CHAPTER VI
"DON'T YOU TOUCH HIM!"
Inside the big chuck tent of the construction camp the cook was busyforking steak to tin plates and ladling potatoes into deep dishes.
"Git a move on you, Red Haid," he ordered.
Bob Dillon distributed the food at intervals along the table which rannearly the whole length of the canvas top. From an immense coffee pot hepoured the clear brown liquid into tin cups set beside each plate. Thisdone, he passed out into the sunshine and beat the triangle.
From every tent men poured like seeds squirted from a squeezed lemon.They were all in a hurry and they jostled each other in their eagernessto get through the open flap. Straw boss, wood walkers, and ground men,they were all hungry. They ate swiftly and largely. The cook and hisflunkey were kept busy.
"More spuds!" called one.
"Coming up!" Dillon flung back cheerfully.
"Shoot along more biscuits!" a second ordered.
"On the way!" Bob announced.
The boss of the outfit came in leisurely after the rush. He brought aguest with him and they sat down at the end of the table.
"Beans!" demanded a line man, his mouth full.
"Headed for you!" promised the flunkey.
The guest of the boss was a big rangy fellow in the early forties. Bobheard the boss call him "Jake," and later "Houck." As soon as the boy hada moment to spare he took a good look at the man. He did not like what hesaw. Was it the cold, close-set eyes, the crook of the large nose, or thetight-lipped mouth gave the fellow that semblance to a rapacious wolf?
As soon as Bob had cleaned up the dishes he set off up the creek to meetJune. The boy was an orphan and had been brought up in a home with twohundred others. His life had been a friendless one, which may have beenthe reason that he felt a strong bond of sympathy for the lonely girl onPiceance. He would have liked to be an Aladdin with a wonder lamp bymeans of which he could magically transform her affairs to good fortune.Since this could not be, he gave her what he had--a warm fellow-feelingbecause of the troubles that worried her.
He found June waiting at their usual place of meeting. Pete Tolliver'sforty-four hung in a scabbard along the girl's thigh. Bob remembered thatshe had spoken of seeing a rattlesnake on the trail yesterday.
"'Lo, boy," she called.
"'Lo, June. I met yore friend."
"What friend?"
"Jake Houck. He was down at the camp for dinner to-day--came in with theboss."
"He's no friend of mine," she said sulkily.
"Don't blame you a bit. Mr. Houck looks like one hard citizen. I'd hateto cross him."
"He's as tough as an old range bull. No matter what you say or do youcan't faze him," she replied wearily.
"You still hate him?"
"More 'n ever. Most o' the time. He just laughs. He's bound an'determined to marry me whether or not. He will, too."
Bob looked at her, surprised. It was the first time she had ever admittedas much. June's slim body was packed with a pantherish resilience. Herspirit bristled with courage. What had come over her?
"He won't if you don't want him to."
"Won't he?" June was lying on a warm flat rock. She had been digging updirt at the edge of it with a bit of broken stick. Now she looked up athim with the scorn of an experience she felt to be infinitely moreextensive than his. "A lot you know about it."
"How can he? If you an' Mr. Tolliver don't want him to."
"He just will."
"But, June, that don't listen reasonable to me. He's got you buffaloed.If you make up yore mind not to have him--"
"I didn't say I'd made up my mind not to have him. I said I hated him,"she corrected.
"Well, you wouldn't marry a fellow you hated," he argued.
"How do you know so much about it, Bob Dillon?" she flared.
"I use what brains I've got. Women don't do things like that. Therewouldn't be any sense in it."
"Well, I'll prob'ly do it. Then you'll know I haven't got a lick o'sense," she retorted sullenly.
"You ce'tainly beat my time," he said, puzzled. "I've heard you say moremean things about him than everybody else put together, an' now you'retalkin' about marryin' him. Why? What's yore reason?"
She looked up. For a moment the morose eyes met his. They told nothingexcept a dogged intention not to tell anything.
But the boy was no fool. He had thought a good deal about the lonely lifeshe and her father led. Many men came into this country three jumps aheadof the law. It was not good form to ask where any one came from unless hevolunteered information about antecedent conditions. Was it possible thatJake Houck had something on Tolliver, that he was using his knowledge toforce June into a marriage with him? Otherwise there would be nonecessity for her to marry him. As he had told her, it was a free land.But if Houck was coercing her because of her fears for Tolliver, it waspossible this might be a factor in determining June to marry him.
"Don't you do it, June. Don't you marry him. He didn't look good to me,Houck didn't," Dillon went on. He was a little excited, and his voice hadlifted.
A man who came at this moment round the bend of the creek was grinningunpleasantly. His eyes focused on Dillon.
"So I don't look good to you. Tha's too bad. If you'll tell me what youdon't like about me I'll make myself over," jeered Houck.
Bob was struck dumb. The crooked smile and the stab of the eyes that wentwith it were menacing. He felt goose quills running up and down hisspine. This man was one out of a thousand for physical prowess.
"I didn't know you was near," the boy murmured.
"I'll bet you didn't, but you'll know it now." Houck moved toward Dillonslowly.
"Don't you, Jake Houck! Don't you touch him!" June shrilled.
"I got to beat him up, June. It's comin' to him. D'you reckon I'll letthe flunkey of a telephone camp interfere in my business? Why, he ain'thalf man-size."
Bob backed away warily. This Colossus straddling toward him would thrashhim within an inch of his life. The boy was white to the lips.
"Stop! Right now!" June faced Houck resolutely, standing between him andhis victim.
The big fellow looked at the girl, a slim, fearless little figure withundaunted eyes flinging out a challenge. He laughed, delightedly, thenbrushed her aside with a sweep of his arm.
Her eyes blazed. The smouldering passion that had been accumulating forweeks boiled up. She dragged out the six-shooter from its holster.
"I won't have you touch him! I won't! If you do I'll--I'll--"
Houck stopped in his stride, held fast by sheer amazement. The revolverpointed straight at him. It did not waver a hair's breadth. He knew howwell she could shoot. Only the day before she had killed a circling hawkwith a rifle. The bird had dropped like a plummet, dead before it struckthe ground. Now, as his gaze took in the pantherish ferocity of her tensepose, he knew that she was keyed up for tragedy. She meant to defend theboy from him if it resulted in homicide.
It did not occur to him to be afraid. He laughed aloud, half inadmiration, half in derision.
"I b'lieve you would, you spunky li'l wild cat," he told her in greatgood humor.
"Run, Bob," called June to the boy.
He stood, hesitating. His impulse was to turn and fly, but he could notquite make up his mind to leave her alone with Houck.
The cowman swung toward the girl.
"Keep back!" she ordered.
Her spurt of defiance tickled him immensely. He went directly to her, hisstride unfaltering.
"Want to shoot up poor Jake, do you? An' you an' him all set for ahoneymoon. Well, go to it, June. You can't miss now."
He stood a yard or so from her, easy and undisturbed, laughing in genuineenjoyment. He liked the child's pluck. The situation, with its salty tangof danger, was wholly to his taste.
But he had disarmed the edge of June's anger and apprehension. Hisamusement was too real. It carried the scene from tragedy to farce.
June's outburst had not been entirely f
or the sake of Bob. Back of theimmediate cause was the desire to break away from this man's dominance.She had rebelled in the hope of establishing her individual freedom. Nowshe knew this was vain. What was the use of opposing one who laughed ather heroics and ignored the peril of his position? There was not any wayto beat him.
She pushed the six-shooter back into its holster and cried out at himbitterly. "I think you're the devil or one of his fiends."
"An' I think you're an angel--sometimes," he mocked.
"I hate you!" she said, and two rows of strong little white teeth snappedtight.
"Sho! Tha's just a notion you got. You like me fine, if you only knew it,girl."
She was still shaken with the emotion through which she had passed. "Younever were nearer death, Jake Houck, than right now a minute ago."
His back to Dillon, the cowman gave a curt command. "Hit the trail,boy--sudden."
Bob looked at June, whose sullen eyes were fighting those of her father'sguest. She had forgotten he was there. Without a word Bob vanished.
"So you love me well enough to shoot me, do you?" Houck jeered.
"I wish I could!" she cried furiously.
"But you can't. You had yore chance, an' you couldn't. What you need is amaster, some one you'll have to honor an' obey, some one who'll lookafter you an' take the devil outa you. Meanin' me--Jake Houck.Understand?"
"I won't! I won't!" she cried. "You come here an' bully mebecause--because of what you know about Father. If you were half aman--if you were white, you wouldn't try to use that against me like youdo."
"I'm using it for you. Why, you li'l' spitfire, can't you see as JakeHouck's wife you get a chance to live? You'll have clothes an' shoes an'pretties like other folks instead o' them rags you wear now. I aim to begood to you, June."
"You _say_ that. Don't I know you? I'd 'most rather be dead than marriedto you. But you keep pesterin' me. I--I--" Her voice broke.
"If you don' know what's best for you, I do. To-morrow I got to go toMeeker. I'll be back Thursday. We'll ride over to Bear Cat Friday an' bemarried. Tha's how we'll fix it."
He did not take her in his arms or try to kiss her. The man was wise inhis generation. Cheerfully, as a matter of course, he continued:
"We'll go up to the house an' tell Tolliver it's all settled."
She lagged back, sulkily, still protesting. "It's not settled, either.You don't run everything."
But in her heart she was afraid he had stormed the last trench of herresistance.