Part 23 (1/2)

”We must reach that train before Ranlett's gang----”

”You've said it! Ranlett's staged the party at Devil's Hold-up. It's only fifteen miles from the X Y Z but ten of that fifteen is wilderness.

We've got to stop that train before it reaches Greyson's crossing.”

”I'll ride for the X Y Z and get Bruce Greyson. I don't know where Steve is,” interrupted the girl breathlessly. ”You go on to the Double O. The Piker will know his way there in the dark. About ten o'clock, did you say?”

”Yes.” Beechy's voice was weaker. ”Don't let _anyone_ know but Greyson.

Ranlett has the place honeycombed with spies. I'll stay here for a while. If he comes--moseying over--the hill----” He slipped suddenly from the saddle to the ground. He stretched flat on his back. ”A-ah!

That's better,” he groaned. He tried to smile up into the concerned face bent over him. ”_C'est drole, ca?_ I bragged that I was through with the good old U. S. A. and the minute I find that I'm caught in a plot against her I throw up my hands. I knew that Ranlett would kill me if I backed out but I'd--I'd rather--die.”

”But you're not going to die, Beechy, and we'll win out,” the girl comforted eagerly. ”Oh, how can I leave you like this----”

”Mount that pony again, quick!” He gathered his strength by a superhuman effort. ”Don't think of me. I'll rest here and then I'll move on, I promise. I want to--get out--of--this sc.r.a.pe as much as--you want me to.

That's right--up you--go.” The last word was a whisper. He struggled to one elbow. ”Tell Greyson if he gets a chance--to put a bullet through the man--Ranlett took on in--my place--that range-rider at Bear-Creek ranch.”

CHAPTER XVI

Benson regarded Ming Soy in stunned amazement. Her words, ”She never come back--not all this time,” revolved stupidly round and round in his brain. They had been catapulted into the midst of his pa.s.sionate declaration to Peggy; what she would have answered he never would know, now. The color which the touch of his lips had brought to the girl's face had faded; she was regarding the Chinese woman with terrified eyes.

She laid a trembling hand on Benson's arm. ”Thank G.o.d, I haven't made you hate me,” he thought fervently as he gripped her cold fingers in a comforting clasp. His faith in the wisdom of a surprise attack had been built upon a rock, after all.

”Tell me again, Ming Soy, just when Mrs. Courtlandt started and what she said to you.”

In her excitement Ming Soy's English kept tripping her up, but Benson was able to get a fairly clear idea of what had happened.

”I watched her rode--not to the flield she tole me--no--down the road. I listened for shoots. No shoots. No noding. No noding in flield. When Ming Soy see you way down road, Ming Soy bleat glong.”

Benson's mind had been working with machine-like speed while he listened. The girl beside him drew a long, ragged breath. He laid his lips upon her hand for a moment.

”Don't worry! I'll find her, Peg-o'-my-heart. She has probably dropped in at Bear Creek ranch to see that new arrival and has forgotten the time. Women are like that when there's a baby.” He advanced the theory with a light-hearted laugh which he flattered himself was a marvel of its kind, but it merely drew a long, quivering sob from the girl. ”Just for company, I'll ride down to meet her.”

”I'll go with you,” announced Peggy eagerly.

”Nothing doing! You'll go back to the house with Ming Soy. Don't let Hopi Soy work off any of his thrift ideas on the dinner. If Jerry has been riding all afternoon she'll be famished, and I--I feel as if I could eat a raw mountain lion this minute. I'll take the horses back to the corral and get a fresh mount.”

”Please--Tommy--take me?”

Benson closed his ears heroically against the wiles of his own particular Circe. He shook his head; his grave eyes met the girl's squarely.

”Be a good little sport, Peg. I can go faster without you. Besides, Jerry may be back before me and she would be anxious if you were not here.”

”All right, Tommy. Come, Ming Soy.”

Benson could get no satisfaction from the man in charge of the corral.

He questioned him as he watched him s.h.i.+ft the saddle from Soapy to a powerful black. Slowman only knew that Mrs. Courtlandt came for Patches at about two o'clock. She was humming and laughing softly to herself as she led him off, quite as though she had heard some good news--or--or was up to some mischief; women were like that, when they had something up their sleeves, he'd noticed. None of the boys who had gone after the Shorthorns had returned. Mr. Courtlandt had 'phoned the corral from Slippy Bend that he should not be back to the ranch until morning, and to keep a sharp watch over the horses.

”By cripes, when he said that,” Slowman added as he looked at Benson with eyes so curiously crossed that they appeared to regard an object from the north and south extremes of the pole of vision, ”it sent the creeps all over me. It was almost as good as though I'd gone back to the days of honest-to-G.o.d hold-ups an' rustlin's. I'm sorry about Mrs.