CHAPTER XXV

"Carston's locoed. He's plumb crazy. There can't be a jail for whites and a palace for Injins. He don't suppose he can stop me, does he?" Bud began, excitedly.

Bill, encouraged by Jim's mastery of the situation, chaffingly answered: "After you arrest Nat-u-ritch you'll never hold office, Bud. You may hold a harp or a coal-shovel." Then he laughed.

"My! You're making a fuss over a squaw," said Bud, who could see no humor in Bill's words.

But Bill replied, "Arrestin' the mother of innocent kids will not be considered a popular form of amusement around here, Bud."

"Kids? What's that got to do with it?"

"Well," said Bill. "The kid's an influential citizen hereabouts. He's our long suit, and there ain't a live thing on the ranch that would let you arrest his rag doll. You couldn't get away with it, Bud." And as though it were his final word on the subject, Bill said, conclusively, "Better get elected some easier way."

A new idea fermented in Bud's brain. If he failed in his scheme to bring to trial the murderer of Cash Hawkins, hundreds of men to whom he had blustered and sworn that he would accomplish the deed would no longer believe in him and he would probably lose the election. Why not try to gain some compensation if this must be the case?

"Git our horses ready, Clarke," he said and watched his assistant leave the yard. Slowly Bud hitched his foot on a log, and, as though he were about to confer a favor upon Jim, spoke with condescension. "Mr. Carston takes this too much to heart, Bill. Perhaps we can come to some understanding."

"What do you mean?"

"Well, he's come into some money, ain't he? Of course I might lose this match-safe crossing Red River." He lovingly fingered the little bag. Bill drew nearer. "And I might"—Bud continued—"be made independent of the job of sheriff, if it's worth the boss's while." There was no mistaking the intention of his words.

"Bud!" For a moment Bill could say no more. In the past he and Bud had been friends—bar-room friends, it was true—but lately he had begun to suspect much about the Sheriff's career that was unsavory. Until to-day, however, he had had no proof that Bud could behave like a blackguard. "Bud," he rejoined, "you're goin' to make me lose my temper, and I 'ain't done that for twenty years." As he spoke he raised his foot on the log beside Bud's and in deliberate imitation of him leaned his elbow on his knee while he stared straight into the Sheriff's face.

"Don't be foolish," Bud began. "I can put you to a lot of trouble, and I will. I'll arrest these English people and put 'em under bond to appear as witnesses. They were at Maverick that day, and I got my posse ready and waitin' to obey orders." This, he thought, was the final shot to bring Bill to his senses. He waited.

With a tolerance that did not hide his contempt, Bill spoke. "Except for Jim's orders, I'd throw you off the place. Get agoin', Bud—get agoin'—and don't stop to pick flowers."

Bud knew that Bill was conveying a threat which, he felt, as he watched his face, it were wiser not to disregard. He walked towards the barn, stopped, ground his teeth, and looked back at Bill; but the big fellow stood motionless and in supreme disgust watched the Sheriff. Bud uttered a low oath, then hurried down to the corral.

Still, Bill did not move. He did not hear Diana as she opened the cabin door and, drinking in the fresh morning air, said, "I feel as though I should suffocate in there." Her looks told that something more than the close air of the cabin room was stifling her. As she came from under the porch she saw the immovable figure of the foreman leaning over the log with his head on his hands, watching several men down the road who were mounting horses and preparing to make a start.

"Oh, Mr.—" She paused.

Bill turned. He saw she had forgotten his name. "Bill, miss," he said.

"Mr. Bill—"

But Bill interrupted as he raised his hat. "Just plain Bill, if you don't mind—and there ain't anything too good for you at Red Butte ranch, lady."

Impulsively Diana held out her hand to Bill, who took it. "Thank you, Bill. It's good to feel that I'm among friends, because I feel so strange, so bewildered." She had learned of the foreman's devotion to Jim and knew that she could trust him. "Bill," she asked, "what do they mean by 'squaw-man'?" There was so much she could not say to Jim, so much that had puzzled her, and she longed to unburden her heart to some one. This faithful soul would understand her, and would, perhaps, help her to learn more about Jim and the Indian woman, concerning whose fate she was now growing anxious.

Bill seated himself. "Well, it's the name some people give a white man who marries an Indian squaw." Then quickly he added: "But I want you to understand, miss, Jim's respected in spite of the fact he's a squaw man. He's lived that down."

"Of course it was a great surprise to us all at first."

"Natural it would be, miss. Of course no ordinary white man would have done it. But you mustn't think any the less of Jim for that, miss."

Quickly Diana answered, in sympathetic accord with Bill's loyalty to his master: "I think all the more of him, Bill. It's only another of Jim's glorious mistakes." Then again she thought of the woman. "I wish I could see her. What is she like?"

Bill could not understand this interest in Nat-u-ritch. "Just a squaw," he said, indifferently. "She's got two ideas, and I guess only two—Hal and Jim."

He liked the little woman, but he could see where she had been a great disadvantage to Jim.

But Diana's voice as she said, "A mother and a wife—that's a good deal, Bill," made him realize that perhaps he was not doing the Indian girl justice. He could see the tears in Diana's eyes as she spoke. "And her boy goes back home with us."

Bill rose. "Kind of tough on yours truly, lady, bein' as Hal and me are kind of side-partners, but then I got to recollect it's the best for the kid. That's about the size of it, ain't it?" This time it was Bill who solicited comfort from Diana. The thought of the child's leaving them had been a difficult proposition for the boys, and they had discussed it long and excitedly when Jim told them the plan the night before.

Diana understood. "It involves a lot of suffering all around, doesn't it, Bill? But it seems to me Nat-u-ritch gets the worst of it."

True to his opinion of the red race, Bill answered, "She's an Injin—used to takin' things as they come," and he hardly heard Diana's words:

"Poor little savage!"

This lady had appealed to him—why shouldn't he ask her advice? It was all very well for him to have frightened the Sheriff into leaving the place, all very well to appear sanguine and hopeful while the boss stood near him, but in his heart he knew he was afraid. Something in the shifting, malicious look of Bud Hardy's eyes as he left the place told Bill that there might still be trouble. Twisting the rim of his big hat nervously, he said:

"Say, miss, you got a lawyer in your party, 'ain't you?" Diana turned to listen to him. "Oh, but pshaw!" he went on, trying to reassure himself even while he spoke the disquieting words. "It 'll never get to the lawyer, cause Jim 'll never let him arrest her—never!"

"Arrest her!" Diana exclaimed, in surprise.

Bill explained. "Nat-u-ritch. The Sheriff thinks he can prove she killed Cash Hawkins—that day you were at Maverick."

Jim had not recalled that incident to Diana last night. He had told her he owed his life to the Indian girl—how and why he had not explained. Eagerly she leaned towards Bill as she cautiously said, "Why did she kill him?"

"Well, if"—and Bill dwelled on the word—"if she killed him, she did it to save Jim's life, and it stands to reason Jim ain't goin' to see her suffer for it." Then as he saw a troubled look on Diana's face he regretted the admission of his worries. "Say, miss, I'm awful glad that you an' Hal are goin' to pull your freight, for there's goin' to be merry hell around here."

He quickly begged her pardon for his involuntary slip, but Diana had hardly noticed it. This would mean new worry for Jim. Then she comforted herself with the thought that perhaps this kind-hearted soul was exaggerating things. Surely, if there were cause for anxiety, Jim would have spoken to her about it.

"Is there nothing that can be done, Bill?"

He shook his head.

"Well, is there anything that I can do?"

"Don't see how, except to git away as soon's you can." And then he told her of Bud's proposition to obtain money from Jim, and that the Sheriff was willing to sell his evidence against the Indian girl. "Why," he added, "I 'most kicked him off the place; and Bud will fight, you know."

But Diana was only concerned to know whether the Sheriff was safely out of the way. "You say the Sheriff's gone?"

"Thank Heaven!" Bill answered. "And, by-the-bye, just to be more cantankerous, he threatened to hold up you and your party as witnesses; but that wouldn't be legal, would it?" As he remembered the boys he added, chuckling, "It certainly wouldn't be popular."

Before Diana could reply, Jim interrupted them. Like a restless spirit he had been wandering over the place, from barn to cabin, from Hal's sleeping-room to the boys' quarters; accomplishing little and vainly trying to accept the events that had crowded into his life during the last hours. The Sheriff, he felt sure, could easily be managed, but Nat-u-ritch's disappearance was causing him anxiety. He knew it was a trait in the Indian character to hide away and stoically endure its grief in silence. Every moment he expected her to return. Stronger than all these thoughts was the desire that Diana should go at once, and little Hal with her. This speedy termination would make it easier for them all, he told himself, and then there were matters enough to claim his attention. So he reasoned as he came from the back of the house, where he had been brooding over a valise containing the child's belongings. As he saw Diana sitting there deep in conversation with Bill, he stood amazed at the simple adaptability that made it possible for her to adjust herself to these primitive belongings and people. Bill was already regarding her as a friend. Then he remembered that he must see Tabywana to tell him of Nat-u-ritch's disappearance, and arrange a plan with him to help her to evade Bud for several days.

"Bill, I wish you would get Baco. I have sent for Tabywana, and want Baco to interpret for me."

Bill's heavy boots creaked down the corral.

"I hope you've rested well, Diana," Jim said.

"I haven't been to bed, Jim. I've been trying to think it all out." She rose and came to him. "Would she be quite impossible at Maudsley Towers?"

Jim knew she wanted to take up their conversation where it had stopped last night. They had discussed the subject already, and he felt the futility of going over the same arguments. It only tormented him, so he answered, "Quite."

Diana persisted. "Couldn't she be sent to school for a few years?"

"It's too late. That might have been done when she was a child, but now she's a woman."

"And a mother." Then hurriedly, as though fearful that she would not have the courage to express to Jim all her concern for Nat-u-ritch, she said, "Jim, I wonder if we are treating her quite fairly?"

"I hope so." And in Jim's voice there was a prayer.

During the night many thoughts had haunted Diana. The soft little arms that had clung to her the night before troubled her. What would their loss mean to this child-woman of the woods? She decided to make one more appeal to Jim and frankly lay before him the conflicting emotions that had torn her since her arrival at the ranch.

"At first, Jim, I hated everybody, then I pitied you. Now I am thinking of her." Jim listened intently. She laid her hand on his arm. "Civilization has bred in people like you and me many needs and interests. But this helpless child-mother has just her child and you, and we are taking the child away. Oh, have you the right to sacrifice her even for the child?"

Jim could not argue. He had made his decision when Petrie wrested from him the concession to let the child go to be prepared for the life he had no right to deny him.

"I have done the best I know how, Diana," he said, simply. "We must leave the rest to God," and Diana knew that the words were the result of his own bitter struggle and she could no longer doubt their wisdom.

She stood silent. Jim looked at her. Of their own love that had endured all these years, neither spoke. It was Jim's moment of greatest temptation. He longed to say something to her that might express what he felt; but again he conquered himself.

"Will you take Hal?" was all he said. "I want you to get away before the heat of the day."

And Diana left him.