Max Brand (13 page)

Nothing could match that speed. The strong mare fell to the rear,
fighting gamely, but beaten by that effort of the stallion.

Jack swerved in the saddle and looked back, laughing her triumph.
Pierre smiled grimly in response and leaned forward, shifting his
weight more over the withers of Mary. He spoke to her, and one of her
pricking ears fell back as if to listen to his voice. He spoke again
and the other ear fell back, her neck straightened, she gave her whole
heart to her work.

First she held the stallion even, then she began to gain. That was the
meaning of those round, strong hips, and the breadth of the chest. She
needed a half-mile of running to warm her to her work, and now the
black came back to her with every leap.

The thunder of the approaching hoofs warned the girl. One more glance
she cast in apprehension over her shoulder, and then brought her spurs
into play again and again. Still the rush of hoofs behind her grew
louder and louder, and now there was a panting at her side and the
head of cream-colored Mary drew up and past.

She gave up the battle with a little shout of anger and slowed up her
mount with a sharp pull on the reins. It needed only a word from
Pierre and his mare drew down to a hand-gallop, twisting her head a
little toward the black as if she called for some recognition of her
superiority.

"It's always this way," cried Jack, and jerked at the reins with a
childish impotence of anger. "I beat you for the first quarter of a
mile and then this fool of a horse—I'm going to give him away."

"The black," said Pierre, assuming an air of quiet and superior
knowing which always aggravated her most, "is a good second-rate
cayuse when someone who knows horses is in the saddle. I'd give you
fifty for him on the strength of his looks and keep him for a
decoration."

She could only glare her speechless rage for a moment. Then she
changed swiftly and threw out her hands in a little gesture of
surrender.

"After all, what difference does it make? Your Mary can beat him in a
long run or a short one, but it's your horse, Pierre, and that takes
the sting away. If it were anyone else's I'd—well, I'd shoot either
the horse or the rider. But my partner's horse is my horse, you know."

He swerved his mare sharply to the left and took her hand with a
strong grip.

"Jack, of all the men I've ever known, I'd rather ride with you, I'd
rather fight for you."

"Of all the
men
you ever knew," she said, "I suppose that I am."

He did not hear the low voice, for he was looking out over the canyon.
A few moments later they swung out onto the very crest of the range.

On all sides the hills dropped away through the gloom of the evening,
brown nearby, but falling off through a faint blue haze and growing
blue-black with the distance. A sharp wind, chill with the coming of
night, cut at them. Not a hundred feet overhead shot a low-winging
hawk back from his day's hunting and rising only high enough to clear
the range and then plunge down toward his nest.

Like the hawks they peered down from their point of vantage into the
profound gloom of the valley below. They shaded their eyes and studied
it with a singular interest for long moments, patient, as the hawk.

So these two marauders stared until she raised a hand slowly and then
pointed down. He followed the direction she indicated, and there,
through the haze of the evening, he made out a glimmer of lights.

He said sharply: "I know the place, but we'll have a devil of a ride
to get there."

And like the swooping hawk they started down the slope. It was
precipitous in many places, but Pierre kept almost at a gallop, making
the mare take the slopes often crouched back on her haunches with
forefeet braced forward, and sliding many yards at a time.

In between the boulders he darted, twisting here and there, and always
erect and jaunty in the saddle, swaying easily with every movement of
the mare. Not far behind him came the girl. Fine rider that she was,
she could not hope to compete with such matchless horsemanship where
man and horse were only one piece of strong brawn and muscle, one
daring spirit. Many a time the chances seemed too desperate to her,
but she followed blindly where he led, setting her teeth at each
succeeding venture, and coming out safe every time, until they swung
out at last through a screen of brush and onto the level floor of
the valley.

In the heart of that valley two roads crossed. Many a year before a
man with some imagination and illimitable faith was moved by the
crossing of those roads to build a general merchandise store.

Time justified his faith, in a small way, and now McGuire's store was
famed for leagues and leagues about, for he dared to take chances with
all manner of novelties, and the curious, when their pocketbooks were
full, went to McGuire's to find inspiration.

Business was dull this night, however; there was not a single patron
at the bar, and the store itself was empty, so he went to put out the
big gasoline lamp which hung from the ceiling in the center of the
room, and was on the ladder, reaching high above his head, when a
singular chill caught him in the center of his plump back and radiated
from that spot in all directions, freezing his blood. He swallowed the
lump in his throat and with his arms still stretched toward the lamp
he turned his head and glanced behind.

Two men stood watching him from a position just inside the door. How
they had come there he could never guess, for the floor creaked at the
lightest step. Nevertheless, these phantoms had appeared silently, and
now they must be dealt with. He turned on the ladder to face them, and
still he kept the arms automatically above his head while he descended
to the floor. However, on a closer examination, these two did not
seem particularly formidable. They were both quite young, one with
dark-red hair and a somewhat overbright eye; the other was hardly more
than a boy, very slender, delicately made, the sort of handsome young
scoundrel whom women cannot resist.

Having made these observations, McGuire ventured to lower his arms by
jerks; nothing happened; he was safe. So he vented his feelings by
scowling on the strangers.

"Well," he snapped, "what's up? Too late for business. I'm closin'
up."

The two quite disregarded him. Their eyes were wandering calmly about
the place, and now they rested on the pride of McGuire's store. The
figure of a man in evening clothes, complete from shoes to gloves and
silk hat, stood beside a girl of wax loveliness. She wore a low-cut
gown of dark green, and over her shoulders was draped a scarf of dull
gold. Above, a sign said: "You only get married once; why don't you do
it up right?"

"That," said the taller stranger, "ought to do very nicely for us,
eh?"

And the younger replied in a curiously light, pleasant voice: "Just
what we want. But how'll I get away with all that fluffy stuff, eh?"

The elder explained: "We're going to a bit of a dance and we'll take
those evening clothes."

The heart of McGuire beat faster and his little eyes took in the
strangers again from head to foot.

"They ain't for sale," he said. "They's just samples. But right over
here—"

"This isn't a question of selling," said the red-headed man. "We've
come to accept a little donation, McGuire."

The storekeeper grew purple and white in patches. Still there was no
show of violence, no display of guns; he moved his hand toward his own
weapon, and still the strangers merely smiled quietly on him. He
decided that he had misunderstood, and went on: "Over here I got a
line of goods that you'll like. Just step up and—"

The younger man, frowning now, replied: "We don't want to see any more
of your junk. The clothes on the models suit us all right. Slip 'em
off, McGuire."

"But—" began McGuire and then stopped.

His first suspicion returned with redoubled force; above all, that
head of dark red hair made him thoughtful. He finished hoarsely: "What
the hell's this?"

"Why," smiled the taller man, "you've never done much in the interests
of charity, and now's a good time for you to start. Hurry up, McGuire;
we're late already!"

There was a snarl from the storekeeper, and he went for his gun, but
something in the peculiarly steady eyes of the two made him stop with
his fingers frozen hard around the butt.

He whispered: "You're Red Pierre?"

"The clothes," repeated Pierre sternly, "on the jump, McGuire."

And with a jump McGuire obeyed. His hands trembled so that he could
hardly remove the scarf from the shoulders of the model, but afterward
fear made his fingers supple, as he did up the clothes in two bundles.

Jacqueline took one of them and Pierre the other under his left arm;
with his right hand he drew out some yellow coins.

"I didn't buy these clothes because I didn't have the time to dicker
with you, McGuire. I've heard you talk prices before, you know. But
here's what the clothes are worth to us."

And into the quaking hands of McGuire he poured a chinking stream of
gold pieces.

Relief, amazement, and a very wholesome fear struggled in the face of
McGuire as he saw himself threefold overpaid. At that little
yellow heap he remained staring, unheeding the sound of the
retreating outlaws.

"It ain't possible," he said at last, "thieves have begun to pay."

His eyes sought the ceiling.

"So that's Red Pierre?" said McGuire.

As for Pierre and Jacqueline, they were instantly safe in the black
heart of the mountains. Many a mile of hard riding lay before them,
however, and there was no road, not even a trail that they could
follow. They had never even seen the Crittenden schoolhouse; they knew
its location only by vague descriptions.

But they had ridden a thousand times in places far more bewildering
and less known to them. Like all true denizens of the mountain-desert,
they had a sense of direction as uncanny as that of an Eskimo. Now
they struck off confidently through the dark and trailed up and down
through the mountains until they reached a hollow in the center of
which shone a group of dim lights. It was the schoolhouse near the
Barnes place, the scene of the dance.

So they turned back behind the hills and in the covert of a group of
cottonwoods they kindled two more little fires, shading them on three
sides with rocks and leaving them open for the sake of light on
the fourth.

They worked busily for a time, without a word spoken by either of
them. The only sound was the rustling of Jacqueline's stolen silks and
the purling of a small stream of water near them, some meager spring.

But presently: "P-P-Pierre, I'm f-freezing."

He himself was numbed by the chill air and paused in the task of
thrusting a leg into the trousers, which persisted in tangling and
twisting under his foot.

"So'm I. It's c-c-cold as the d-d-d-devil."

"And these—th-things—aren't any thicker than spider webs." "Wait.
I'll build you a great big fire."

And he scooped up a number of dead twigs.

There was an interlude of more silk rustling, then: "P-P-Pierre."

"Well?"

"I wish I had a m-m-m-mirror."

"Jack, are you vain?"

A cry of delight answered him. He threw caution to the winds and
advanced on her. He found her kneeling above a pool of water fed by
the soft sliding little stream from the spring. With one hand she held
a burning branch by way of a torch, and with the other she patted her
hair into shape and finally thrust the comb into the glittering,
heavy coils.

She started, as if she felt his presence.

"P-P-Pierre!"

"Yes?"

"Look!"

She stood with the torch high overhead, and he saw a beauty so
glorious that he closed his eyes involuntarily and still he saw the
vision in the dull-green gown, with the scarf of old gold about her
dazzling white shoulders. And there were two lights, the barbaric red
of the jewels in her hair, and the black shimmer of her eyes. He drew
back a step more. It was a picture to be looked at from a distance.

She ran to him with a cry of dismay: "Pierre, what's wrong with me?"

His arms went round her of their own accord. It was the only place
they could go. And all this beauty was held in the circle of his will.

"It isn't that, but you're so wonderful, Jack, so glorious, that I
hardly know you. You're like a different person."

He felt the warm body trembling, and the thought that it was not
entirely from the cold set his heart beating like a trip-hammer. What
he felt was so strange to him that he stepped back in a vague alarm,
and then laughed. She stood with an expectant smile.

"Jack, how am I to risk you in the arms of all the strangers in that
dance?

"It's late. Listen!"

She cupped a hand at her ear and leaned to listen. Up from the hollow
below them came a faint strain of music, a very light sound that was
drowned a moment later by the solemn rushing of the wind through the
great trees above them.

They looked up of one accord.

"Pierre, what was that?"

"Nothing; the wind in the branches, that's all."

"It was a hushing sound. It was like—it was like a warning, almost."

But he was already turning away, and she followed him hastily.

Jacqueline could never ride a horse in that gown, or even sit sidewise
in the saddle without hopelessly crumpling it, so they walked to the
schoolhouse. It was a slow progress, for she had to step lightly and
carefully for fear of the slippers. He took her bare arm and helped
her; he would never have thought of it under ordinary conditions, but
since she had put on this gown she was greatly changed to him, no
longer the wild, free rider of the mountain-desert, but a
defenseless, strangely weak being. Her strength was now something
other than the skill to ride hard and shoot straight and quick.