CHAPTER XXIII
UNMASKED
Lambert was out of the saddle at the sound of the shot. He sprang to theshelter of the nearest rock, gun in hand, thinking with a sweep ofbitterness that Grace Kerr had led him into a trap. Whetstone was lyingstill, his chin on the ground, one foreleg bent and gathered under him,not in the posture of a dead horse, although Lambert knew that he wasdead. It was as if the brave beast struggled even after life to picturethe quality of his unconquerable will, and would not lie in death asother horses lay, cold and inexpressive of anything but death, withstiff limbs straight.
Lambert was incautious of his own safety in his great concern for hishorse. He stepped clear of his shelter to look at him, hoping againsthis conviction that he would rise. Somebody laughed behind the rock onhis right, a laugh that plucked his heart up and cast it down, as adrunken hand shatters a goblet upon the floor.
"I guess you'll never race me on _that_ horse again, fence-rider!"
There was the sound of movement behind the rock; in a moment Grace Kerrrode out from her concealment, not more than four rods beyond the placewhere his horse lay. She rode out boldly and indifferently before hiseyes, turned and looked back at him, her face white as an eveningprimrose in the dusk, as if to tell him that she knew she was safe, evenwithin the distance of his arm, much as she despised his calling and hiskind.
Lambert put his gun back in its sheath, and she rode on, disappearingagain from his sight around the rock where the blasted valley of stonesbranched upon its arid way. He took the saddle from his dead horse andhid it behind a rock, not caring much whether he ever found it again,his heart so heavy that it seemed to bow him to the ground.
So at last he knew her for what Vesta Philbrook had told him shewas--bad to the core of her heart. Kindness could not regenerate her,love could not purge away the vicious strain of blood. She might havescorned him, and he would have bent his head and loved her more; struckhim, and he would have chided her with a look of love. But when she senther bullet into poor old Whetstone's brain, she placed herself beyondany absolution that even his soft heart could yield.
He bent over Whetstone, caressing his head, speaking to him in his oldterms of endearment, thinking of the many fruitless races he had run,believing that his own race in the Bad Lands had come to an end.
If he had but turned back from the foot of the hill where he recognizedher, as duty demanded of him that he turn, and not pressed on with hissimple intention of friendliness which she was too shallow to appreciateor understand, this heavy loss would have been spared him. For this deadanimal was more to him than comrade and friend; more than any man whohas not shared the good and evil times with his horse in the silentplaces can comprehend.
He could not fight a woman; there was no measure of revenge that hecould take against her, but he prayed that she might suffer for thisdeed of treachery to him with a pang intensified a thousand timesgreater than his that hour. Will-o'-the-wisp she had been to him,indeed, leading him a fool's race since she first came twinkling intohis life.
Bitter were his reflections, somber was his heart, as he turned to walkthe thirty miles or more that lay between him and the ranch, leaving oldWhetstone to the wolves.
* * * * *
Lambert was loading cattle nearly a week later when the sheriff returnedVesta's horse, with apologies for its footsore and beaten state. He hadfollowed Kerr far beyond his jurisdiction, pushing him a hard racethrough the hills, but the wily cattleman had evaded him in the end.
The sheriff advised Lambert to put in a bill against the county for theloss of his horse, a proposal which Lambert considered with grave faceand in silence.
"No," he said at last, "I'll not put in a bill. I'll collect in my ownway from the one that owes me the debt."
The Duke Of Chimney Butte Page 23