Laramie Holds the Range | Page 6

ready to push aside the curtain and
spring from the stage at the least alarm, Kate listened painfully; the
voices reached her ears again.
One was Bradley's--of that she felt sure; the other, deeper, more full,
and with a curiously even carrying quality through the silent night, she
knew she had never heard before; but the darkness, the solitude, the
shock of strange surroundings, if nothing else, made it terrifying to her.
Kate had never been reckoned a timid girl, but she listened dumb with
fear. Bradley did most of the talking. He was recounting, with
occasional profanity, the mishaps of his trip, beginning with the late
train.
"Any passengers?" Kate heard the stranger ask.
"Two women--c'n y' beat it? One of 'em a girl for Doubleday's."
"What can a girl be wanting at Doubleday's?"

"D'no. Came off the train tonight."
"The Double-draw is out."
"Jing!" exclaimed Bradley, "it was there an hour ago."
"The ford is your only chance to get her over."
"Can I make it?"
"You've got good horses; you ought to make it by daylight."
"Hear they got a new foreman over at Doubleday's," Bradley said.
There was no comment, unless the silence could be so construed.
"Tom Stone," added Bradley, as if bound to finish.
There was an instant and angry exclamation, none the less ferocious
because of the restrained feeling in its sudden utterance.
"Doubleday sets a good deal by what Van Horn says; I reckon he put
him in there," suggested Bradley.
There was a further silence. Then she heard the stranger dryly say: "I
expect so." It seemed as if behind everything he did say there was so
much left unsaid.
"I never got rightly, Jim," Bradley went on, "how you 'n' Van Horn's
related."
"I hope you never will," returned the man saluted as "Jim," in the same
low, cold tone. "We're not related. He was my partner--once."
"Stone will change things at the ranch."
"He can't hurt them much."
"I guess they're full bad," said Bradley, and then, lowering his voice:

"The gal's asleep there in the stage. How'd the land contest they made
on y' at Medicine Bend come off?"
"The cattlemen own that Land Office. I'll beat the bunch at
Washington."
"Doubleday wanted me to go down to swear. I wouldn't do it--wasn't
even at the trial----"
"No honest man was, from Doubleday's."
"Was it Stone cut your wire, Jim?"
"You know as much about it as I do."
"Got it up again?"
"All I could find."
"Meaner 'n' hell over there, ain't they?"
There was no comment.
"How long you goin' to stand it, Jim?" persisted Bradley. And after the
odd pause, the slow answer: "Till I get tired."
"That'll be about the time they rip it off again."
"About that time, Bill."
"Well," hazarded the old driver, meditatively, "the boys are waitin'.
They say you're slow to start anything, Jim; but they look f'r hell t' pay
when y' do."
To the stranger--it seemed to Kate--words must be worth their weight
in gold, he parted with them so sparingly.
"What's this talk 'bout Farrell Kennedy makin' a depity marshal, Jim?"

"Mostly talk, Bill. Good night."
"Farrel offered it to y', didn't he?"'
"So Lefever says."
"Where y' headin' f'r now?" persisted Bradley, as Kate heard the shuffle
of a horse's feet.
"Home."
"They ain't burned your shack?" Bradley asked with a half chuckle.
Kate just heard the man's reply: "Not yet."
The hoofbeats drew away. Kate cautiously pushed back her curtain.
The late moon was shining in an old and ghostly light. Distant heights
rose like black walls against the sky. At intervals a peak broke sharply
above the battlements, or a rift in a closer sierra opened to show the
stars.
Kate could hear but could not for some time see the galloping
horseman. Then of a sudden he reached the brow of a low hill and rode
swiftly out into the spectral light. There he halted. Horse and rider
stood for a moment silhouetted against the sky. The horse chafed at his
bit. He stretched his head restively into the north, his rider sitting
motionless, a somber flat hat crowning his spare figure. For barely a
moment the man sat thus immovable. Then he turned slightly in the
saddle and the horse struck off into the night.
Drowsiness had deserted the tired girl that watched him. While her
companions slept she sat in the solitude waiting for day. Bradley, as
good as an alarm dock, was stirring with the first streak and feeding his
horses. He told his passengers that the bridges were all out and he was
going back to the ford.
Belle, incredulous, when first told by Kate of a visitor in the night, had
no scruples in asking questions:

"Who was here last night, Bill?"