From the first his sympathies for Barbara had been deep, beginning on the evening Lane Morgan had mentioned her in his presence—when the man seemed to see her in that strange, awesome moment before his death—when he had seemed to hold out his arms to her. Later, at Lamo, when Harlan had held the girl in his arms, he felt that at that instant he must have experienced much the same protective impulse that Morgan would have felt, had the experience occurred to him. Harlan had been slightly cynical until that minute; but since then he had known that his rage against the outlaws was deeply personal.
That rage, though, had centered most heavily upon Deveny. He had hated Haydon, too—from the first. In the beginning it had been a jealous hatred, aroused over the conviction that Barbara loved the man. But later—when he had discovered that Haydon was the mysterious “Chief,” that he was the real murderer of Lane Morgan, and that behind his professed love for the girl was meditated trickery—his hatred had become a passion in which Barbara did not figure.
His hatred for Haydon, though, could not be compared with the passionate contempt and loathing he felt for Deveny. The man had attempted, in Lamo, a thing that Harlan had always abhorred, and the memory of that time was still vivid in Harlan’s brain.
Into Harlan’s heart as he rode toward the Star flamed that ancient loathing, paling his face and bringing a gleam to his eyes that had been in them often of late—a lust for the lives of the men whose evil deeds and sinister influence had kept Barbara a virtual prisoner at the Rancho Seco.
He rode the valley trail slowly, his thoughts upon Barbara, his lips straightening when he thought of how he would have to return to the Rancho Seco, some day, to tell her of her brother’s death. Twice had tragedy visited her, and again he would be the messenger to bring her the grim news.
When he reached the Star he rode up to the corral fence and dismounted. He stood for a long time at the fence, his elbows on one of the rails, his thoughts dwelling upon Barbara. Pity for her whitened his face, set his lips in rigid lines.
She had been in danger, but it seemed to him that it would soon be over. For Haydon would bother the girl no more, and as soon as he could meet Deveny he would remove another menace to Barbara’s life and happiness.
He had no regrets for the men he had killed; they deserved what he had given them. As he had told Morgan, he had considered himself merely an instrument of the law of right and justice—which law was based upon the very principle that governed men in civilized communities.
He was facing south, and he raised his head after a few minutes, for upon the slight breeze was borne to him the rapid drumming of hoofs. As he looked up he saw, far out toward the southern edge of the valley, a dust cloud, moving swiftly toward him.
At first he suspected that the men in the group belonged to Deveny, and he drew out his pistols, one after the other, and examined them—for he decided—if Deveny was among the men—to settle for good the question of power and authority that Haydon had raised.
When the men came closer, though, swooping toward the ranchhouse like feathers before a hurricane, he saw that Rogers was among them.
Then, as the men came toward him down along the corral fence, Harlan saw that Rogers’ eyes were wide with excitement. And he stood, his face darkening, as Rogers told him what he had seen, and voiced his suspicions.
“We’re with you, Harlan,” declared Rogers, sweeping a hand toward the men; “an’ them other boys which have trailed Deveny, are with you. We’re out to ‘get’ Deveny if you say the word; and that thief, Haydon, too.”
Harlan did not answer. He grinned at the men, though, and at Rogers—acknowledging his gratitude for their decision to be “with” him; then he turned, leaped on Purgatory, and sent the big beast thundering toward the timber that led to the main trail.
Their voices silent, their horses falling quickly into the pace set by the big black, Rogers and the other men followed.
The other half of Rogers’ men, headed by Colver, were several miles behind Deveny’s horsemen when they reached the South Trail. They gained very little on the other men, though, for Deveny and his men were just then racing Barbara to the point where the trails converged, having seen her. But during Deveny’s halt at the covert, where he had shot Stroud, Colver’s men gained, and they were not more than two or three miles from the covert when Deveny’s men left it.
From the shelving trail, ever sweeping toward the trail in the valley, Colver had noted the halt at the covert, though he had not seen Barbara, nor Stroud. He had seen, of course, that Deveny had not gone to the Rancho Seco, that for some reason or other he had swerved, taking the trail up the valley.
Colver was puzzled, but he remembered Rogers’ orders, and when he and his men reached the covert, they halted. They came upon Stroud, lying near some bushes, and they saw his horse, grazing on the tall grass near by. They had reached the covert too late to see Barbara’s pony; and when they remounted, after taking a look at Stroud, they caught a glimpse of a lone horseman racing up the valley in the direction taken by Deveny and his men.
The lone horseman was Red Linton, though Colver did not know it, for the South Trail dipped into the basin miles before it emerged to the level at the point of convergence with the other trail, and Colver had not seen Linton when he had passed.
Colver and his men fled up the valley, following the trail taken by Deveny and the lone horseman, and when they had gone two or three miles they saw a rider coming toward them. They raced toward him, for they saw he was in trouble; that he had lashed himself to the pommel of the saddle, and that he was leaning far over it, limp and inert.
Linton was not unconscious, but he was very near it; so near that he seemed to dream that men were around him and that voices were directed at him.
Into his mind as he straightened and looked at the men finally came the conviction that this was not a dream; and after an instant of intense effort, during which he fixed his gaze on Colver, he recognized the other.
He laughed, grimly, mockingly:
“Front an’ rear—eh?” he said. “You got me, goin’ an’ comin’. Well, go to it—I deserve it, for lettin’ Barbara out of my sight. If you don’t kill me, Harlan will. But if you guys are men, you won’t let Deveny——”
“Deveny’s got Barbara Morgan?”
This was Colver. Something in his voice straightened Linton further, and he steadied himself in the saddle and looked fairly at the man.
“Deveny’s got her. An’ they got me—chasin’ ’em. I was headin’ back to the Rancho Seco, to get the T Down boys—all Harlan’s friends—to wipe Deveny out. If you guys are men——”
Sheer will could no longer support Linton’s failing muscles—and he again collapsed over the pommel.
For an instant only did Colver hesitate. Then he turned to a lean rider who bestrode a tall, rangy horse. He spoke sharply to the rider:
“Hit the breeze to the Rancho Seco, an’ get them T Down boys. Fan it, damn you!”
The rider was off with the word, leaping his horse down the trail with dizzying speed. Then Colver loosed the rope that held Linton to the saddle, and with the help of the other men lifted the man down and stretched him in a plot of grass beside the trail, where they worked over him until they saw, far out on the level toward the Rancho Seco, a number of horsemen coming, seemingly abreast, as though they were racing, each man trying his best to outstrip the others.
* * *
CHAPTER XXIX
WORLD’S END
Barbara Morgan had fought Deveny until she became exhausted. Thereafter she lay quiet, breathing fast, yielding to the nameless terror that held her in its icy clutch.
The appearance of Deveny so soon after the end of the heartbreaking ride down the trail had brought into her heart a sense of the futility of resistance—and yet she had resisted, involuntarily, instinctively. Yet resistance had merely served to increase the exhaustion that had come upon her.
She had not known—until she lay passive in Deveny’s arms
—how taut her nerves had been, nor how the physical ordeal had drained her strength.
She felt the strain, now, but consideration for her body was overwhelmed by what she saw in Deveny’s eyes as she lay watching him.
There were a dozen men with Deveny—she had seen them, counted them when they had been racing down the shelving trail on the other side of the valley. And she knew they were following Deveny, for she could hear the thudding of hoofs behind.
Deveny’s big arms were around her; she could feel the rippling of his muscles as he swayed from side to side, balancing himself in the saddle. He was not using the reins; he was giving his attention to her, letting the horse follow his own inclinations.
Yet she noted that the animal held to the trail, that he traveled steadily, requiring no word from his rider.
Once, after they had ridden some distance up the valley, Barbara heard a man behind them call Deveny’s attention to some horsemen who were riding the shelving trail that Deveny and his men had taken on their way to the level; and she heard Deveny laugh.
“Some of the Star gang, I reckon. Mebbe Haydon, goin’ to the Rancho Seco, to see his girl.” He grinned down into Barbara’s face, his own alight with a triumph that made a shiver run over her.
Later—only a few minutes, it seemed—she heard a man call to Deveny again, telling him that a lone rider was “fannin’ it” up the valley.
“Looks like that guy, Linton,” said the man.
“Two of you drop back and lay for him!” ordered Deveny. “Make it sure!” he added, after a short pause.
Barbara yielded to a quick horror. She fought with Deveny, trying in vain to free her arms—which he held tightly to her sides with his own. She gave it up at last, and lay, looking up into his face, her eyes blazing with impotent rage and repugnance.
“You mean to kill him?” she charged.
“Sure,” he laughed; “there’s no one interfering with what’s going on now.”
Overcome with nausea over the conviction that Deveny’s order meant death to Red Linton, Barbara lay slack in Deveny’s arms for a long time. A premonitory silence had settled over the valley; she heard the dull thud of hoofs behind her, regular and swift, the creaking of the saddle leather as the animal under her loped forward.
There was no other sound. For the men behind her were strangely silent, and even Deveny seemed to be listening.
After what seemed to be a long interval, she heard a shot, and then almost instantly, another. She shuddered, closing her eyes, for she knew they had killed Linton. And she had blamed Linton for guarding her from—from the very thing that had happened to her. And Linton had given his life for her!
How long she had her eyes closed she did not know. The time could not have been more than a few minutes though, for she heard a voice behind her saying to Deveny:
“They got him.”
Then she looked up, to see Deveny grinning at her.
“I reckon that’s all,” he said. “We’re headin’ for the Cache—my hang-out. If you’d have been good over in Lamo, the day that damned Harlan came, this wouldn’t have happened. I’d sent for a parson, an’ I intended to give you a square deal. But now it’s different. Then I was scared of running foul of Haydon—I didn’t want to make trouble. But I’m running my own game now—Haydon and me have agreed to call it quits. Me not liking the idea of Haydon adopting Harlan.”
She stared up at him, her eyes widening.
“You and Haydon were—what do you mean?” she asked, her heart seeming to be a dead weight in her breast, heavy with suspicion over the dread significance in his voice and words. She watched him, breathlessly.
“I’m meaning that Haydon and me were running things in the valley—that we were partners, splitting equal. But I’m playing a lone hand now.”
He seemed to enjoy her astonishment—the light in her eyes which showed that comprehension, freighted with hopelessness, was stealing over her.
He grinned hugely as he watched her face.
“Haydon is the guy we called ‘Chief,’” he said, enjoying her further amazement and noting the sudden paleness that swept over her face. “He’s the guy who killed your father at Sentinel Rock. He was after you, meaning to make a fool of you. Hurts—does it?” he jeered, when he saw her eyes glow with a rage that he could understand. “I’ve heard of that chain deal—Haydon was telling me. When he shot your father he lost a bit of chain. Harlan found it and gave it back to him, with you looking on. I reckon that’s why him and Harlan hit it off together so well—Harlan knowing he killed your father and not telling you about it.”
The long shudder that shook the girl betrayed something of the terrible emotion under which she was laboring; and when she finally opened her eyes to gaze again into Deveny’s, they were filled with a haunting hopelessness—a complete surrender to the sinister circumstances which seemed to have surrounded her from the beginning.
“Harlan,” she said weakly, as though upon him she had pinned her last hope; “Harlan has joined you after all—he is against me—too?”
“Him and Haydon are after the Rancho Seco. Harlan’s been playing with Haydon right along.”
Barbara said nothing more. She was incapable of coherent thought or of definite action—or even of knowledge of her surroundings.
For it seemed to her that Deveny had spoken truthfully. She had seen the incident of the broken chain; she had seen Harlan’s hypocritical grin upon that occasion—how he had seemed to be eager to ingratiate himself with Haydon.
All were against her—everybody. Everybody, it seemed, but Red Linton. And they had killed Linton.
She seemed to be drifting off into a place which was peopled with demons that schemed and planned for her honor and her life; and not one of them who planned and schemed against her gave the slightest indication of mercy or manliness. The world became chaotic with swirling objects—then a blank, aching void into which she drifted, feeling nothing, seeing nothing.
* * *
CHAPTER XXX
THE ULTIMATE TREACHERY
When Barbara regained consciousness she was lying in some long, dusty grass beside the trail where she seemed to have been thrown, or where she had fallen. For she was lying on her right side, her right arm doubled under her, and she felt a pain in her shoulder which must have been where she had struck when she had fallen.
She twisted around and sat up, bewildered, almost succumbing to the hideous terror which instantly gripped her when she remembered what had happened.
Deveny’s horse stood near her, nipping the tips of the grass that grew at her feet. Beyond the animal—a little to her right, and perhaps fifty feet from her—were other horses, with riders.
As she staggered to her feet she recognized the men who had been with Deveny. They were on their horses—all facing away from her. Facing Deveny’s men were all the T Down boys—she recognized them instantly. Pistols glittered in their hands; they seemed to be in the grip of some strong passion, which wreathed their faces into grim, bitter lines.
Near the T Down men—flanking them—were other men. Among them she saw faces she knew—Colver, Strom Rogers, and others.
There must have been twenty-five or thirty men, altogether, and they were all on a little level beside the trail. It seemed to Barbara that they all appeared to have forgotten her; seemed not to know that she was in the vicinity.
She saw Deveny standing on the little level. His profile was toward her; there was a wild, savage glare in his eyes.
Not more than a dozen feet from him was Harlan.
She saw Harlan’s face from the side also. There was a grin on his lips—bitter, mirthless, terrible.
She stood for what seemed to her a long time, watching all of them; her heart throbbing with a dread heaviness that threatened to choke her; her body in a state of icy paralysis.
She thought she knew what had happened, for it seemed to her that everything in the world—all the passions and the desires of men—centered upon her. She felt
that there were two factions—one headed by Deveny, and the other by Harlan, representing Haydon—and that they were about to fight for her. The T Down men seemed to be standing with Harlan—as, of course, they would, since he had sent for them to come to the Rancho Seco.
Oddly, though, they apparently seemed to pay no attention to her; not one of them looked at her.
If they were to fight it made no difference to her which faction won, for her fate would be the same, if she stayed.
She did not know what put the thought into her mind, but as she stood there watching the men she repeated mentally over and over the words: “If I stay.”
Why should she stay? She answered the question by stealing toward Deveny’s horse. When she reached the animal she paused, glancing apprehensively at the men, her breathing suspended—hoping, dreading, her nerves and muscles taut. It seemed they must see her.
Not a man moved as she climbed upon the back of the horse; it seemed to her as she urged the animal gently and slowly away from the men that they heard nothing and saw nothing but Harlan and Deveny, and that Harlan and Deveny saw nothing but each other.
She sent the horse away, walking him for a dozen yards or more, until he crossed the little level and sank into a shallow depression in the trail. Still looking back, she saw that none of the men had changed position—that they seemed to be more intent upon Harlan and Deveny. And she could hear Harlan’s voice, now, low, husky.
She urged the horse into a lope; and when she had ridden perhaps a hundred yards, the conviction that she would escape grew strong in her. Once out of the valley she would ride straight to Lamo, to ask Sheriff Gage to protect her.
She rode faster as she widened the distance that separated her from the men; and soon the horse was covering the trail rapidly; and she leaned forward in the saddle, praying that the men might not see her.
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