"We may as well stay here now," Rexhill said, when the two young people had left the room. "When did all this happen?"

"I just got word of it," Moran answered, a bit excitedly. "Don't you see how it plays right into our hands? It's the greatest thing that could have happened for us. It might have been made to order."

"Are you sure it wasn't? Are you sure you didn't have the man shot, Race?" Senator Rexhill's tone was very dry and he watched his companion keenly as he asked the question.

Moran a.s.sumed an att.i.tude of indignation.

"Why, Senator...!"

"Tush! I want to know where we stand. By G.o.d, Race, you mustn't go too far! We're traveling mighty close to the wind as it is."

"But these brawls are likely to happen at any time. This one in particular has been brewing for weeks. Why connect me with it, unnecessarily?"

"All right. I see your point, of course. The a.s.sa.s.sin is unknown; suspicion naturally falls upon Wade, who is at the head of the cattle faction and who, as you say, threatened Jensen only this morning. If we can jail him for awhile his party is likely to fall down."

"Exactly!" Moran cried eagerly. "Fortune has placed him right in our hands."

"Well, I'm not going to have him arrested," Rexhill announced doggedly, "at least, not on any trumped up charge. He's broken my bread, Helen likes him. We call him a friend, in fact. I always play square with my friends--as far as possible. Strategy is strategy, n.o.body can quarrel with that; but this thing you propose is something more."

Moran, while listening, had restrained his impatience with difficulty.

He not only had reason on his side, but personal hate as well. His sense of triumph in bringing the news to Rexhill had not been for their mutual cause alone; it had seemed to Moran to point toward the end of his rivalry with Wade for the love of Helen. To have the fruits of victory s.n.a.t.c.hed from him, because of a sentiment of friendship, was almost more than the agent could stand for.

"Good G.o.d, Senator," he burst out, "don't throw this chance away! Think what it means to us! We are running close to the wind, and until this moment, it's been a toss up whether we'd get out of here with our lives; whether I would, at any rate. I've run a mighty big bluff on these cattle people, but I did it because it was the only way. I've held my own so far, but when they find out that it's not farm land we're after, but ore--why, Senator, there'll be no holding them at all! With Wade at their head and forty miles between us and the cars, where would we get off? We'd be lucky if we didn't swing from the limb of a tree. Do you suppose Wade would remember then that he'd broken your bread? I'll bet dollars to doughnuts he wouldn't.

"But"--his voice sank to a significant whisper--"if we land him in jail...."

"His friends here would get him out," interposed the Senator, nervously wiping his gla.s.ses.

"Then Uncle Sam would put him in again, with a troop of cavalry to keep order here, and _that_ would be another advantage gained for our side.

No, sir, once we get him in jail, we've got the law with us and against him, don't forget that. Then the cattle party would lay mighty low. Wade has been their leader right along. I tell you, it's the only way, and you know what it means to us--to you."

"You don't have to tell me that," rasped Rexhill. "If we fail to put this through, I'm a ruined man."

Moran's eyes gleamed.

"Well, then, it's the only way, unless--unless...."

"Unless what?"

"Unless your daughter marries him, and it all comes into the family."

Upon that point, Moran wished to know just where he stood.

"I've never made a dollar through my daughter yet, and I never will,"

said the Senator grimly. "I'm not selling my own flesh and blood. I'll rot in the poor-house first."

Moran gently breathed his relief. He would have fought to the fullest extent of his power to have aborted such a marriage, but if the Senator had favored it, he knew that it would have been difficult to prevent.

"Wade has a foreman he's mighty fond of, an old man named Santry," the agent remarked, trying another tack.

"That's a horse of another color." Rexhill appeared aroused, at last. "I remember the old fellow. He must be nearly ready for the bone yard by this time anyhow. Saddle it on him, if you can. Wade's devoted to him.

He'd do as much for Santry as for himself, maybe more."

"I've heard about that kind of devotion," the agent sneered, "but I've yet to see a sample of it."

"Well, you may before long. Your first proposition's no good anyway. It would simply further antagonize Wade's friends. It's quite possible, though, that Santry might have been mixed up in such a brawl. Get him arrested, and then we'll let Wade know, gradually, that our influence is at his command, for a price. I've no objection to that--none at all. By Heaven, we've got to do something."

"We'll do it all right. I'll have a warrant sworn out."

"Meanwhile, Race, go easy with those sheep. Wade was telling me about them, and as a matter of strategy, I had to pretend that I would help him. Move them across the Divide until we see what comes of this Santry affair. I can't go too heavy with the boy right at the start."

"All right." Moran arose. "The sheep don't count much now anyway."

"I don't mind saying, Race," Senator Rexhill observed, a trifle pompously, "that you've done pretty well so far. If you stick to it, you'll not find me ungrateful when the battle is over. You'll be ent.i.tled to your reward."

Moran hesitated, seeming to summon courage to say something.

"Maybe you've guessed the reward I'll ask, Senator," he said slowly.

"There are some things that mean more to a man than mere money. I'm thinking of Miss Helen."

Rexhill found some difficulty in placing his gaze so that it would appear to naturally fall elsewhere than on Moran. He was mortified by a sense of shame that he could not deal squarely with this aspirant for his daughter's hand. He had been sincere in saying that he would never barter her to further his own interests, but so much hung in the balance here that until the issue really arose he feared to pa.s.s upon it. He felt himself stultified by this truth.

"I haven't spoken to her, Senator, because the time has not come, and just now she's too much occupied elsewhere, perhaps. But all my hopes are fixed on her, sir, and when the time does come, I trust you'll not oppose them."

Rexhill coughed to hide what his face might otherwise have shown.

"Well, Race," he said, with a choking sensation that was new to him, "you know what I think of you. As for the rest, well, that will depend entirely upon Helen."

CHAPTER VI

MURDER

"How do you think you'd like to live in Crawling Water?"

Wade looked whimsically at Helen, as she picked her way with the grace of a kitten through the dust of the main street. Carefully though she walked, her shoes and the bottom of her skirt were covered with dust, and gray with it.

"I shouldn't like it," she said, with a little moue. "I don't see why you stay here. You aren't going to always, are you?"

"I reckon it's likely."

"Not--for always?" She had stopped and was looking up into his face with delicious dismay. "That would be awful."

"Most of my friends, and all of my business interests are here. Besides, I have a kind of pride in growing up with this country. Back in the East, things have been settled for so long that a man's only a cog in a machine. Out here, a fellow has a sense of ownership, even in the hills.

I think it's because he gets closer to the soil, until he comes to love it and to be almost a part of it."