By Right of Purchase Part 33

A man came up, and she recognised him as Gallwey. He apparently heard her, for he beckoned to them.

"Will you come forward, Mrs. Leland?" he said. "We have a good deal to be thankful for."

They went with him a hundred yards or so. Then Carrie gasped at what she saw in the growing light of dawn.

"Oh," she cried joyously, "it hasn't reached the rest of it!"

"No," said Gallwey, "we are on the dividing line. I don't know how many bushels it has reaped, but, by comparison, it is not enough to worry about. A little wonderful. Still, I believe it's not unusual, and I have seen very much the same thing once before."

"Is there no more of the wheat damaged?" asked Carrie, and there was still a tension in her voice.

"Not a blade," said Gallwey. "I've been all round."

Then all the strength seemed to leave the girl. Moving shakily, with her hand on Eveline Annersly's arm, she turned towards the house, as the pearly greyness crept into the eastern sky. Eveline Annersly said nothing, for she could feel that her companion was trembling, and hear her catch her breath. Carrie stopped when they reached the homestead, and looked eastward with tear-dimmed eyes.

"Ah," she said, "I wonder why this favour was shown me. I felt I had ruined Charley a little while ago."

Then she pulled herself together. "Aunt Eveline," she said softly, "did you ever hate and despise yourself?"

Eveline Annersly said nothing, but she smiled with comprehension in her eyes, for she understood what was in Carrie Leland's mind.

CHAPTER XXIII

GALLWEY'S ADVENTURE

The night was still dark, and there was not then or afterwards any sign of hail when Sergeant Grier halted his little force under the Blackfoot Ridge. There were, in all, eight of them, excellently mounted, and most of them rode with a magazine rifle slung across their shoulders. In front of them a deep ravine wound away into the Ridge, which, though sometimes called a mountain, consisted of a long, broken rise, perhaps two hundred feet above the level of the rest of the prairie. Stunted birches, and, where the grounds were moister, a dense growth of willows, clothed its sides. Behind the first rise lay a rolling, deeply fissured plateau, lined here and there with trees. It stretched away before them, a black and shadowy barrier, and Sergeant Grier sat with his hand upon his hip, looking at it reflectively.

"I guess your news can be relied on, Mr. Leland?" he said.

Leland patted his fidgeting horse. "I wouldn't have worried you with it unless I had felt tolerably sure," he said. "Two waggons, driven by strangers, pa.s.sed through the Cannersly settlement three days ago. I don't know what was in them, but they were full of something, and I have my notion as to what it was. The same night four men, who asked about those waggons, rode into Cannersly. They stayed there just five minutes, and that appeared significant to me."

The Sergeant sat silent a moment, and then turned to the rest.

"Boys," he said, "I've been worrying the thing out most of the way. The whisky boys have friends round Barber, and they'd get pack-horses there.

West of the settlement, the folks are shy of them, and it's easy figuring they'd push on to get up north, beyond my reach. Well, it would cost them a day to work a traverse round the mountain, and that's why I'm putting down my stake on their coming through. There's only one good trail, and we're here to block it; but a man who knew the way might bring them out by the Willow Coulee. I guess it's not more than two miles away." He raised his voice a little. "Trooper Standish, you and Tom Gallwey will ride up the coulee, and lie by in the old herder's hut.

If you hear anything, a shot will bring us in at a gallop. Trooper Cornet, you'll push on straight ahead for half an hour with Mr. Custer, and hide your horses clear of the trail. I guess once the boys get into the mountain they're going to have some trouble getting out again."

The troopers saluted, and four shadowy men melted into the darkness.

When they pa.s.sed out of hearing, the Sergeant swung himself from the saddle.

"Lead your horses well back among the trees, boys, and tether them," he said. "Then we'll camp down here. I figure we're not going to see the whisky boys before the morning."

They did his bidding. Presently Leland and one or two of the others lay down among the first of the birches. The Sergeant sat close by, with his back to one of the trees, his pipe in his hand.

"It's 'bout time we got in a blow," he said. "Things are going bad, and, with the new country opening up north, I can't get more men. Now, we wouldn't be long running off the regular whisky men; the trouble is that every blamed tough between here and the frontier is standing in with them, and, unless you catch him out at night, you've nothing to show against him. When he comes home, he's a harmless settlement loafer, or an industrious pre-emptor. A good year would kill the thing, but I guess there's more in whisky than wheat, at present figures."

"There's more in running off horses," said one of the others. "The boys get them for nothing, and I've lost three of mine. How much have they taken out of you altogether, Charley?"

"Most of four or five thousand dollars, one way or another, and I have a notion they've not done with me yet. In fact, it seems to me that either the whisky boys or I will have to get out of this part of the prairie."

The Sergeant nodded. "It will be the whisky boys," he said. "You can bluff the law for awhile, if you're smart enough, but it's quite hard to keep it up, and the first mistake you make, it's got you sure. In another way, Mr. Leland's right. I'd have done nothing with my few troopers if he hadn't brought you in. We have nothing to raise trouble over--a few steers and horses missing, a gra.s.s fire raised. They're things that happen all the time. The whisky boys know it as well as I do, and, since I can't get more troopers, it means that what is done must be done by you. They know that, too, and it's running up quite a big account against the man who's leading you."

There was a little murmur of concurrence, and Leland laughed.

"Well," he said, "there's a _per contra_ claim, and I fancy it's going to be settled by-and-bye. I've had about enough to pull against this season, and I don't feel kind towards the men who have made it harder still for me."

Though he calmly filled his pipe, one or two of those who heard him fancied that the reckoning he looked forward to would be a somewhat grim one when it came. Leland of Prospect was, as they were aware, not the man to submit patiently to an injury, and his quietness had its significance. Still, he was only one man, and his enemies were many--men who struck shrewdly in the dark, and left no sign to show who they were.

None of those who rode with him envied their unofficial leader.

In the meantime, Gallwey and the young trooper picked their way along the edge of the bluff. The night was dark and hazy, and there were no stars in the sky. The smoke of a big gra.s.s fire drifted in a grey mist athwart the sweep of the plain. Now and then a crimson blaze leapt up and faded on the horizon, and the still air was heavy with the smell of burning. It was advisable to ride cautiously, for there were a good many badger-holes, and here and there the ground was seamed by a watercourse. Brittle branches occasionally snapped in the dense silence.

"I guess I could hear myself a mile away," the trooper said. "Still, that horse of yours is making row enough for a squadron."

Gallwey did not contradict him, for, as it happened, the horse just then blundered into a little watercourse and plunged down the slope of it with a great smas.h.i.+ng of undergrowth. Gallwey contrived to avoid a fall.

With some noise they scrambled up the other side, though this time Trooper Standish made an effort to control his indignation.

"I guess you would report me if I told you what I think of you," he said.

Still, they made the coulee without mishap, and the trooper checked his horse as they rode into it. It opened up before them, a black and shadowy hollow, with little streamlets trickling through. Dim trees rolled up its sides, blurred ma.s.ses against the sky above. Save the soft splash of the stream, no sound broke the stillness.

"n.o.body here, anyway," he said. "We'll push on for the herder's hut. It was built when the Scotchman who had Lister's ranch put sheep on the mountain, but the timber wolves got most of them, and he let up. It's 'bout the only place in this country where there are any wolves, and the agent didn't think it worth while to mention it when he gave his lease out. I guess you don't have timber wolves in Scotland."

Gallwey said they didn't. He made no further observations, for his horse fell into the stream with a loud splash. After this they pushed on up the coulee as silently as they could, until Trooper Standish pulled his horse up.

"We're here," he said. "That looks like the hut. We'll get down and hitch up the horses at the back of it."

Gallwey made out a shadowy ma.s.s among the birches, and swung himself out of the saddle as his comrade did. It was not what Sergeant Grier would have done, but Gallwey knew nothing of vedette duty, and Standish was very young. He had hitched his bridle round a branch when the latter turned to him.

"We may as well go in and make ourselves comfortable," he said. "If the whisky boys come down this way, it's a sure thing that we'll hear them."

They turned back towards the door of the hut, Gallwey a few paces behind the trooper, who thrust the door open. Gallwey could barely see him, for they were in the deep shadow of the trees. Just after Standish strolled in, there came the sound of a scuffle out of the darkness. Then there was a crash, a cry, and the thud of a heavy fall.

Gallwey stood fumbling with his pistol-holster, which, as it happened, was b.u.t.toned down. The b.u.t.ton fitted tightly, and he was clumsy in his haste. As he tore at it, he heard a sound behind him, and was swinging round when a pair of sinewy arms were wound round him. He struggled furiously, reaching back with one foot for his a.s.sailant's leg, and succeeded in so far that he and the unseen man came down heavily together. The other man, however, was uppermost, and when somebody else came running up, Gallwey lay still.

"Let him up!" said the last arrival; and when he rose shakily, his a.s.sailant jerked one arm behind him.

"Walk right into the shanty before you get hurt," he said.

Gallwey did it, since there was apparently no other course open to him.

The way the man held his arm was excruciatingly painful. Somebody struck a sulphur match, and, lighting a lantern, held it up. It showed two more men, busily engaged in holding Trooper Standish, who kicked and struggled valiantly on the floor. Then the third man laid down the lantern, and, taking up a rifle, prodded the trooper with the b.u.t.t of it. It was no gentle, perfunctory prodding.

"Let up and lie still before you're made. You're going to get it hard if you move again," he said, and turned to Gallwey. "Sit right down yonder."

Gallwey, who fancied that his expostulations would not be listened to, did as he was bidden. His holster was b.u.t.toned down still, and he did not think he could get it open without attracting undesirable attention.

Presently one of the men unclasped the belt it was fastened to and flung it aside, while Gallwey, recognising that a conciliatory att.i.tude was advisable, nearly laughed as he looked at Trooper Standish. The lad still lay flat upon the earthen floor, flushed in face, and hurled a stream of vitriolic compliments at his captors. One of them grinned broadly, but did not move his hands from the trooper's arms.