The Winds of Chance Part 50

"Morris Best was willing to go his bail," Rock informed him, "but Miller wouldn't allow it. Ben is sore at having the Rialto implicated--there's been so much short-weighing going on.

Understand?"

'Poleon wagged his head in bewilderment. "I don' savvy dis new kin' of law you feller is bring in de country. S'pose I say, 'M'sieu' Jodge, I know dis boy long tam; he don' steal dat gold.'

De Jodge he say, 'Doret, how much money you got? T'ousand dollar?'

I say, 'Sure! I got 'bout t'ousand dollar.' Den he tell me, 'Wal, dat ain't 'nough. Mebbe so you better gimme two t'ousan' dollar biffore I b'lieve you.' Bien! I go down-town an' win 'noder t'ousan' on de high card, or mebbe so I stick up some feller, den I come back and m'sieu' le jodge he say: 'Dat's fine! Now we let Phillips go home. He don' steal not'in'.' Wat I t'ink of dem proceedin's? Eh? I t'ink de jodge is dam' grafter!"

Rock laughed heartily. "Don't let Colonel Cavendish hear you," he cautioned. "Seriously now, he'd let Pierce go if he could; he told me so. He'll undoubtedly allow him the freedom of the Barracks, so he'll really be on parole until his trial."

"Trial? You goin' try him again?" The woodsman could make little of the affair. "If you try him two tam, dose crook is mak' t'ief of Pierce for sure. One trial is plenty. I s'pose mebbe I better kill dem feller off an' settle dis t'ing."

"Don't talk like that," Rock told him. "I'm not saying they don't need killing, but--n.o.body gets away with that stuff nowadays."

"No?" 'Poleon was interested and a trifle defiant. "For why? You never catch me, M'sieu'. n.o.body is able for doin' dat. I'm good traveler."

Rock eyed the stalwart speaker meditatively. "I'd hate to take your trail, that's a fact, but I'd have to do it. However, that would be a poor way to help Pierce. If he's really innocent, Courteau will have a hard job to convict him. I suggest that you let matters rest as they are for a day or so. We'll treat the kid all right."

On the way to her room Rouletta met the Countess Courteau, and in a few words made known the facts of Pierce's arrest. The elder woman listened in astonishment.

"Arrested? For theft? Absurd! Who made the charge?"

"Count Courteau."

"COURTEAU? Where did he get a thousand dollars?" The speaker's face was set in an expression of utter incredulity.

"I don't know. It's all too wretched, too terrible--" Rouletta's voice broke; she hid her face in her hands. For a moment there was silence; then the elder woman exclaimed, harshly, peremptorily:

"Tell me everything. Quick! There's a reason why I must know all about it."

Drawing Rouletta into her room, she forced her into a chair, then stood over her while the latter repeated the story in greater detail.

"So! That's it!" the Countess cried, at last. "The McCaskeys backed him up. Of course! And he referred to Sheep Camp--to me.

He's the sort to do a thing like that. G.o.d! What a dog!" After a time she went on: "I'm sorry Pierce struck him; he'll never get over that and it will make it harder--much harder."

"You think it can be straightened out?" Rouletta s face was strained; her eyes searched the former speaker's face eagerly.

"It's GOT to be straightened out. It would be monstrous to allow-- " The Countess shook her head, then, with a mirthless smile, exclaimed: "But what a situation! Henri, of all persons! It's pleasant for me, isn't it? Well, somebody planted that poke-- probably one of the McCaskeys. They'd like to railroad the boy.

Joe is as vindictive as an Indian and he blames Pierce and me for his brother's death."

In desperation Rouletta cried: "I'll pay the Count back his money- -I'll double it."

"HIS money?" sneered the woman. "He hasn't a cent, except what I give him. That was McCaskey's dust." She stared at the apprehensive figure crouched upon the edge of the chair, and slowly her expression softened. In a gentler tone she said, "I see you didn't take my advice; you didn't heed my warning."

"Who ever heeds a warning like yours?"

"Does Pierce know that you--feel this way about him?"

Rouletta sighed wearily. "I didn't know myself, although I more than half suspected. I didn't permit myself to think, it made me so unhappy."

"It ought to satisfy me somewhat to learn that he doesn't care for you, but--somehow it doesn't. He didn't care for me, either. But I cared for him. I love him now, just as you love him--better, probably. Oh, why conceal it? I've spent a good many black hours thinking about it and trying to fight it. Mind you, it wasn't his fault; it was just fate. There are some fellows who go smiling and singing along through life--clean, decent fellows, too--attending to their own affairs in a perfectly proper manner, but leaving a trail of havoc behind them. It isn't so true of women--they're usually flirts--their smiles don't last and the echo of their songs dies out. He's perfectly impossible for me. I wouldn't marry him if I were free and if he asked me. But that has nothing whatever to do with the case."

"I had no idea!" Rouletta said. "I suppose there's no hope for me, either. I'm not his kind. He's told me about his life, his people.

I wouldn't fit in."

"It isn't that--people are adaptable, they make themselves fit, for a while at least--it's a question of ident.i.ties. As much a matter of family histories as anything else. You're his ant.i.thesis in every respect and--like should mate with like. Now then, about this other trouble. I must work in my own way, and I see but one.

I'll have to pay high, but--" The speaker lifted her shoulders as if a cold wind had chilled her. "I've paid high, up to date, and I suppose I shall to the end. Meanwhile, if you can get him out of jail, do so by all means. I can't. I daren't even try."

When, at a late hour, Count Henri Courteau entered the establishment that bore his name he was both surprised and angered to find his wife still awake. The guests of the hotel were asleep, the place was quiet, but the Countess was reading in an easy-chair beside the office stove. She was in negligee, her feet were resting upon the stove fender. She turned her head to say:

"Well, Henri, you look better than I thought you would."

The Count pa.s.sed a caressing hand over his swollen cheek and his discolored left eye. "You heard about the fight, eh?" he inquired, thickly.

"Yes--if you'd call it that."

Courteau grimaced, but there was a ring of triumph and of satisfaction in his voice when he cried:

"Well, what do you think of that fellow? It was like him, wasn't it, after I had caught him red-handed?"

"To punch you? Quite like him," agreed the woman.

"Pig! To strike a defenseless man. Without warning, too. It shows his breeding. And now"--the speaker sneered openly--"I suppose you will bail him out."

"Indeed! Why should I?"

"Oh, don't pretend innocence!" the Count stormed. "Don't act so unconcerned. What's your game, anyhow? Whatever it is, that fellow will cut cord-wood for the rest of the winter where the whole of Dawson can see him and say, 'Behold the lover of the Countess Courteau!'"

"There's some mistake. He isn't a thief."

"No?" The husband swayed a few steps closer, his face working disagreeably. "Already it is proved. He is exposed, ruined. Bah!

He made of me a laughing-stock. Well, he shall suffer! A born thief, that's what he is. What have you to say?"

"Why--nothing. I hoped it was a mistake, that's all."

"You HOPED! To be sure!" sneered the speaker. "Well, what are you going to do about it?" When his wife said nothing the man muttered, in some astonishment: "I didn't expect you to take it so quietly. I was prepared for a scene. What ails you?"

Hilda laid down her book. She turned to face her accuser. "Why should I make a scene?" she asked. "I've had nothing to do with Phillips since we parted company at White Horse. I've scarcely spoken to him, and you know it."

"You don't deny there was something between you?"

The woman shrugged non-committally, her lips parted in a faint, cheerless smile. "I deny nothing. I admit nothing."

Although Courteau's brain was fogged, he experienced a growing surprise at the self-possession with which his wife had taken this blow which he had aimed as much at her as at Pierce Phillips; he studied her intently, a mingling of suspicion, of anger, and of admiration in his uncertain gaze. He saw, for one thing, that his effort to reach her had failed and that she remained completely the mistress of herself. She reclined at ease in her comfortable chair, quite unstirred by his derision, his jubilation. He became aware, also, of the fact that she presented an extremely attractive picture, for the soft white fur of the loose robe she wore exposed an alluring glimpse of snowy throat and bosom; one wide sleeve had fallen back, showing a smoothly rounded arm; her silken ankles, lifted to the cozy warmth of the stove, were small and trim; her feet were shod in neat high-heeled slippers. The Count admired neatly shod ladies.

"You're a very smart-looking woman," he cried, with some reluctance. "You're beautiful, Hilda. I don't blame the young fool for falling. But you're too old, too wise--"

Hilda nodded. "You've said it. Too old and too wise. If I'd been as young and as silly as when I met you--who knows? He's a handsome boy."

Again the husband's anger blazed up.