Chapter XXIII
In the Pit
Beulah shut her eyes to steady herself. From the impact of her fallshe was still shaken. Moreover, though she had shot many arattlesnake, this was the first time she had ever been flung head firstinto the den of one. It would have been easy to faint, but she deniedherself the luxury of it and resolutely fought back the swimminglightness in her head.
Presently she began to take stock of her situation. The prospect holewas circular in form, about ten feet across and nine feet deep. Thewalls were of rock and smooth clay. Whatever timbering had been leftby the prospector was rotted beyond use. It crumbled at the weight ofher foot.
How was she to get out? Of course, she would find some way, she toldherself. But how? Blacky was tied to a bush not fifty yards away, andfastened to the saddle horn was the rope that would have solved herproblem quickly enough. If she had it here--But it might as well be atCheyenne for all the good it would do her now.
Perhaps she could dig footholds in the wall by means of which she couldclimb out. Unbuckling the spur from her heel, she used the rowel as aknife to jab a hole in the clay. After half an hour of persistent workshe looked at the result in dismay. She had gouged a hollow, but itwas not one where her foot could rest while she made steps above.
Every few minutes Beulah stopped work to shout for help. It was notlikely that anybody would be passing. Probably she had been the onlyperson on this hill for months. But she dared not miss any chance.
For it was coming home to her that she might die of starvation in thisprison long before her people found the place. By morning searchparties would be out over the hills looking for her. But who wouldthink to find her away over on Del Oro? If Brad had carried out histhreat immediately and gone down to Battle Butte, nobody would knoweven the general direction in which to seek.
With every hour Beulah grew more troubled. Late in the afternoon shefired a fourth shot from her revolver in the hope that some one mighthear the sound and investigate. The sun set early for her. Shewatched its rays climb the wall of her prison while she workedhalf-heartedly with the spur. After a time the light began to fade,darkness swept over the land, and she had to keep moving in order notto chill.
Never had she known such a night. It seemed to the tortured girl thatmorning would never come. She counted the stars above her. Sometimesthere were more. Sometimes fewer. After an eternity they began tofade out in the sky. Day was at hand.
She fired the fifth shot from her revolver. Her voice was hoarse fromshouting, but she called every few minutes. Then, when she was at thelow ebb of hope, there came an answer to her call. She fired her lastshot. She called and shouted again and again. The voice that cameback to her was close at hand.
"I'm down in the prospect hole," she cried. Another moment, and shewas looking up into the face of a man, Dan Meldrum. In vacantastonishment he gazed down at her.
"Whad you doing here?" he asked roughly.
"I fell in. I've been here all night." Her voice broke a little."Oh, I'm so glad you've come."
It was of no importance that he was a man she detested, one who hadquarreled with her father and been thrashed by her brother forinsulting her. All she thought of was that help had come to her atlast and she was now safe.
He stared down at her with a kind of drunken malevolence.
"So you fell in, eh?"
"Yes. Please help me out right away. My riata is tied to Blacky'ssaddle."
He looked around. "Where?"
"Isn't Blacky there? He must have broken loose, then. Never mind.Pass me down the end of a young sapling and you can pull me up."
"Can I?"
For the first time she felt a shock of alarm. There was in his voicesomething that chilled her, something inexpressibly cruel.
"I'll see my father rewards you. I'll see you get well paid," shepromised, and the inflection of the words was an entreaty.
"You will, eh?"
"Anything you want," she hurried on. "Name it. If we can give it toyou, I promise it."
His drunken brain was functioning slowly. This was the girl who hadbetrayed him up in Chicito Canon, the one who had frustrated hisrevenge at Hart's. On account of her young Rutherford had given himthe beating of his life and Hal had driven him from Huerfano Park.First and last she was the rock upon which his fortunes had split. Nowchance had delivered her into his hands. What should he do with her?How could he safely make the most of the opportunity?
It did not for an instant occur to him to haul her from the pit andsend her rejoicing on the homeward way. He intended to make her pay infull. But how? How get his revenge and not jeopardize his own safety?
"Won't you hurry, please?" she pleaded. "I'm hungry--and thirsty.I've been here all night and most of yesterday. It's been . . . ratherawful."
He rubbed his rough, unshaven cheek while his little pig eyes lookeddown into hers. "That so? Well, I dunno as it's any business of minewhere you spend the night or how long you stay there. I had it put upto me to lay off 'n interfering with you. Seems like yore family gotnotions I was insulting you. That young bully Jeff jumped me whilst Iwasn't looking and beat me up. Hal Rutherford ordered me to pull myfreight. That's all right. I won't interfere in what don't concernme. Yore family says 'Hands off!' Fine. Suits me. Stay there or getout. It's none of my business. See?"
"You don't mean you'll . . . leave me here?" she cried in horror.
"Sure," he exulted. "If I pulled you out of there, like as not you'dhave me beat up again. None o' my business! That's what yore folkshave been drilling into me. I reckon they're right. Anyhow, I'll playit safe."
"But--Oh, you can't do that. Even you can't do such a thing," shecried desperately. "Why, men don't do things like that."
"Don't they? Watch me, missie." He leaned over the pit, his broken,tobacco-stained teeth showing in an evil grin. "Just keep an eye onyore Uncle Dan. Nobody ever yet done me a meanness and got away withit. I reckon the Rutherfords won't be the first. It ain't on thecyards," he boasted.
"You're going away . . . to leave me here . . . to starve?"
"Who said anything about going away? I'll stick around for a while.It's none of my business whether you starve or live high. Do just asyou please about that. I'll let you alone, like I promised Jeff Iwould. You Rutherfords have got no call to object to being starved,anyhow. _Whad you do to Dave Dingwell in Chicito_?"
After all, she was only a girl in spite of her little feminineferocities and her pride and her gameness. She had passed through aterrible experience, had come out of it to apparent safety and had beenthrown back into despair. It was natural that sobs should shake herslender body as she leaned against the quartz wall of her prison andburied her head in her forearm.
When presently the sobs grew fewer and less violent, Beulah becameaware without looking up that her tormentor had taken away hismalignant presence. This was at first a relief, but as the hourspassed an acute fear seized her. Had he left her alone to die? Inspite of her knowledge of the man, she had clung to the hope that hewould relent. But if he had gone--
She began again to call at short intervals for help. Sometimes tearsof self-pity choked her voice. More than once she beat her brown fistsagainst the rock in an ecstasy of terror.
Then again he was looking down at her, a hulk of venom, eyes blearedwith the liquor he had been drinking.
"Were you calling me, missie?" he jeered.
"Let me out," she demanded. "When my brothers find me--"
"If they find you," he corrected with a hiccough.
"They'll find me. By this time everybody in Huerfano Park is searchingfor me. Before night half of Battle Butte will be in the saddle.Well, when they find me, do you think you won't be punished for this?"
"For what?" demanded the man. "You fell in. I haven't touched you."
"Will that help you, do you think?"
His rage broke into speech. "You're aimin' to st
op my clock, are you?Take another guess, you mischief-making vixen. What's to prevent mefrom emptying my forty-four into you when I get good and ready, thenhitting the trail for Mexico?"
She knew he was speaking the thoughts that had been drifting throughhis mind in whiskey-lit ruminations. That he was a wanton killer shehad always heard. If he could persuade himself it could be done withsafety, he would not hesitate to make an end of her.
This was the sort of danger she could fight against--and she did.
"I'll tell you what's to prevent you," she flung back, as it were in akind of careless scorn. "Your fondness for your worthless hide. Ifthey find me shot to death, they will know who did it. You couldn'thide deep enough in Chihuahua to escape them. My father would neverrest till he had made an end of you."
Her argument sounded appallingly reasonable to him. He knew theRutherfords. They would make him pay his debt to them with usury.
To stimulate his mind he took another drink, after which he stared downat her a long time in sullen, sulky silence. She managed at the sametime to irritate him and tempt him and fill his coward heart with fearof consequences. Through the back of his brain from the first therehad been filtering thoughts that were like crouching demons. Theyreached toward her and drew back in alarm. He was too white-livered togo through with his villainy boldly.
He recorked the bottle and put it in his hip pocket. "'Nough said," heblustered. "Me, I'll git on my hawss and be joggin' along to Mex.I'll take chances on their finding you before you're starved. Afterthat it won't matter to me when they light on yore body."
"Oh, yes, it will," she corrected him promptly, "I'm going to write anote and tell just what has happened. It will be found beside me incase they . . . don't reach here in time."
The veins in his blotched face stood out as he glared down at her whilehe adjusted himself to this latest threat. Here, too, she had him. Hehad gone too far. Dead or alive, she was a menace to his safety.
Since he must take a chance, why not take a bigger one, why not followthe instigation of the little crouching devils in his brain? He leereddown at her with what was meant to be an ingratiating smile.
"Sho! What's the use of we 'uns quarreling, Miss Beulah? I ain't gotnothing against you. Old Dan he always liked you fine. I reckon youdidn't know that, did you?"
Her quick glance was in time to catch his face napping. The keen eyesof the girl pounced on his and dragged from them a glimpse of thedepraved soul of the ruffian. Silently and warily she watched him.
"I done had my little joke, my dear," he went on. "Now we'll be heapgood friends. Old Dan ain't such a bad sort. There's lots of folksworse than Dan. That's right. Now, what was that you said a while agoabout giving me anything I wanted?"
"I said my father would pay you anything in reason." Her throat wasparched, but her eyes were hard and bright. No lithe young panther ofthe forest could have been more alert than she.
"Leave yore dad out of it. He ain't here, and, anyway, I ain't havingany truck with him. Just say the word, Miss Beulah, and I'll git apole and haul you up in a jiffy."
Beulah made a mistake. She should have waited till she was out of thepit before she faced the new issue. But her horror of the man wasoverpowering. She unscabbarded swiftly the revolver at her side andlifted it defiantly toward him.
"I'll stay here."
Again he foamed into rage. The girl had stalemated him once more."Then stay, you little wild cat. You've had yore chance. I'm throughwith you." He bared his teeth in a snarling grin and turned his backon her.
Beulah heard him slouching away. Presently there came the sound of afuriously galloping horse. The drumming of the hoofbeats died in thedistance.
During the rest of the day she saw no more of the man. It swept overher toward evening in a wave of despair that he had left her to herfate.