"Why, yes, honey," Aunt Martha smiled at her, though it seemed forced.

"Only--" She hesitated eloquently.

"Only what, Aunt Martha?" Ruth's voice was a little sharp, as with all persons who act in opposition to her better judgment and who resent anyone understanding them.

"Only I was hoping it would be Randerson, my dear," said Aunt Martha gently.

"Randerson!" Ruth's voice was scornful. But it sounded insincere to her, and she would trust it no further.

"Honey!" Aunt Martha's arm was around her, and Aunt Martha's sympathetic and knowing eyes were compelling hers; and her voice was ineffably gentle. "Are you sure, honey, that you don't wish it were Randerson? It is a great event in your life, dear, and once it is done, it can't be undone. Don't be hasty."

"It can never be Randerson," Ruth said firmly--not, however, as firmly as she had intended. "Randerson is a murderer--a reckless taker of human life!"

"He _had_ to shoot, they say," defended Aunt Martha. "I don't believe he would harm a living thing except in defense of his own life. Defending themselves is their way out here, girl--they know no other way. And he is a man, dear. I don't know when I have met a man who has impressed me more!"

"Please don't talk about it any more." Ruth's face was pale, her brows contracted, for Aunt Martha's reference to Randerson had brought back haunting sensations that, she thought, she had succeeded in putting out of her life. She was ready to cry, and when she thought of Randerson--how calmly he had accepted his dismissal, with what manliness he had borne her insults, a chill of sympathy ran over her. She believed she would never forget him as he had looked on the night he had ridden away after telling her that he would leave the Flying W--riding into the darkness of the plains, with his hopes blasted, bravely making no complaint.

She got her pony, after a while, and rode far and long, coming in to the ranchhouse about noon. After she had turned the pony into the corral and was coming toward the house, she saw Uncle Jepson sitting on the porch, puffing furiously at his pipe. She spoke to him in greeting, and was about to pa.s.s him to go into the house, when he called to her:

"I want to talk to you a minute, Ruth." He spoke rapidly, his voice dry and light, and she could see his facial muscles twitching. Wonderingly, she sank into a chair near him.

"You're sure thinkin' of marryin' Masten, girl?" he said.

"Yes," she declared firmly.

"Well, then I've got to tell you," said Uncle Jepson decisively. "I've been puttin' it off, hopin' that you'd get shet of that imp of Satan, an'

I wouldn't have to say anything."

"Uncle Jep!" she protested indignantly.

"That's just what he is, Ruth--a durned imp of the devil. I've knowed it from the first day I saw him. Since he's come out here, he's proved it."

He swung his chair around and faced her, and forgetting his pipe in his excitement, he told her the story he had told Randerson: how he had gone into the messhouse on the day of the killing of Pickett, for a rest and a smoke, and how, while in there he had overheard Chavis and Pickett plotting against Randerson, planning Pickett's attack on her, mentioning Masten's connection with the scheme. She did not open her lips until Uncle Jepson had concluded, and then she murmured a low "Oh!" and sat rigid, gripping the arms of her chair.

"An' that ain't all, it ain't half of it!" pursued Uncle Jepson vindictively. "Do you know that Masten set that Watt Kelso, the gunfighter, on Randerson?" He looked at Ruth, saw her start and draw a long breath, and he grinned triumphantly. "Course you don't know; I cal'late Randerson would never make a peep about it. He's all man--that feller. But it's a fact. Blair told me. There'd been bad blood between Randerson an' Kelso, an' Masten took advantage of it. He paid Kelso five hundred dollars in cold cash to kill Randerson!"

"Oh, it can't be!" moaned the girl, covering her face with her hands and shrinking into her chair.

"Shucks!" said Uncle Jepson derisively, but more gently now, for he saw that the girl was badly hurt. "The whole country is talkin' about it, Ruth, an' wonderin' why Randerson don't salivate that durned dude! An'

the country expects him to do it, girl! They'll fun him out of here, if he don't! Why, girl," he went on, "you don't know how much of a sneak a man can be when he's got it in him!"

She was shuddering as though he had struck her, and he was on the edge of his chair, looking at her pityingly, when Aunt Martha came to the door and saw them. She was out on the porch instantly, flushing with indignation.

"Jep Coakley, you're up to your tricks again, ain't you? You quit devilin' that girl, now, an' go on about your business!"

"I've got some things to say, an' I cal'late to say them!" declared Uncle Jepson determinedly. "I've kept still about it long enough. I ain't wantin' to hurt her," he added apologetically, as Aunt Martha slipped to her knees beside Ruth and put an arm around her, "but that durned Masten has been doin' some things that she's got to know about, right now. An'

then, if she's set on marryin' him, why, I cal'late it's her business. It was Masten who was behind Pickett kissin' her--he tellin' Pickett to do it. An' he hired Kelso to kill Randerson."

"Oh, Ruth!" said Aunt Martha, her voice shaky, as she nestled her head close to the girl's. But her eyes shone with satisfaction.

"There's another thing," went on Uncle Jepson to Ruth. "Did you notice Randerson's face, the night he come to hunt you, when you hurt your ankle? Marked up, kind of, it was, wasn't it? An' do you know what Masten went to Las Vegas for? Business, shucks! He went there to get his face nursed up, Ruth--because Randerson had smashed it for him! They'd had a fight; I saw them, both comin' from the same direction, that night. I reckon Randerson had pretty nigh killed him. What for?" he asked as Ruth turned wide, questioning eyes on him. "Well, I don't rightly know. But I've got suspicions. I've seen Masten goin' day after day through that break in the canyon over there. A hundred times, I cal'late. An' I've seen him here, when you wasn't lookin', kissin' that Catherson girl. I cal'late, if you was to ask her, she'd be able to tell you a heap more about Masten, Ruth."

Ruth got up, pale and terribly calm, disengaging herself from Aunt Martha and standing before Uncle Jepson. He too got to his feet.

Ruth's voice quavered. "You wouldn't, oh, you couldn't lie to me, Uncle, because you like Rex Randerson? Is it true?" She put her hands on his shoulders and shook him, excitedly.

"True? Why, Ruth, girl; it's as true as there's a Supreme Bein' above us.

Why----"

But she waited to hear no more, turning from him and putting out her hands to keep Aunt Martha away as she pa.s.sed her. She went out to the corral, got her pony, saddled it, mounted, and rode over the plains toward the break in the canyon wall. Uncle Jepson had one quick glimpse of her eyes as she turned from him, and he knew there would be no Monday for Willard Masten.

Ruth had no feelings as she rode. The news had stunned her. She had only one thought--to see Hagar Catherson, to confirm or disprove Uncle Jepson's story. She could not have told whether the sun was shining, or whether it was afternoon or morning. But she must see Hagar Catherson at once, no matter what the time or the difficulties. She came to the break in the canyon after an age, and rode through it, down across the bed of the river, over the narrow bridle path that led to the Catherson cabin.

The dog Nig did not greet her this time; he was stretched out on his belly, his hind legs gathered under him, his forelegs stuck out in front, his long muzzle extending along them, while he watched in apparent anxiety the face of his master, Abe Catherson, who was sitting on the edge of the porch, his elbows on his knees, his chin in his hands, in an att.i.tude of deep dejection. The dog's concern was for Catherson's future actions, for just a few minutes before he had witnessed a scene that had made his hair bristle, had brought ugly growls out of him, had plunged him into such a state of fury that he had, for one wild instant, meditated a leap at his master's throat. He had seen his master leap upon his mistress and raise his hand to strike her. If the blow had been struck--Nig would have leaped, then, no matter what the consequences.

Catherson had not struck. But one great, dominating pa.s.sion was in his mind at this moment--the yearning to slay! The dog had seen him, twice during the last half hour, draw out his heavy six-shooter and examine it, and each time the dog had growled his disapproval of the action. And on both occasions Catherson had muttered thickly: "I wish I knowed, for sure. A man can't do nothin' if he don't know. But I reckon it was him!"

He looked up to see Ruth coming toward him. The girl had seen him twice--had spoken to him. He was a bearded giant, grizzled, unkempt, with hairy arms, ma.s.sive and muscled superbly, and great hands, burned brown by the sun, that were just now clenched, forming two big fists. There had been a humorous, tolerant twinkle in his eyes on the other occasions that Ruth had seen him; it was as though he secretly sympathized with her efforts to do something for his girl, though he would not openly approve.

But now she saw that his eyes were blazing with an insane frenzy, that his lips were working, and that the muscles of his neck stood out like great cords, strained to the bursting point.

He got up when he saw Ruth, and stood on the sand at the edge of the porch, swaying back and forth, and Ruth's first thought was that he had been drinking. But his first words to her revealed her mistake. It was the light, dry voice of a violent pa.s.sion that greeted her, a pa.s.sion that was almost too great for words. He ran to her pony and seized it by the bridle:

"You know, ma'am. Tell me who treated my li'l gal like that?" His great hands writhed in the reins. "I'll twist his buzzard's head off his shoulders."

"What do you mean?" Ruth's own voice startled her, for the spirit of a lie had issued from her mouth; she knew what he meant; she realized that Uncle Jepson had told the truth.

"Don't you know, ma'am?" There was wild derision in his voice, insane mirth. "You've been comin' here; she's been goin' to your place! An' you don't know! You're blinder than me--an' I couldn't see at all!" He went off into a gale of frenzied laughter, at which the dog began to bark.

Then Catherson's eyes glared cunningly. "But you've seen who's been comin' here; you know the man's name, ma'am; an' you're goin' to tell me, ain't you? So's I c'n talk to him--eh?"

"I don't know, Mr. Catherson." Ruth got a firm grip on herself before she answered, and it was to save a life that she lied again, for she saw murder in Catherson's eyes. "Where is Hagar?" she asked.

At his jerk of the head toward the cabin door Ruth got down from her pony. She was trembling all over, but at Catherson's words all thought of self had been banished. The effect of Masten's deed on her own life, his duplicity, his crimes--all were forgotten. Here was her friend who had been sinned against, needing the comfort of her presence. And in an instant she was inside the cabin, leaning over the little figure that was curled up in a bunk in a corner, speaking low words of cheer and forgiveness.

Outside, Catherson paced back and forth, his lips forming soundless words, his big hands working as though the fingers were at the throat of the thief that had stolen into his home. His mind was going over certain words that Hagar had answered to his questions, just before Ruth's coming. He dwelt upon every slight circ.u.mstance that had occurred during the past few months. There were the tracks of horse's hoofs about the cabin, in the paths and trails leading to it. Hagar had refused to tell him. But he figured it all out for himself, as he walked. When had this thing started? At about the time that Randerson had taken Vickers' place at the Flying W! Why had not there been trouble between him and the Flying W, as under previous range bosses? What had Randerson given him money for, many times? Ah, he knew now!

"The black-hearted hound!" he gritted.

He reeled, and held to a corner of the cabin to steady himself, for this last access of rage came near to paralyzing him. When he recovered he drew back out of sight, and leaning against the wall of the cabin, with a pencil and a small piece of paper taken from a note book in a pocket, he wrote. He laid the piece of paper on the edge of the porch, ran to the corral and caught his pony, mounted, and rode drunkenly down the narrow path toward the break in the canyon.

CHAPTER XXIII

BANISHING A SHADOW

Randerson could not adjust his principles to his purpose to do Masten to death while working for Ruth, and so, in the morning following his meeting with the Easterner on the trail leading to Chavis' shack, he announced to the men of the outfit that he was going to quit. He told Red Owen to take charge until Ruth could see him.

Glum looks followed his announcement. They tried to dissuade him, for they did not know his thoughts, and perhaps would not have given him credit for them if they had.