He had forgotten the pretense that still lay between them, so far as words went when they had last parted. Nor did it yet occur to him that he had swept aside the convention of her being a boy. But she was vividly aware of it, and aware, too, of the demand his last words had made for a recognition of the relationship that existed in feeling between them.
"I knew you knew I was a girl," she murmured.
"You knew more than that," he challenged joyfully.
But, in woman's way, she ignored his frontal attack. He was going at too impetuous a speed for her reluctance. "How long have you known that I wasn't a boy—not from the first, surely?"
"I don't know why I didn't, but I didn't. I was sure locoed," he confessed. "It was when you came out dressed as a gypsy that I knew. That explained to me a heap of things I never had understood before about you."
"It explained, I suppose, why I never had licked the stuffing out of any other kid, and why you did not get very far in making a man out of me as you promised," she mocked.
"Yes, and it explained how you happened to say you were eighteen. By mistake you let the truth slip out. Course I wouldn't believe it."
"I remember you didn't. I think you conveyed the impression to me diplomatically that you had doubts."
"I said it was a lie," he laughed. "I sure do owe you a heap of apologies for being so plumb dogmatic when you knew best. You'll have to sit down on me hard once in a while, or there won't be any living with me."
Blushingly she did some more ignoring. "That was the first time you threatened to give me a whipping," she recalled aloud.
"My goodness! Did I ever talk so foolish?"
"You did, and meant it."
"But somehow I never did it. I wonder why I didn't."
"Perhaps I was so frail you were afraid you would break me."
"No, that wasn't it. In the back of my haid somewhere there was an instinct that said: 'Bucky, you chump, if you don't keep your hands off this kid you'll be right sorry all your life.' Not being given to many ideas, I paid a heap of respect to that one."
"Well, it's too bad, for I probably needed that whipping, and now you'll never be able to give it to me."
"I shan't ever want to now."
Saucily her merry eyes shot him from under the long lashes. "I'm not so sure of that. Girls can be mighty aggravating."
"That's the way girls are meant to be, I expect," he laughed. "But fifteen-year-old boys have to be herded back into line. There's a difference."
She rescued her hands from him and led the way to a bench that served for a seat. "Sit down here, sir. There are one or two things that I have to explain." She sat down beside him at the farther end of the bench.
"This light is so dim, I can't see you away over there," he pleaded, moving closer.
"You don't need to see me. You can hear me, can't you?"
"I reckon."
She seemed to find a difficulty in beginning, even though the darkness helped her by making it impossible for him to see her embarrassment. Presently he chuckled softly. "No, ma'am, I can't even hear you. If you're talking, I'll have to come closer."
"If you do, I'll get up. I want you to be really earnest."
"I never was more earnest in my life, Curly."
"Please, Bucky? It isn't easy to say it, and you mustn't make it harder."
"Do you have to say it, pardner?" he asked, more seriously.
"Yes, I have to say it." And swiftly she blurted it out. "Why do you suppose I came with you to Mexico?"
"I don't know." He grappled with her suggestion for a moment. "I suppose—you said it was because you were afraid of Hardman."
"Well, I wasn't. At least, I wasn't afraid that much. I knew that I would have been quite safe next time with the Mackenzies at the ranch."
"Then why was it?"
"You can't think of any reason?" She leaned forward and looked directly into his eyes—eyes as honest and as blue as an Arizona sky.
But he stood unconvicted—nay, acquitted. The one reason she had dreaded he might offer to himself had evidently never entered his head. Whatever guesses he might have made on the subject, he was plainly guiltless of thinking she might have come with him because she was in love with him.
"No, I can't think of any other reason, if the one you gave isn't the right one."
"Quite sure?"
"Quite sure, pardner."
"Think! Why did you come to Chihuahua?"
"To run down Wolf Leroy's gang and to get Dave Henderson out of prison."
"Perhaps there is a reason why I should want him out of prison, a better reason than you could possibly have."
"I don't savvy it. How can there be? You don't know him, do you? He's been in prison almost ever since you were born." And on top of his last statement Bucky's eyes began to open with a new light. "Good heavens! It can't be possible. You're not Webb Mackenzie's little girl, are you?"
She did not answer him in words, but from her neck she slipped a chain and handed it to him. On the chain hung a locket.
The ranger struck a match and examined the trinket. "It's the very missing locket. See! Here's the other one. Compare them together." He touched the spring and it opened, but the match was burned out and he had to light another. "Here's the mine map that has been lost all these years. How did you get this? Have you always had it? And how long have you known that you were Frances Mackenzie?"
His questions tumbled out one upon another in his excitement.
She laughed, answering him categorically. "I don't know, for sure. Yes, at least a great many years. Less than a week."
"But—I don't understand—"
"And won't until you give me a chance to do some of the talking," she interrupted dryly.
"That's right. I reckon I am getting off left foot first. It's your powwow now," he conceded.
"So long as I can remember exactly I have always lived with the man Hardman and his wife. But before that I can vaguely recall something different. It has always seemed like a kind of fairyland, for I was a very little tot then. But one of the things I seem to remember was a sweet, kind-eyed mother and a big, laughing father. Then, too, there were horses and lots of cows. That is about all, except that the chain around my neck seemed to have some connection with my early life. That's why I always kept it very carefully, and, after one of the lockets broke, I still kept it and the funny-looking paper inside of it."
"I don't understand why Hardman didn't take the paper," he interrupted.
"I suppose he did, and when he discovered that it held only half the secret of the mine he probably put it back in the locket. I see you have the other part."
"It was lost at the place where the robbers waited to hold up the T. P. Limited. Probably you lost it first and one of the robbers found it."
"Probably," she said, in a queer voice.
"What was the first clue your father had had for many years about his little girl. He happened to be at Aravaipa the day you and I first met. I guess he took a fancy to me, for he asked me to take this case up for him and see if I couldn't locate you. I ran Hardman down and made him tell me the whole story. But he lied about some of it, for he told me you were dead."
"He is a born liar," the girl commented. "Well, to get on with my story. Anderson, or Hardman, as he now calls himself, except when he uses his stage name of Cavallado, went into the show business and took me with him. When I was a little bit of a girl he used to use me for all sorts of things, such as a target for his knife throwing and to sell medicine to the audience. Lots of people would buy because I was such a morsel of a creature, and I suppose he found me a drawing card. We moved all over the country for years. I hated the life. But what could I do?"
"You poor little lamb," murmured the man. "And when did you find out who you were?"
"I heard you talking to him the night you took him back to Epitaph, and then I began to piece things together. You remember you went over the whole story with him again just before we reached the town."
"And you
knew it was you I was talking about?"
"I didn't know. But when you mentioned the locket and the map, I knew. Then it seemed to me that since this man Henderson had lost so many years of his life trying to save me I must do something for him. So I asked you to take me with you. I had been a boy so long I didn't think you would know the difference, and you did not. If I hadn't dressed as a girl that time you would not know yet."
"Maybe, and maybe not," he smiled. "Point is, I do know, and it makes a heap of difference to me."
"Yes, I know," she said hurriedly. "I'm more trouble now."
"That ain't it," he was beginning, when a thought brought him up short. As the daughter of Webb Mackenzie this girl was no longer a penniless outcast, but the heiress of one-half interest in the big Rocking Chair Ranch, with its fifteen thousand head of cattle. As the first he had a perfect right to love her and to ask her to marry him, but as the latter—well, that was quite a different affair. He had not a cent to bless himself with outside of his little ranch and his salary, and, though he might not question his own motives under such circumstances, there would be plenty who would question them for him. He was an independent young man as one could find in a long day's ride, and his pride rose up to padlock his lips.
She looked across at him in shy surprise, for all the eagerness had in an instant been sponged from his face. With a hard, impassive countenance he dropped the hand he had seized and turned away.
"You were saying—" she suggested.
"I reckon I've forgot what it was. It doesn't matter, anyhow."
She was hurt, and deeply. It was all very well for her to try her little wiles to delay him, but in her heart she longed to hear the words he had been about to say. It had been very sweet to know that this brown, handsome son of Arizona loved her, very restful to know that for the first time in her life she could trustfully let her weakness lean on the strength of another. And, more than either, though she sometimes smilingly pretended to deny it to herself, was the ultimate fact that she loved him. His voice was music to her, his presence joy. He brought with him sunshine, and peace, and happiness.
He was always so reliable, so little the victim of his moods. What could have come over him now to change him in that swift instant? Was she to blame? Had she unknowingly been at fault? Or was there something in her story that had chilled him? It was characteristic of her that it was herself she doubted and not him; that it never occurred to her that her hero had feet of clay like other men.
She felt her heart begin to swell, and choked back a sob. It wrung him to hear the little breath catch, but he was a man, strong-willed and resolute. Though he dug his finger nails into his palms till the flesh was cut he would not give way to his desire.
"You're not angry at me—Bucky?" she asked softly.
"No, I'm not angry at you." His voice was cold because he dared not trust himself to let his tenderness creep into it.
"I haven't done anything that I ought not to? Perhaps you think it wasn't—wasn't nice to—to come here with you."
"I don't think anything of the kind," his hard voice answered. "I think you're a prince, if you want to know."
She smiled a little wanly, trying to coax him back into friendliness. "Then if I'm a prince you must be a princess," she teased.
"I meant a prince of good fellows."
"Oh!" She could be stiff, too, if it came to that.
And at this inopportune moment the key turned harshly and the door swung open.
CHAPTER 12. A CLEAN WHITE MAN'S OPTION
The light of a lantern coming down the steps blinded them for a moment. Behind the lantern peered the yellow face of the turnkey. "Ho, there, Americano! They want you up above," the man said. "The generals, and the colonels, and the captains want a little talk with you before they hang you, senor."
The two soldiers behind the fellow cackled merrily at his wit, and the encouraged turnkey tried again.
"We shall trouble you but a little time. Only a few questions, senor, an order, and then poco tiempo, after a short walk to the gallows—paradise."
"What—what do you mean?" gasped the girl whitely.
"Never mind, muchacho. This is no affair of yours. Your turn will come later. Have no fear of that," nodded the wrinkled old parchment face.
"But—but he hasn't done anything wrong."
"Ho, ho! Let him explain that to the generals and the colonels," croaked the old fellow. "And that you may explain the sooner, senor, hurry—let your feet fly!"
Bucky walked across to the girl he loved and took her hands in his.
"If I don't come back before three hours read the letter that I wrote you yesterday, dear. I have left matches on that bench so that you may have a light. Be brave, pardner. Don't lose your nerve, whatever you do. We'll both get out of this all right yet."
He spoke in a low voice, so that the guards might not hear, and it was in kind that she answered.
"I'm afraid, Bucky; afraid away down deep. You don't half believe yourself what you say. I can't stand it to be here alone and not know what's going on. They might be—be doing what that man said, and I not know anything about it till afterward." She broke down and began to sob. "Oh, I know I'm a dreadful little coward, but I can't be like you—and you heard what he said."
"Sho! What he says is nothing. I'm an American citizen, and I reckon that will carry us through all right. Uncle Sam has awful long arms, and these greasers know it. I'm expecting to come back here again, little pardner. But if I don't make it, I want you, just as soon as they turn you loose, to go straight to your father's ranch."
"Come! This won't do. Look alive, senor," the turnkey ordered, and to emphasize his words reached a hand forward to pluck away the sobbing lad. Bucky caught his wrist and tightened on it like a vise. "Hands off, here!" he commanded quietly.
The man gave a howl of pain and nursed his hand gingerly after it was released.
"Oh, Bucky, make him let me go, too," the girl wailed, clinging to his coat.
Gently he unfastened her fingers. "You know I would if I could, Curly; but it isn't my say-so."
And with that he was gone. Ashen-faced she watched him go, and as soon as the door had closed groped her way to the bench and sank down on it, her face covered with her hands. He was going to his death. Her lover was going to his death. Why had she let him go? Why had she not done something—thought of some way to save him?
The ranger's guards led him to the military headquarters in the next street from the prison. He observed that nearly a whole company of Rurales formed the escort, and this led him to conclude that the government party was very uneasy as to the situation and had taken precautions against a possible attempt at rescue. But no such attempt was made. The sunny streets were pretty well deserted, except for a few lounging peons hardly interested enough to be curious. The air of peace, of order, sat so incongruously over the plaza that Bucky's heart fell. Surely this was the last place on earth for a revolution to make any headway of consequence. His friends were hidden away in holes and cellars, while Megales dominated the situation with his troops. To expect a reversal of the situation was surely madness.
Yet even while the thought was in his mind he caught a glimpse in a doorway of a man he recognized. It was Rodrigo, one of his allies of the previous night's escapade, and it seemed to him that the man was trying to tell him something with his eyes. If so, the meaning of his message failed to carry home, for after the ranger had passed he dared not look back again.
So far as the trial itself went, O'Connor hoped for nothing and was the less disappointed. One glance at his judges was enough to convince him of the futility of expectation. He was tried by a court-martial presided over by General Carlo. Beside him sat a Colonel Onate and Lieutenant Chaves. In none of the three did he find any room for hope. Carlo was a hater of Americans and a butcher by temperament and choice, Chaves a personal enemy of the prisoner, and Onate looked as grim an old scoundrel as Jeffreys the hanging judge of James Stuart. Governor Megales, thou
gh not technically a member of the court, was present, and took an active part in the prosecution. He was a stout, swarthy little man, with black, beady eyes that snapped restlessly to and fro, and from his manner to the officers in charge of the trial it was plain that he was a despot even in his own official family.
The court did not trouble itself with forms of law. Chaves was both principal witness and judge, notwithstanding the protest of the prisoner. Yet what the lieutenant had to offer in the way of testimony was so tinctured with bitterness that it must have been plain to the veriest novice he was no fit judge of the case.
But Bucky knew as well as the judges that his trial was a merely perfunctory formality. The verdict was decided ere it began, and, indeed, so eager was Megales to get the farce over with that several times he interrupted the proceedings to urge haste.
It took them just fifteen minutes from the time the young American was brought into the room to find him guilty of treason and to decide upon immediate execution as the fitting punishment.
General Carlo turned to the prisoner. "Have you anything to say before I pronounce sentence of death upon you?"
"I have," answered Bucky, looking him straight in the eyes. "I am an American, and I demand the rights of a citizen of the United States."
"An American?" Incredulously Megales lifted his eyebrows. "You are a Spanish gypsy, my friend."
The ranger was fairly caught in his own trap. He had donned the gypsy masquerade because he did not want to be taken for what he was, and he had succeeded only too well. He had played into their hands. They would, of course, claim, in the event of trouble with the United States, that they had supposed him to be what his costume proclaimed him, and they would be able to make good their pretense with a very decent appearance of candor. What an idiot of sorts he had been!
"We understand each other perfectly, governor. I know and you know that I am an American. As a citizen of the United States I claim the protection of that flag. I demand that you will send immediately for the United States consul to this city."
Megales leaned forward with a thin, cruel smile on his face. "Very well, senor. Let it be as you say. Your friend, Senor O'Halloran, is the United States consul. I shall be very glad to send for him if you can tell me where to find him. Having business with him to-day, I have despatched messengers who have been unable to find him at home. But since you know where he is, and are in need of him, perhaps you can assist me with information of value."
Bucky OConnor Page 13