"And that--that snake had the impertinence to ask me to marry him,"

she continued later, "still thinks he may induce my father to agree to a marriage between us. I think that he is working up some scheme now to get daddy too heavily involved, so that we may have to use him. The miserable hound!--as if my dad would think of coercing me into marrying him!"

"You aren't afraid of Brenchfield, Eileen? Because, if you are, I'll throttle the life out of him."

"No, no! I am not a bit afraid of Mayor Brenchfield,--not now. But I am afraid for my father.

"Brenchfield has a scheme for grabbing the land in the Valley whenever, wherever, and by whatever means he can. He has infected father with the same desire. They buy, and buy, and buy--vying each other in their daring. No one knows--they hardly know themselves--how much they really have."

"But don't they turn it over?"

"No! Everyone else does and gets rich in the process. They buy, and buy, and when offered a big advance on their purchase price they refuse to sell. They think this advancing in prices will go on for ever. The bank keeps on lending them money when they run short, taking their holdings as security in return. After all, daddy really owns but an interest in the properties--and a precarious interest at that. The banks won't lose. Allow them! But they have no right to encourage this kind of business;--it is bad for the country at large."

"That is true enough, but still, I think property will go on advancing for quite a little time yet," said Phil. "Every tendency points that way. Settlers from Ontario and Manitoba farms are coming in here by the hundreds to ranch, on account of the less rigorous climate. The Valley is the favourite in Canada for Old Country people with capital who are anxious to do fruit farming, and they are pouring in all the time. I can see nothing but increases in values for some time to come, Eileen."

"Well,--maybe I am wrong, but it looks to me as if the West were going mad and that there will be one wild, hilarious fling and then--the deluge.

"G.o.d help daddy, Brenchfield or anybody else who gets caught in the maelstrom.

"Phil,--promise me one thing;--you won't get caught in this? Buy and sell for others if you wish. Yes!--gamble with a little if you have it to spare, but you won't,--promise me you won't get involved in this awful business in such a way that a turn of the tide would leave you broken and dishonoured."

"I never was lucky in mines, oils or land, Eilie, dear;--and you have my promise. If ever I have anything to do with real estate, believe me, it will be simply--as you suggest--in buying and selling for the other fellow. That game has always had a great fascination for me."

"Why, yes!--you can get all the excitement without the far-reaching consequences. But what worries me about daddy is that he has so many unfinished ends lying everywhere. That was always his weakness; now it seems to be his obsession. He has ranches stocked with the best animals in the country. He has the best implements, but he has no real record of them and they disappear all the time. Some of his foremen are getting marvellously well-to-do suddenly. Why, the other day a man brought in a herd of pigs and sold them to daddy for cash. The pigs were daddy's own--stolen from one of his ranches the night before--and daddy didn't know them. Last spring, one of his foremen told daddy, just before the snow went, that they would require new machinery for this particular ranch he was working; ploughs, reapers, binders, et cetera. Dad ordered them for him and, when the snow went, he discovered all kinds of the same machinery there which had been left lying out all winter and simply ruined--really enough machinery to work a dozen ranches."

"And didn't he fire the foreman?"

"Not he! He said he couldn't put a married man out in that way. And that same married man came in here penniless four years ago, has been working for dad all the time for wages; and he could retire to-morrow and live on the interest of his invested capital.

"Daddy Royce Pederstone doesn't see it at all. He says some men are lucky speculators. Oh,--it makes me furious!"

In that short drive to town Phil got confirmed in a great many things he had previously considered merely gossip and conjecture.

At the entrance to Eileen's home he handed over the reins.

"Are you going to clear yourself with the police regarding Mayor Brenchfield, Phil?" asked Eileen.

"That is just what Jim asked, girlie. I may, some day. And I may never require to. Meantime, Brenchfield is stewing in his own juices.

I prefer, for a while at any rate, to let him work away--as you said not so very long ago--and leave the result or issue to his Creator.

What is it the Great Book says?--'Vengeance is mine. I will repay.'"

Eileen sighed and turned her head away to hide a tell-tale tear.

"Well--I shall not see you again for a long time, little girlie.

Good-bye, and--and, G.o.d bless you!"

And there among the shade trees of the avenue Eileen threw the reins aside and sprang down beside Phil. His arms went about her agile little body, as her fingers clung to him. He kissed her lips, her eyes and her hair. Then he caught her face in his hands again, as he had done out at the ranch, looked deeply into the heart of her eyes, and her eyes answered him bravely.

He kissed her solemnly on the lips once more and let her go.

When she looked back at the turn of the avenue, he was still standing there where she had left him.

CHAPTER XXII

Fire Begets Hot Air

Late one afternoon three months after Eileen's departure for the coast, just as the dark was beginning to come down and as Phil was turning off the main road by the trail leading to the ranch, he noticed a man in sheepskin chaps making for the trees a hundred yards behind the farmhouse. He stopped his horse and watched him quietly, for there was something in the fellow's gait that seemed familiar to him. The man mounted a horse among the trees, came out boldly, cantered through the orchard on to the main road and away.

The spring thaw was on, mud was everywhere, and the stranger's beast ambled away with the silence of a ghost.

Phil did not know what to make of it, so he questioned Jim on the subject.

"Were any of that Redmans gang in seeing you?" he asked.

"Seeing me? Good land, no! Why?"

"Oh, I saw what looked like one of them getting on his horse among the trees at the back there, and riding away."

"Uhm!" said Jim, rubbing his chin.

"I thought it was Skook.u.m, but I couldn't be quite sure.

"I wonder what the devil he could be up to, so far from home?"

"Might have been along by the lake a bit seeing some of that bunch at Larry Woodc.o.c.k's place. Larry's gang and the Redmans lot are pretty much of the same kidney."

"Well," said Phil, dismissing the subject, "I guess it is up to us to keep our eyes peeled, anyway."

It was two weeks after this, following a run to town, that Jim came in with an angry look in his eyes.

"Say, Phil!--there's some darned monkey-doodle business afoot. I wish I could get to the bottom of it."

"What is it now?"

"I saw Red McGregor on the main road yesterday, and to-night I met him, St.i.tchy Summers and Skook.u.m full in the teeth, jogging into town.

Darned funny thing,--I never saw them on this road before."

"Well,--it is a good job we haven't started in with any stock yet.

Like enough somebody will be hollering again about being shy a few fat steers or calves. There were three hundred head of cattle reported missing off the ranges last year and about that much or more every year for a dog's age--if all reports be true. Funny thing they can't lay the rustlers by the heels and hang them by the necks in the good old-fashioned way."

"Yes!" commented Jim, "if that crowd are mean enough to thieve feed and grain, I wouldn't care to turn them loose among anybody's cattle, especially now the feed and grain stealing business is unhealthy."

"But how can they get away with it, Jim? The cattle are branded."

"Sure thing, Simple Simon! But they are not branded under their hides."