elise came back with a crash.

"Mrs. Morrison!" She did not speak the words, she shrank from them and left them hanging in their self-polluted atmosphere. "Learn me!" The words were vibrant with a low-pitched hum, that smote and bored like the impact of an electric wave. "You--you--snake; you--how dare you!"

Morrison did not flinch. The blind fury of a dared beast flamed in his eyes.

"Dare, you vixen! I'll make you, or break you! I've been in too many sc.r.a.ps and smelled too much powder to get scared by a hen that's trying to crow."

The animal was dominant in elise. Fury personified flew at Morrison.

"You'll teach me; will you? I'll teach you the difference between a hen and a wild cat."

The door from the kitchen was opened and Madame came in. She flung herself between elise and Morrison. The repressed timorous love of years flamed upon the thin cheeks, flashed from the faded eyes. There was no trace of fear. Her slight form fairly shook with the intensity of her pa.s.sion.

"Go! Go! Go!" The last was uttered in a voice little less than a shriek.

"Don't you touch elise. She is mine. Why don't you go?"

Her trembling hands pushed Morrison toward the open door. Bewildered, staggered, cowed, he slunk from the room. Madame closed the door. She turned toward elise. The pa.s.sion had receded, only the patient pleading was in her eyes.

The next instant she saw nothing. Her head was crushed upon elise's shoulder, the clasping arms caressed and bound, and hot cheeks were pressed against her own. Another instant and she was pushed into a chair. For the first time in her life, Madame's hungry heart was fed.

elise loved her. That was enough.

The westward sinking sun had drawn the veil of darkness up from the greying east. Its cycles of waxing and waning were measured by the click of tensioned springs and beat of swinging pendulums. But in the growing darkness another sun was rising, its cycles measured by beating hearts to an unending day.

CHAPTER XX

_The River Gives up its Prey_

Because Zephyr saw a school of fishes disporting themselves in the water, this never diverted his attention from the landing of the fish he had hooked.

This principle of his life he was applying to a particular event. The river had been closely watched; now, at last, his fish was hooked. The landing it was another matter. He needed help. He went for it.

Zephyr found Bennie taking his usual after-dinner nap.

"Julius Benjamin, it's the eleventh hour," he began, indifferently.

Bennie interrupted:

"The eleventh hour! It's two o'clock, and the time you mention was born three hours ago. What new kind of bug is biting you?"

Zephyr studiously rolled a cigarette.

"Your education is deficient, Julius. You don't know your Bible, and you don't know the special force of figurative language. I'm sorry for you, Julius, but having begun I'll see it through. Having put my hand to the plough, which is also figuratively speaking, it's the eleventh hour, but if you'll get into your working clothes and whirl in, I'll give you full time and better wages."

Bennie sat upright.

"What?" he began.

Zephyr's cigarette was smoking.

"There's no time to waste drilling ideas through a thick head. The wagon is ready and so is the block and ropes. Come on, and while we're on the way, I'll tackle your wits where the Almighty left off."

Bennie's wits were not so muddy as Zephyr's words indicated. He sprang from his bed and into his shoes, and before the stub of Zephyr's cigarette had struck the ground outside the open window Bennie was pushing Zephyr through the door.

"Figures be hanged, and you, too. If my wits were as thick as your tongue, they'd be guessing at the clack of it, instead of getting a wiggle on the both of us."

The stableman had the wagon hooked up and ready. Zephyr and Bennie clambered in. Bennie caught the lines from the driver and cracking the whip about the ears of the horses, they clattered down the trail to the Devil's Elbow.

Zephyr protested mildly at Bennie's haste.

"Hold your hush," growled Bennie. "There's a h.e.l.l of a fight on at the office this day. If you want to see a good man win the sooner we're back with the safe the better."

There were no lost motions on their arrival at the Devil's Elbow. The actual facts that had hastened Zephyr's location of the safe were simple. He had studied the position which the stage must have occupied before the bridge fell, its line of probable descent. From these a.s.sumed data he inferred the approximate position of the safe in the river and began prodding in the muddy water. At last he was tolerably sure that he had located it. By building a sort of wing dam with loose rock, filling the interstices with fine material, the water of the pool was cut off from the main stream and began to quiet down and grow comparatively clear. Then Zephyr's heart almost stood still. By careful looking he could distinguish one corner of the safe. Without more ado he started for Bennie.

The tackle was soon rigged. Taking a hook and chain, Zephyr waded out into the icy water, and after a few minutes he gave the signal to hoist.

It was the safe, sure enough. Another lift with the tackle in a new position and the safe was in the wagon and headed for its starting-point.

Bennie was rigid with important dignity on the way to the office and was consequently silent save as to his breath, which whistled through his nostrils. As for Zephyr, Bennie's silence only allowed him to whistle or go through the noiseless motions as seemed to suit his mood. The driver was alive with curiosity and spoiling to talk, but his voluble efforts at conversation only confirmed his knowledge of what to expect. When later interrogated as to the remarks of Zephyr and Bennie upon this particular occasion he cut loose the pent-up torrent within him.

"You fellows may have heard," he concluded, "that clams is h.e.l.l on keeping quiet; but they're a flock of blue jays cussin' fer a prize compared with them two fellers."

As Firmstone turned to leave the office the door was thrust open and the two men entered. Bennie led, aggressive defiance radiating from every swing and pose. Zephyr, calm, imperturbable, confident, glanced at the red-faced Hartwell and at the set face of Firmstone. He knew the game, he knew his own hand. He intended to play it for its full value. He had an interested partner. He trusted in his skill, but if he made breaks it was no concern of his.

"a.s.suming," he began; "that there's an interesting discussion going on, I beg leave to submit some important data bearing on the same."

"Trim your switches," burst out Bennie. "They'll sting harder."

The unruffled Zephyr bent a soothing eye on Bennie, moved his hat a little farther back from his forehead, placed his arms leisurely akimbo, and eased one foot by gradually resting his weight on the other. It was not affectation. It was the physical expression of a mental habit.

"Still farther a.s.suming," here his eyes slowly revolved and rested on Hartwell, "that truth crushed to earth sometimes welcomes a friendly boost, uninvited, I am here to tender the aforesaid a.s.sistance." He turned to Bennie. "Now, Julius, it's up to you. If you'll open the throttle, you can close your blow-off with no danger of bursting your boiler." He nodded his head toward the door.

Hartwell's manner was that of a baited bull who, in the multiplicity of his a.s.sailants, knew not whom to select for first attack. For days and weeks he had been marshalling his forces for an overwhelming a.s.sault on Firmstone. He had ignored the fact that his adversary might have been preparing an able defence in spite of secrecy on his part. It is a wise man who, when contemplating the spoliation of his neighbour, first takes careful account of defensive as well as of offensive means. His personal a.s.sault on Firmstone had met with defeat. In the mental rout that followed he was casting about to find means of concealing from others that which he could not hide from himself. The irruption of Bennie and Zephyr threatened disaster even to this forlorn hope. Firmstone knew what was coming. Hartwell could not even guess. As he had seen Firmstone as his first object, so now he saw Zephyr. Blindly as he had attacked Firmstone, so now he lowered his head for an equally blind charge on the placid Zephyr.

"Who are you, anyway?" he burst out, with indignant rage.

"Me?" Zephyr turned to Hartwell, releasing his lips from their habitual pucker, his eyes resting for a moment on Hartwell. "Oh, I ain't much. I ain't a sack of fertilizer on a thousand-acre ranch." His eyes drooped indifferently. "But at the same time, you ain't no thousand-acre ranch."

"That may be," retorted Hartwell; "but I'm too large to make it safe for you to prance around on alone."

Zephyr turned languidly to Hartwell.

"That's so," he a.s.sented. "I discovered a similar truth several decades ago and laid it up for future use. Even in my limited experience you ain't the first thorn-apple that I've seen pears grafted on to. In recognition of your friendly warning, allow me to say that I'm only one in a bunch."

A further exchange of courtesies was prevented by the entrance of four men, of whom Bennie was one. Their entrance was heralded by a series of b.u.mps and grunts. There was a final b.u.mp, a final grunt, and the four men straightened simultaneously; four bended arms swept the moisture from four perspiring faces.

"That's all." Bennie dismissed his helpers with a wave of his hand, then stood grimly repressed, waiting for the next move.