, and she had not moved her eyes from the face of the elder woman. "Not a step with you. What I have to say has got to be told to someone who loves Terry Hollis. I've found that someone. I stick here till I've done talking."

Vance Cornish gasped. But Elizabeth opened her eyes, and they brightened--but coldly, it seemed to Kate.

"I think I understand," said Elizabeth Cornish gravely. "He has entangled the interest of this poor girl--and sent her to plead for him. Is that so? If it's money he wants, let her have what she asks for, Vance. But I can't talk to her of the boy."

"Very well," said Vance, without enthusiasm. He stepped before her. "Will you step this way, Miss Pollard?"

"Not a step," she repeated, and deliberately sat down in a chair. "You'd better leave," she told Vance.

He considered her in open anger. "If you've come to make a scene, I'll have to let you know that on account of my sister I cannot endure it.

Really--" "I'm going to stay here," she echoed, "until I've done talking.

I've found the right person. I know that. Tell you what I want? Why, you hate Terry Hollis!"

"Hate--him?" murmured Elizabeth.

"Nonsense!" cried Vance.

"Look at his face, Miss Cornish," said the girl.

"Vance, by everything that's sacred, your eyes were positively shrinking.

Do you hate--him?"

"My dear Elizabeth, if this unknown--"

"You'd better leave," interrupted the girl. "Miss Cornish is going to hear me talk."

Before he could answer, his sister said calmly: "I think I shall, Vance.

I begin to be intrigued."

"In the first place," he blurted angrily, "it's something you shouldn't hear--some talk about a murder--"

Elizabeth sank back in her chair and closed her eyes.

"Ah, coward!" cried Kate Pollard, now on her feet.

"Vance, will you leave me for a moment?"

For a moment he was white with malice, staring at the girl, then suddenly submitting to the inevitable, turned on his heel and left the room.

"Now," said Elizabeth, sitting erect again, "what is it? Why do you insist on talking to me of--him? And--what has he done?"

In spite of her calm, a quiver of emotion was behind the last words, and nothing of it escaped Kate Pollard.

"I knew," she said gently, "that _two_ people couldn't live with Terry for twenty-four years and both hate him, as your brother does. I can tell you very quickly why I'm here, Miss Cornish."

"But first--what has he done?"

Kate hesitated. Under the iron self-control of the older woman she saw the hungry heart, and it stirred her. Yet she was by no means sure of a triumph. She recognized the most formidable of all foes--pride. After all, she wanted to humble that pride. She felt that all the danger in which Terry Hollis now stood, both moral and physical, was indirectly the result of this woman's att.i.tude. And she struck her, deliberately cruelly.

"He's taken up with a gang of hard ones, Miss Cornish. That's one thing."

The face of Elizabeth was like stone.

"Professional--thieves, robbers!"

And still Elizabeth refused to wince. She forced a cold, polite smile of attention.

"He went into a town and killed the best fighter they had."

And even this blow did not tell.

"And then he defied the sheriff, went back to the town, and broke into a bank and stole fifty thousand dollars."