In the Shadow of the Hills Part 24

He set the gears and the car started forward once more. A sensation of being under the paws of a beast, odious and fetid, savage and pitiless, overwhelmed her. That this was no trick of a moment but a calculated scheme to abase and possess her she now realized with a sort of dull horror. And on top of all he was, despite his denial, partly drunk.

Through the terror of her situation two thoughts now continued to course like fiery threads--one a hope, one a purpose. The former rested on Juanita, whom in his inflamed ferocity of intention, the man seemed to have forgotten--on Juanita and Steele Weir, "Cold Steel"

Weir; and this failing, there remained the latter, a set idea to kill herself before this brute at her side worked his will. Somehow she could and would kill herself. Somehow she would find the means to free her hands and the instrument to pierce her heart.

Sorenson had switched on his lights. He drove the car through the damp darkness at headlong speed along the trail that leaped from the gloom to meet them and vanished behind. At the end of a quarter of an hour he swung into a canyon; and Janet perceived they were ascending Terry Creek. He stopped the car anew.

"I'll just take no chances with you," he exclaimed. "We have to pa.s.s your friends, the Johnsons, you know. Had to take my stuff up here in the middle of the night--up one night and back the next--and mighty still too, so that they wouldn't suspicion I was fixing a little bower for you."

He bound a cloth over her mouth and again flung the blanket over her head. Janet struggled fiercely for a moment, but finally sank back choking and half in a faint. She was barely conscious of the car's climbing again. Though when pa.s.sing the ranch house the man drove with every care for silence, she was not aware of the fact. Her breath, mind, soul, were stifled. She seemed transfixed in a hideous nightmare.

At length her lips and head were released. But her hands and feet were numb. Still feeling as if she were in some dreadful dream she saw the beam of the headlights picking out the winding trail, flas.h.i.+ng on trees by the wayside, s.h.i.+ning on wet rocks, heard the chatter of the creek over stones and the labor of the engine.

The road was less plain, a mere track now, and steeper. They were climbing, climbing up the mountain side, up into the heavier timber, up into one of the "parks" among the peaks. Johnson's ranch was miles behind and far below. Occasionally billows of fog swathed them in wet folds that sent a chill to Janet's bones.

Sorenson held his watch down to the driver's light.

"Ten o'clock; we're making good time. Must give the engine a drink--and take one myself."

He descended to the creek with a bucket, bringing back water to fill the steaming radiator. Afterwards, standing in the light of the car's lamps, he tilted a flask to his lips and drank deep.

"Not far now; three or four miles. But it's slow going. Have to make it on 'low'," said he, swinging himself up into his place.

Janet held her face turned away. She was thinking of Juanita and Steele Weir. Had the girl gone home again? Or, terrified, had she run to her own home and said nothing? Had the engineer come and waited and learning nothing at last returned to the dam? Despair filled her breast. Even should the Mexican girl have apprised him of the kidnapping, how should he know where to follow? And in the solitude of the wet dark mountains all about her hope died.

She began desperately to tug against the handkerchief binding her wrists.

Suddenly the going became easier and she felt rather than saw that the trees had thinned. A flash of the car lamps at a curve in the trail showed a great glistening wall of rock towering overhead, then this was pa.s.sed and the way appeared to lead into a gra.s.sy open s.p.a.ce. A dark shape beside the road loomed into view--a cabin by a clump of pine trees. Sorenson brought the car to a stop a few yards from the house.

"Here at last," he announced, springing down.

He unstrapped her feet, bade her get out.

"I make a last appeal to your decency and manhood--if you have either," she said, sitting motionless.

"Rot," he answered. Half dragging her, half lifting her, he removed her from the machine. Slipping a hand within her arm he led her inside the log house.

"Sit there," he ordered.

Janet dropped upon the seat, a rude plank bench against the wall farthest from the door. Indeed, fatigue and the numbness of her limbs rendered her incapable of standing.

"When I've touched off this fire and set out some grub, then I'll untie your hands," he continued. "A snug little cabin, eh? Just the place for us, what? See all the stuff I've brought up here to make you warm and happy and comfortable. Regular nest. Lot of work on my part, I want to say."

He touched a match to the wood already laid in the fireplace, flung off his rain coat and stood to warm his hands at the blaze. Lighting a cigarette, he began placing from a box of supplies plates and food on the table in the middle of the room, but paused to reproduce his flask. With a sardonic grin he lifted the bottle, bowed to Janet and drank the liquor neat. When he had finished, he turned the bottle upside down to show it was empty, then tossed it into a corner. Again he fixed his drunken, mocking smile upon her.

"Can't preach to me about booze here, can you, honey?" he said. "Ought to take a swallow yourself; warm you up. I have plenty. Guess I better untie your hands now." He advanced towards her, swaying slightly.

"You're going to love me from this time on, ain't you, girlie?" He untied the handkerchief and dropped it at his feet. "No nonsense now about trying to get away; I'll rope you for good if you try to start anything. h.e.l.lo, what's that?"

"No; give it to me!" she cried, in alarm as he pulled the folded sheets of paper from her stiffened fingers.

"Something I ought to see, maybe." Then he added harshly, "Sit down, if you don't care to have me teach you a thing or two. I'm master here."

He stepped to the table and drawing a box beside him settled upon it, pulled the candle-stick nearer and began to read the doc.u.ment. Janet glanced swiftly about the room for a weapon. Escape past him she could not, for by a single spring he could bar the way; but could she lay hand on a stick of wood she might fight her way out. None was nearer than the fire, and again he could interpose.

He read on and on, with a darkening brow and an evil glint showing in his eyes. Page by page he perused Saurez' deposition until he reached the end. Then he got to his feet, shaking the paper at her head.

"You were in on this," he snarled. "This is what you were in Martinez'

office to get. You're wise to this cursed scheme to help Weir make my father and Vorse and Burkhardt and Judge Gordon out a gang of swindlers. So they trimmed _his_ father of something--at least I fancy they did, and I hope to G.o.d they did, the coward! And you were in with them! You're not quite the little white angel you'd have people believe, are you? Not quite so innocent and simple as you've made me think, anyway. Well, I'll square all that. That slippery snake, Martinez, I'll twist his neck the minute I get back to town. I'll bet a thousand it was framed up to use this when Weir was arrested--but he'll never use it now!"

He glared at the girl with a face distorted by rage.

"We'll just burn it here and now," he continued. "Then we'll be sure it won't be used."

Janet gripped her hands tightly, while her lips opened to utter a wild protest at this desecration. What the doc.u.ment contained she did not yet know, except that it was evidence that fixed upon the men named guilt for some past deed in which Weir had suffered and which would bring them to account. But something more than protest was needed, she saw in a flash, to deflect the man from his purpose and save the sheets from the flame.

She shut her lips for an instant to choke the cry, then said with an a.s.sumption of unconcern:

"Go ahead. I didn't want your father to see it, in any case."

The paper had almost reached the candle, but the hand that held it paused. Sorenson stared at it, and from it to her. At last a malignant curl of his lips uncovered his teeth.

"Oh, you didn't want him to see it," he sneered. "If that's so, I'll just save it. He'll be interested in reading what your friends have prepared to destroy his good name and reputation."

He folded the doc.u.ment and slipped it into his inner coat pocket. Then he walked towards her. At the look on his face Janet sprang to her feet.

"I've changed my mind about the marriage matter, just as you did," he said. "I agree with you now; there won't be any marriage. But I'll have your arms about my neck just the same."

And he seized her wrist.

"Let me go, let----" The words ceased on her lips.

Her eyes were riveted on the cabin door; she scarcely felt the man's loathsome touch on her arm. How had the door come unlatched? And was it only the wind that slowly moved it open?

CHAPTER XVI

WEIR TAKES UP THE HUNT

On leaving the construction camp Steele Weir had whirled away down the river road for San Mateo with a feeling both of satisfaction and of enmity--satisfaction at Martinez' success in at last having secured the evidence ardently desired, as betokened by his words; enmity at whoever was laying violent hands on the lawyer. Unfortunately when yet half a mile from town his car suffered one of the common misadventures of automobiles:--ping-g-g! sang a tire in a shrill dying whine.

Weir did not stop to change and inflate the tube, but pushed ahead on his mission though at slackened speed. He brought his car to rest before Doctor Hosmer's house. The windows were lighted, yet at his knock there was no response; so brus.h.i.+ng conventionalities aside he entered and called Janet's name. Only echoes and a following silence greeted his call.

Doubtful whether to remain awaiting the girl's return or go at once to Martinez' office in the hope of still finding her, he finally chose the latter course leaving his car where it stood and proceeding on foot, as a result of which he pa.s.sed in the darkness Juanita hurrying home in a fright. A bad choice and valuable time lost, he afterwards discovered. At Martinez' office he stepped inside, called the lawyer by name, called Janet Hosmer, stood for a little while in the black room harkening and thinking, then went forth into the street.

This time chance fell his way. He had but come out when he heard footsteps and two men in low-toned talk as they approached; and he withdrew further into the concealing darkness of the street. The new visitors, striking matches at the entrance, walked inside. The men were Vorse and Burkhardt.