CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
THE MAKING OF NEW TRAILS
At the corral, that time-honored conference ground of all true rangemen, the three Lorrigans leaned their backs against the rails andtalked things over in true range style: laconic phrases that statedtheir meaning without frills or mental reservations, and silences thatcarried their thoughts forward to the next utterance.
"Al can take the outfit and drift," said Tom, as though he werediscussing some detail of the round-up. "He knows where--and they canscatter, I'll give 'em a horse apiece as a--a kinda bonus. I'll haveto stay, looks like. Fall round-up's coming on."
"Wel-ll," said Lance, throwing an arm over a rail and drumming withhis fingers, "I was raised on round-ups. I don't suppose I'veforgotten all about it. You might turn the management over to me for ayear or so, and take a trip. Belle needs it, dad. I think I could keepthings riding along, all right."
"Sounds kinda like you had that idea for a joker up your sleeve," Alobserved meaningly. "Are you plumb sure of that dope, Lance?"
Lance removed his arm from the corral rail, and reached into hispocket. "I didn't think you had it in you, Al, to be that big a fool.But since you've said it, here's the dope. Take it, dad. I said I'dturn it in, but I didn't say who'd receive it. The stock detectivethat's been camping on your trail for the last few weeks was killed onthe Lava Beds to-day. I found him. He's at Conley's, now, waiting forthe coroner. You might ride over, Al, and see for yourself. And on theway, you might ride up the Slide trail and take a look around theTooth. You'll see signs where he's watched the ranch from up there.And you can go on down and find where he camped several times atCottonwood Spring.
"The coroner won't get on the job before to-morrow or next day, and itwill take a little time, I suppose, for Brownlee's employers to wakeup and wonder what became of the evidence he was sent to collect.You'll have, perhaps, a week in which to make your getaway. They'rewaiting outside the Rim for the evidence this Burt Brownlee wascollecting, so that they could make one big clean-up.
"I'm not setting myself up as a judge, or anything like that--but--well,the going's good, right now. It may not be so good if you wait."
He lighted a match and held it up so that Tom could glance at themaps and skim the contents of the memorandum book. By the blaze of thematch Lance's face still looked rather hard, determined to see thething through.
"You'd better burn that stuff, dad. And in the morning--how wouldit be if we went to town and got the legal end of my new jobstraightened out! I'll want a Power of Attorney. You may be gonefor some time. I suppose you know," he added, "that Mary Hope andI are going to be married. So you and Belle can take a tripsomewhere. They say it's worth while going down to the big cattlecountry in the Argentine--South America, you know."
Tom did not reply. He had lighted a second match and was studyingattentively the data in Burt Brownlee's book. The third match told himenough to convince him. He gave a snort when darkness enveloped themagain.
"I sharpened my pencil pretty darn fine when I made out my billagainst the Black Rim a few years ago--and by the humpin' hyenas,these figures here kinda go to show I overcharged 'em. Some. Not sodamn much, either, if you look at my side. Better get up the horses,Al, and you'n the boys take the trail. The kid's right. The goin'sdern good, right now. Better'n what it will be."
In the scuffed sand before the corral gate Tom made a small fire, witha few crumpled papers and one small book, which he tore apart andfed, leaf by leaf, to the flames. The light showed him grimly smiling,when he tilted his head and looked up at Lance who watched him.
"So you'n the Douglas kid is figuring on getting hitched! Well, don'tever try to eye her down like you done to yore dad. She'll brain yuh,likely--if you wait long enough for her to make up her mind."
Lance laughed. Up at the house Belle heard him and caught her breath.She stared hard at the three forms silhouetted like Rembrandt figuresaround the little fire, started toward them and stopped. She was awise woman, was Belle. Some things a woman may know--and hide theknowledge deep in her heart, and in the hiding help her mate.
Black Rim folk, who always knew so much of their neighbors' affairs,once more talked and chortled and surmised, and never came within amile of the truth. The young college rooster had come home to theDevil's Tooth, they gossiped, and had a row with Al; so Al left home,and Duke too. The Lorrigans always had been hard to get along with,but that Lance--he sure must be a caution to cats, the way he'dcleaned off the ranch.
Marrying the Douglas girl, and taking that paralyzed old lady right tothe ranch, had probably had a lot to do with it. Lance might bewilling to forget that old trouble with Scotty, but the rest of theLorrigans sure never would. And it was queer, too, how all thatrustling talk petered out. Mebby there hadn't been much in it, afterall.
Not even Mary Hope guessed why she and Lance were left so completelyin charge of the ranch. Sometimes, when the invalid was captious andshowed too plainly that she preferred Belle's playing and singing tothe musical efforts of her own daughter, and scrawled impatientquestions about Belle's return, Mary Hope would wonder if Tom Lorriganreally hated her, and if her coming had practically driven him out ofhis own home. She would cry a little, then,--unless Lance happened tobe somewhere near. If he were, there was no crying for Mary Hope.
"He's a good son," Mother Douglas once wrote, "I wish Aleck was alive,to see how the Lord has changed the Lorrigans."
THE END