Part 47

"Stole that there packet o' yourn--whatever there was into it."

"Who put him up to it?"

"A fella called Quintana."

"What was there in it for Jake?" inquired Clinch pleasantly.

"Ten thousand."

"How about you?"

"I told 'em I wouldn't touch it. Then they pulled their guns on me, and I was scared to squeal."

"So that was the way?" asked Clinch in his even, reassuring voice.

Leverett's eyes travelled stealthily around the circle of men, then reverted to Clinch.

"I dassn't touch it," he said, "but I dassn't squeal.... I was huntin' onto Drowned Valley when Jake meets up with me."

"'I got the packet,' he sez, 'and I'm a-going to double criss-cross Quintana, I am, and beat it. Don't you wish you was whacks with me?'

"'No,' sez I, 'honesty is my policy, no matter what they tell about me. S'help me God, I ain't never robbed no trap and I ain't no skin thief, whatever lies folks tell. All I ever done was run a little hootch, same's everybody.'"

He licked his lips furtively, his cold, bright eyes fastened on Clinch.

"G'wan, Earl," nodded the latter, "heave her up."

"That's all. I sez, 'Good-bye, Jake. An' if you heed my warnin', ill-gotten gains ain't a-going to prosper nobody.' That's what I said to Jake Kloon, the last solemn words I spoke to that there man now in his bloody grave----"

"Hey?" demanded Clinch.

"That's where Jake is," repeated Leverett. "Why, so help me, I wa'nt gone ten yards when, bang! goes a gun, and I see this here Quintana come outen the bush, I do, and walk up to Jake and frisk him, and Jake still a-kickin' the moss to slivers. Yessir, that's what I seen."

"G'wan."

"Yessir.... 'N'then Quintana he shoved Jake into a sink-hole. Thaswot I seen with my two eyes. Yessir. 'N'then Quintana he run off, 'n'I jest set down in the trail, I did; 'n'then Hal come up and acted like I had stole your packet, he did; 'n'then I told him what Quintana done. 'N'Hal, he takes after Quintana, but I don't guess he meets up with him, for he come back and ketched holt o' me, 'n'he druv me in like I was a caaf, he did. 'N'here I be."

The dusk in the forest had deepened so that the men's faces had become mere blotches of grey.

Smith said to Clinch: "That's his story, Mike. But I preferred he should tell it to you himself, so I brought him along.... Did you drive Star Peak?"

"There wa'nt nothin' onto it," said Clinch very softly. Then, of a sudden, his shadowy visage became contorted and he jerked up his rifle and threw a cartridge into the magazine.

"You dirty louse!" he roared at Leverett, "you was into this, too, a-robbin' my little Eve----"

"Run!" yelled somebody, giving Leverett a violent shove into the woods.

In the darkness and confusion, Clinch shouldered his way out of the circle and fired at the crackling noise that marked Leverett's course,--fired again, lower, and again as a distant crash revealed the frenzied flight of the trap-robber. After he had fired a fourth shot, somebody struck up his rifle.

"Aw," said Jim Hastings, "that ain't no good. You act up like a kid, Mike. 'Tain't so far to Ghost Lake, n'them Troopers might hear you."

After a silence, Clinch spoke, his voice heavy with reaction:

"Into that there packet is my little girl's dower. It's all I got to give her. It's all she's got to make her a lady. I'll kill any man that robs her or that helps rob her. 'N'that's that."