by Zane Grey
“They said you were a devil with the women,” retorted June, unconscious of jealousy.
“Never mind what I was. It’s what I am now thet should count with yu. Trust me, June.”
“It’s none of my business,” said June, distantly, her face averted.
Brazos gave her a little shake and pulled her closer, scarcely master of himself under the sweet and bewildering feelings she had betrayed. She had made no attempt to withdraw her hands, and when he drew her so close that her cheek brushed his shoulder still she did not repulse him.
“June, it’s all yore business. If yu won’t trust me aboot this Surface girl I’ll never go near her. An’ by thet we might lose time. For Lura Surface, withoot knowin’, will give me hunches.”
“But she hates Jan an’ me,” declared June, with heat. “Jan hates her—and I’m going to hate her.”
“Why does Janis hate her?”
“She made a fool out of Allen. That happened before we came home.”
“Was Allen in love with her?”
“Yes.”
“Wal, thet lady ‘pears to have a trade rat’s instinct to collect—only she doesn’t trade.”
“There you’re wrong, Brazos. She does trade—if you mean kiss for kiss, and all that.”
“How do yu know?”
“Women don’t have to be told such things. We just know.”
“Ahuh,” rejoined Brazos. He was thrillingly aware of June resting her cheek ever so slightly against his shoulder, and yearned to prolong the disturbing contact.
“Jan and I tried to be decent to Lura Surface,” went on June. “We didn’t hold anything against her because she lived in our home. And she is pretty and fascinating, even to girls. But she stuck up her nose at us. One day she came into the restaurant with Henry Sisk. Jan and I ignored them. Would not wait upon them. Then Henry came to the counter and wanted to know why he could not get any service. It was Jan he approached. And did Jan tell him? Right then and there Lura Surface lost him.”
“A handsome cat,” muttered Brazos, to himself.
“It’s catty of me—to talk this way,” replied June, turning to face Brazos. “But, Brazos, think of my—of our side of it. Jan and I have been deeply hurt by Lura Surface. But we have been taking our medicine, as Westerners say. Here you come along and fill me—us—with some new wild hope. Suppose you . . . Oh, I wouldn’t say it.”
“June, yu’d hate me, I reckon. An’ shore with reason. But isn’t this because of the new hope thet I may be able to help yore Dad?”
“Yes. Yet it’s only fair to tell you that’s not the only reason.” She had paled again and her eyes were eloquent.
Brazos dared not ask that reason. The sweeter she grew, the more restraint he put upon himself. Then June withdrew her hands.
“We are talking like old friends. I declare I don’t quite recognize myself,” said June, with a nervous laugh, trying to throw off the spell. “I wouldn’t want you to think any cowboy could hold my hands and—and—”
“Wal, I wouldn’t,” interposed Brazos, smiling. “Shore yu’ve been sweet an’ gracious. Yu make me proud, June. An’ I’m askin’ yu. Yore brother Allen was a cowboy. Now if he’d swore on his honor, wouldn’t yu have trusted him?”
“Indeed I would have, Brazos. Allen didn’t make many promises, but you could rely on him.”
“Wal, I’m like Allen, June. I give yu my word. An’ if yu won’t take it, I’ll be hurt powerful deep.”
“Your word for what?” she flashed, dark eyes bright and solemn on his.
“To fight yore Dad’s battle. . . . June, thet means, in the first place, workin’ every way to find things oot. An’ if I pretend to be loco aboot Lura Surface, an’ to drink an’ gamble aboot town, or to do anythin’—yu gotta know I’m playin’ a deep game. I’ll be one lyin’ deceitful hombre. To all but yu, June!”
“Oh, I wouldn’t want Dad to think—”
“I couldn’t fool Hank Bilyen, an’ he’ll explain to Neece. I reckon Kiskadden will savvy, too. An’ thet Texan will help me, June. . . . Give me a free rein, girl.”
“Is it so—so personal, Brazos?” she inquired, wistfully. “Wouldn’t you help Dad to get his property back even if there were no June Neece?”
“I shore would. But there is a June Neece. An’ I’ve—I’m gonna fall powerful hard in thet quarter. Don’t let thet worry yu. It’ll be an anchor for me.”
“How could I help worry? Suppose by some miracle you reinstated Dad at Twin Sombreros Ranch. What would you ask of me?”
“Nothin’, June. Yu’ve already paid me for thet.”
“How?” ‘
“Why—by bein’ so sweet an’—an’ all. I feel what I mean, but cain’t explain. . . . An’ June, yu forget I’m Brazos Keene—gunman an’ killer.”
“Oh, you’re either the most wonderful fellow in the world—or the most brazen devil,” she exclaimed, in a quandary
“June, I’m shore not the first.”
“Yes, you are, Brazos, I don’t care what you’ve been,” she declared suddenly glowing. “I don’t do things by halves. I’ll believe in you, Brazos Keene.”
Brazos put his hand inside his vest and took out his precious letter.
“June, shore thet’ll be aboot all.” Brazos’ drawl could not entirely subdue the emotion in his voice. “Another girl believed in me once. I helped her all I could, but I failed her in thet I never lived up to what she thought me. . . . I want yu to read this letter from her. Kiskadden had me read it to him. An’ thet’s why he set me free. It’ll prove some things to yu, June—the things yu believed true of me. Maybe yu’re the girl Holly speaks of in this letter. I hope to Gawd yu air an’ thet I can be worthy. But for the job in hand, I’m yore man.”
“Holly who?” questioned June, wondering, as she received the letter.
“Did yu ever heah of Holly Ripple?”
“Indeed I did. I remember hearing about her years ago before Jan and I went away to school. She lived out in New Mexico—on a vast Spanish grant. . . . Oh, Allen wrote me five or six years ago—all about Holly Ripple’s ranch and her terrible riders. Brazos, could you have been one of them?”
“Wal, I reckon.”
“Holly Ripple!” June beheld him with searching woman’s eyes.
“Yes . . . I rode with that ootfit, June. She called us her Knights of the Range. . . . Wal—wal—we were all in love with her, yu savvy. An’ the best of us, Renn Frayne, won her love an’ married her. They have a boy they call Brazos, after me. . . . But read the letter some time, an’ keep it safe till yu see me again. . . . An’ now let’s get down to practical things.”
“Oh, Brazos, can we ever be practical?”
“I’ve got to be if yu cain’t. . . . I want to ask some questions aboot Allen. Were yu in his confidence, June?”
“Yes. Allen was afraid to tell Dad what he was doing. And he didn’t even tell Jan.”
“Ahuh. Wal, if I figure Allen correct, he was trackin’ the ootfit thet ruined yore father.”
“He was on the trail of the three men who held Dad up that night and robbed him.”
“Did he tell yu anythin’?”
“Not much. Oh, let me recall it,” she went on, excitedly. “They did not belong around Las Animas. But they rode here often. He had nothing to go by except—except the night they robbed Dad, one of them—a boy with a girl’s voice called another of the three by the name Brad. Allen said Dad told him that.”
“Yes, June, your Dad told me. And here’s the funny part of it. One of the three hombres who held me up thet night called his pard Brad, or a name thet sounded like thet. By Gawd! Those men murdered Allen. He was on their trail. . . . Did any one else but yu know Allen was workin’ on yore father’s case?”
“Yes. It was found out. I remember Allen was sore because the loungers around town called him the cowboy detective. Allen kept the secret of what he suspected and had learned—except from me—but any one could have guessed what he was doing. He w
as so dark and grim and determined.”
“June, do yu reckon Raine Surface heahed what Allen was up to?”
“Lura would have heard it, surely.”
“Shore, she’d tell her father. . . . June, can yu remember any more Allen told yu?”
“Let me think. Yes . . . The night before Allen was killed he had supper with me downstairs. It was late, almost time for Jan and me to come off duty. Allen asked me if I’d seen a handsome hard-faced cowgirl, small and slim with eyes like black diamonds. She looked the real thing in riders, he said. I told Allen no girl of that description had come into the restaurant. Then he said she had made up to him in the Happy Days saloon. He seemed curious, yet distrustful. But he didn’t tell me any more.”
“A cowgirl! . . . Wal, now I wonder. . . . An’ thet’s all, June?”
“I wouldn’t say all by any means. Only it’s all I can remember now. Perhaps when I see you again——”
“Thet’ll be in the mawnin’, I reckon. But don’t worry aboot me. I’m takin’ over Allen’s job of huntin’ for the three hombres who robbed yore Dad—an’ murdered Allen—an’ held me up. . . . An’ shore as death, one of thet three was a girl with a high-keyed voice!”
CHAPTER
5
BRAZOS espied Lura Surface’s white horse tied among the pine saplings before he turned in off the road. He found her most effectively placed in a green-shaded, brown-matted nook opening upon the bank of the swift brook. Bareheaded, her red hair flaming, her strange eyes alight, her lissome full-breasted figure displayed to advantage in her riding habit, she made a picture that struck fire in Brazos, despite his cool preconception.
“Good afternoon, Miss Surface. I shore am sorry to be late,” he drawled, and throwing aside his sombrero he sat down and slid to his elbow beside her.
The green eyes devoured him, for nothing except her effect upon him. Yet her quick breath, and the quick rise of her breast, betrayed a little shock at his nearness. She was used to men, but not of his stripe, Brazos thought. His gun had bumped her knee.
“Howdy, Brazos Keene,” she said, with a smile that enhanced her hard bright charm.
“Wal, I do pretty good, considerin’,” returned Brazos. “Cowboys don’t often fall into such luck as this.”
“I came early. Had a quarrel with father. But I thought yu’d never get here.”
“Wild hawses couldn’t have kept me away from yu, Lura.”
“Same old cowboy blarney.”
“Ump-um. If yu take me for any other cowboy, wal, we won’t get nowhere atall.”
“Where will we get if I take you as I did yesterday?”
“An’ how was thet?”
“A lonely cowboy, down on his luck, unjustly jailed, suspicious of men—an’ needing a friend.”
“Thet’s takin’ me true, Lura. But I cain’t say I’m without friends altogether.”
“You could always get women friends, Brazos.”
“Shore. Thet’s my trouble. I almost didn’t come today.”
“Why?”
“Wal, yu shore took my eye. An’ I knew if I saw yu again I’d go loco.”
“Loco? What’s that? I’ve heard the word.”
“Loco is a weed hawses eat sometimes an’ go oot of their haids.”
“Humph! I can just see you going loco!” she ejaculated. “Why, you’re the coolest cowboy I ever met. And Lord knows I’ve met some cool ones.”
“Wal, suppose at thet I did go loco?”
“I’d be delighted. You’re different, Brazos. Oh, I was sorry when I thought they’d hang you! And what a thrill I had yesterday! Scared too? Brazos Keene—the notorious Brazos Keene! . . . But I’m not so scared now.”
“Gosh, Lady, I’m as harmless as a kitten. . . . So yu’d be delighted if I went plumb loco aboot yu?”
“I’d love it,” she said, slyly, yet with a catch in her voice. Her brazen coquetry had not heretofore been used to subjugate gunmen.
“Lura Surface, I’m not gonna do it. I reckon I’ll get over this meetin’ with yu. But I won’t risk another.”
“Oh,” she pouted, blushing becomingly. “And why not?”
“Yu’re just my dish of a woman an’ if I tasted yu once I’d have nothin’ to look forward to but starvation.”
“I never satisfied any man’s hunger yet. But I might—yours.”
Brazos sat up, and with swift strong arms he drew her back so that she lay almost flat with her head on his breast. Then he held her, gazing down upon a suddenly paling face and eyes that dilated strangely between fear and desire. Her red lips parted. But she was thoroughbred in that, as she had invited this onslaught, she would not show the white feather.
“Lura, yu shore oughtn’t play at love with a hombre like me.”
“Who says I’m playing?”
“Shore yu air. An’ I’ve got sense enough to see it an’ decency enough to spare yu what many a cowboy I’ve known would take.”
“You think I’m a flirt?”
“Wal, I never call women names, onless they’re nice names. . . . Yu’re powerful seductive, Lura, turrible appealin’, an’ pretty isn’t the word. Yu’ve got a devastatin’ kind of beauty. . . . If I let go of myself now, an’ fell to kissin’ yu, as I reckon I might do by force, I’d be a gone goslin’. I might fall stark ravin’ mad in love with yu. An’ where’d thet get me, Lura? I’m Brazos Keene, only a notch or two behind Billy the Kid in range standin’. Yu’re daughter of Raine Surface, rich rancher, an’ yu’re the belle of this corner of Colorado. Suppose such a wild thing as yore fallin’ in love with me. Yu couldn’t never marry me.”
“I could run away with you,” she panted, her eyes like green stars.
“Wal, thet’s too wild for even me to reckon with an’ yu wouldn’t. . . . So when it comes to Brazos Keene just yu figure thet he’s not gonna dream such dreams. At the same time, I’d like yu to know it’d be damn sweet an’ wonderful to tear yu to pieces.”
“Well, since you’re not going to try—please let me up,” she said, serious over what seemed a greater conquest than she had hoped for. If he resisted her, at least he paid tribute to her charm. And perhaps he grew all the more desirable for that. She sat up, scarlet of face.
“I wouldn’t let yu off thet easy next time,” he warned.
“You are a queer one. What’d you meet me for, if not to make love? Who ever heard of a cowboy who didn’t?”
“Wal, heah’s one. Lura, could yu get me a job ridin’ for yore dad?”
“Oh, I’d like that. In fact I thought of it. I said to Father: ‘Why not get this Keene cowboy to ride for us?’ He flouted the idea. That gun-throwing desperado from New Mexico! I guess not!’ And I said: ‘But, Father, you never care how tough cowboys are coming from Dodge or Abilene.’ And he shut me up.”
“Ahuh. He’s got a grudge against Western riders, I reckon. Wal, thet’s tough on us from over the divide.”
“I can’t understand it, Brazos,” she replied, as she straightened her disheveled hair. “Riders like you are not tough or low-down. You may be wild, dangerous, and all that. But Father’s excuse is queer. Why, he has hired rustlers and even outlaws when we ranched outside of Abilene. He had some bad outfits—bad in another sense. That’s why he sold out and came to Colorado.”
“Reckon I savvy thet. Bad ootfits sometimes hurt a cattleman’s reputation,” replied Brazos, casually.
“Indeed they do. Father lost friends in Kansas. He had one serious lawsuit during which some pretty raw things were hinted against him. He shot a cattleman named Stearns.”
“Kill him?” queried Brazos, as if shocked.
“No. Stearns recovered, I’m glad to say.”
“Wal, yore dad didn’t strike me as the shootin’ kind.”
“He’s not,” the girl returned, with some note akin to contempt. “Unless he’s got the edge on the other man. Why, he was scared to go into town for fear he’d run into Allen Neece.”
“Neece? Thet was the cowboy I was ac
cused of killin’. Did yu know him, Lura?”
“Yes. I liked him better than any boy I knew. I was terribly shocked at his death.”
“Reckon yu would be. From all I heah, Neece was a nice chap. Did he ever ride for yu?”
“No. Father not only wouldn’t have Allen but ran him out of the job he had.”
“What for?”
“Allen was in love with me.”
“Aw, I see. Shore tough for Allen—an’ then gettin’ murdered in the bargain. Who could have done thet job, Lura? Some cowboy jealous of yore likin’ for Allen?”
“Hardly. No cowboy ever liked me that well.”
“When did yu see Allen last?” asked Brazos, apparently growing interested.
“The very night he was murdered. I was in town. I met him coming out of the Show Down Saloon. He was half drunk. Allen took to drink after the Neeces lost Twin Sombreros. He didn’t see me. And I didn’t stop him for the good reason that he was with a little black-eyed wench in boy’s pants. She was hanging on to Allen as if she’d lose him. I had seen her once before somewhere. I think on the street in Dodge. Not the dancehall type, but a pretty hard-faced hussy. I’ll always remember her and think she had something to do with Allen’s murder.”
“Shore thet might be. She scraped acquaintance with Allen, got him to drinkin’, an’ had a couple of hombres ootside, maybe, waitin’ to rob him. I’ve known thet to happen to many a cowboy.”
“It’ll never happen to Allen Neece again, poor devil. If it hadn’t been for that black-eyed girl my conscience would hurt me.”
“Yore what?” drawled Brazos, with his slow smile.
“I daresay you think I have no conscience—or any womanly virtues.”
“Nope. But yu don’t need anythin’ with yore good looks. . . . Lura, yu’ve made me doggone interested in young Neece’s case.”
“Have you seen his doll-faced sisters—the twins?” she asked, quickly, and the green eyes showed her true nature.
“Did he have sisters? I didn’t know. Tough on them, I reckon.”
“Humph! They didn’t seem to take it so hard. They didn’t even stop slinging hash—not for a day.”