XIII
UNDER FIRE
It was getting late and Torrance evidently becoming impatient, whenClavering, who had ignored the latter fact as long as he considered itadvisable, glanced at Hetty with a smile. He stood by the piano in the bighall at Cedar Range, and she sat on the music-stool turning over one ofthe new songs he had brought her from Chicago.
"I am afraid I will have to go," he said. "Your father is not fond ofwaiting."
Though Hetty was not looking at him directly, she saw his face, whichexpressed reluctance still more plainly than his voice did; but just thenTorrance turned to them.
"Aren't you through with those songs yet, Clavering?" he said.
"I'm afraid I have made Miss Torrance tired," said Clavering. "Still, wehave music enough left us for another hour or two."
"Then why can't you stay on over to-morrow and get a whole night at it? Iwant you just now."
Clavering glanced at Hetty, and, though she made no sign, fancied that shewas not quite pleased with her father.
"Am I to tell him I will?" he asked.
Hetty understood what prompted him, but she would not commit herself. "Youwill do what suits you," she said. "When my father asks any one to Cedar Ireally don't often make myself unpleasant to him."
Clavering's eyes twinkled as he walked towards the older man, while Hettycrossed the room to where Miss Schuyler sat. Both apparently becameabsorbed in the books Clavering had brought, but they could hear theconversation of the men, and it became evident later that one of themlistened. Torrance had questions to ask, and Clavering answered them.
"Well," he said, "I had a talk with Purbeck which cost us fifty dollars.His notion was that the Bureau hadn't a great deal to go upon if theymeant to do anything further about dispossessing us. In fact, he quiteseemed to think that as the legislature had a good many other worries justnow, it would suit them to let us slide. He couldn't recommend anythingbetter than getting our friends in the lobbies to keep the screw on themuntil the election."
Torrance looked thoughtful. "That means holding out for another sixmonths, any way. Did you hear anything at the settlement?"
"Yes. Fleming wouldn't sell the homestead-boys anything after they brokein his store. Steele's our man, and it was Carter they got theirprovisions from. Now, Carter had given Jackson a bond for two thousanddollars when he first came in, and as he hadn't made his payments lately,and we have our thumb on Jackson, the Sheriff has closed down on hisstore. He'll be glad to light out with the clothes he stands in when we'rethrough with him."
Torrance nodded grim approval. "Larry wouldn't sit tight."
"No," said Clavering. "He wired right through to Chicago for most of acarload of flour and eatables, but that car got billed wrong somehow, andnow they're looking for her up and down the side-tracks of the Pacificslope. Larry's men will be getting savage. It is not nice to be hungrywhen there's forty degrees of frost."
Torrance laughed softly. "You have fixed the thing just as I would."
Then his daughter stood up with a little flush in her face. "You could nothave meant that, father?" she said.
"Well," said Torrance, drily, "I quite think I did, but there's a gooddeal you can't get the hang of, Hetty--and it's getting very late."
He looked at his daughter steadily, and Flora Schuyler looked at all ofthem, and remembered the picture--Torrance sitting lean and sardonic withthe lamplight on his face, Clavering watching the girl with a curiouslittle smile, and Hetty standing very slim and straight, with something inthe poise of her shapely head that had its meaning to Miss Schuyler. Thenwith a "Good-night" to Torrance, and a half-ironical bend of the head toClavering, she turned to her companion, and they went out together beforehe could open the door for them.
Five minutes later Hetty tapped at Miss Schuyler's door. The pink tingestill showed in her cheeks, and her eyes had a suspicious brightness inthem.
"Flo," she said, "you'll go back to New York right off. I'm sorry Ibrought you here. This place isn't fit for you."
"I am quite willing, so long as you are coming too."
"I can't. Isn't that plain? This thing is getting horrible--but I have tosee it through. It was Clavering fixed it, any way."
"Put it away until to-morrow," Flora Schuyler advised. "It will be easierto see whether you have any cause to be angry then."
Hetty turned towards her with a flash in her eyes. "I know just what youmean, and it would be nicer just to look as if I never felt anything, assome of those English folks you were fond of did; but I can't. I wasn'tmade that way. Still, I'm not going to apologize for my father. He isTorrance of Cedar, and I'm standing in with him--but if I were a man I'dgo down and whip Clavering. I could almost have shaken him when he wantedto stay here and tried to make me ask him."
"Well," said Flora Schuyler, quietly, "I am going to stay with you; but Idon't quite see what Clavering has done."
"No?" said Hetty. "Aren't you just a little stupid, Flo? Now, he has mademe ashamed--horribly--and I was proud of the men we had in this country.He's starving the women and the little children; there are quite a few ofthem lying in freezing shanties and sod-huts out there in the snow. It'sjust awful to be hungry with the temperature at fifty below."
Miss Schuyler shivered. It was very warm and cosy sitting there, behinddouble casements, beside a glowing stove; but there had been times when,wrapped in costly furs and great sleigh-robes and generously fed, she hadfelt her flesh shrink from the cold of the prairie.
"But they have Mr. Grant to help them," she said.
Even in her agitation Hetty was struck by something which suggestedunquestioning faith in her companion's tone.
"You believe he could do something," she said.
"Of course! You know him better than I do, Hetty."
"Well," said Hetty, "though he has made me vexed with him, I am proud ofLarry; and there's just one thing he can't do. That is, to see women andchildren hungry while he has a dollar to buy them food with. Oh, I knowwho was going to pay for the provisions that came from Chicago thatClavering got the railroad men to send the wrong way, and if Larry hadonly been with us he would have been splendid. As it is, if he feeds themin spite of Clavering, I could 'most forgive him everything."
"Are you quite sure that you have a great deal to forgive?"
Hetty, instead of resenting the question, stretched out her handappealingly. "Don't be clever, Flo. Come here quite close, and be nice tome. This thing is worrying me horribly; and I'm ashamed of myself and--ofeverybody. Oh, I know I'm a failure. I couldn't sing to please folks and Isent Jake Cheyne away, while now, when the trouble's come, I'm too meaneven to stand behind my father as I meant to do. Flo, you'll stay with me.I want you."
Miss Schuyler, who had not seen Hetty in this mood before, petted her,though she said very little, for she felt that the somewhat unusualabasement might, on the whole, be beneficial to her companion. So therewas silence in the room, broken only by the snapping of the stove and thefaint moaning of the bitter wind about the lonely building, while MissSchuyler sat somewhat uncomfortably on the arm of Hetty's chair with thelittle dusky head pressed against her shoulder. Hetty could not see herface or its gravity might have astonished her. Miss Schuyler had notspoken quite the truth when, though she had only met him three times, sheadmitted that Hetty knew Larry Grant better than she did. In variousplaces and different guises Flora Schuyler had seen the type of manhood hestood for, but had never felt the same curious stirring of sympathy thisgrave, brown-faced man had aroused in her.
A hound bayed savagely, and Hetty lifted her head. "Strangers!" she said."Bowie knows all the cattle-boys. Who can be coming at this hour?"
The question was not unwarranted, for it was close on midnight, but FloraSchuyler did not answer. She could hear nothing but the moan of the wind,the ranch was very still, until once more there came an angry growl. Then,out of the icy darkness followed the sound of running feet, a hoarse cry,and a loud pounding at the outer door.
Hetty stood u
p, trembling and white in the face, but very straight. "Don'tbe frightened, Flo," she said. "We'll whip them back to the place theycame from."
"Who is it?" asked Miss Schuyler.
Again the building rang to the blows upon the outer door; but Hetty'svoice was even, and a little contemptuous.
"The rustlers!" she said.
There was a trampling below, and a corridor beneath the girls vibratedwith the footsteps of hurrying men, while Torrance's voice rose faintlythrough the din; a very unpleasant silence, until somebody rapped upon thedoor. Flora Schuyler felt her heart throbbing painfully, and gasped whenTorrance looked in. His lean face was very stern.
"Put the lamp out, and sit well away from the window," he said.
"No," said Hetty in a voice Miss Schuyler had not heard before; "we arecoming down."
Torrance considered for a second, and then smiled significantly as heglanced at his daughter's face. "Well, you would be 'most as safe downthere--and I guess it was born in you," he said.
The girls followed him down the cedar stairway and into the hall. A lampburning very low stood on a table in one corner, but the big room was dimand shadowy, and the girls could scarcely see the five or six men standingnear, not in front of, one open window. Framed by its log casing the whiteprairie faded into the dimness under a smear of indigo sky. Here and therea star shone in it with intense brilliancy, and though the great stoveroared in the draught it seemed to Miss Schuyler that a destroying coldcame in. Already she felt her hands grow numb.
"Where are the boys, Hetty?" she asked.
"In at the railroad, most of them. One or two at the back. Now, I'll showyou how to load a rifle, Flo."
Miss Schuyler followed her to the table, where several rifles were lyingbeside a big box of cartridges, and Hetty took one of them up.
"You push this slide back, and drop the cartridge in," she said. "Now ithas gone into this pipe here, and you drop in another. Get hold, and pushthem in until you can't get in any more. Why--it can't hurt you--yourhands are shaking!"
There was a rattle, and the venomous, conical-headed cartridge slippedfrom Miss Schuyler's fingers. She had never handled one before, and itseemed to her that a horrible, evil potency was bound up in thatinsignificant roll of metal. Then, while the rifle click-clacked inHetty's hands, Torrance stood by the window holding up a handkerchief. Hecalled out sharply, and there was a murmur of derision in the darknessoutside.
"Come out!" said a hoarse voice. "We'll give you a minute. Then you canhave a sleigh to drive to perdition in."
The laughter that followed frightened Miss Schuyler more than any threatswould have done. It seemed wholly horrible, and there was a hint in it ofthe fierce exultation of men driven to desperation.
"That wouldn't suit me," said Torrance. "What do you want here, any way?"
"Food," somebody answered. "You wanted to starve us, Torrance, and rode usout when we went chopping stove wood in the bluff. Well, you don't oftenmiss your supper at the Range, and there's quite enough of it to make adecent blaze. You haven't much of that minute left. Are you coming out?"
"No," said Torrance briefly, and, dropping the handkerchief, moved fromthe window.
The next moment there was a flash in the darkness, and something camewhirring into the room. The girls could not see it, but they heard thethud it struck with and saw a chip start from the cedar panelling. Then,there was a rush of feet, and twice a red streak blazed from the window. Aman jerked a cartridge, which fell with a rattle from his rifle, and alittle blue smoke blew across the room. Flora Schuyler shivered as theacrid fumes of it drifted about her, but Hetty stood very straight, withone hand on the rim of the table.
"Got nobody, and they're into the shadow now," said a man disgustedly, andFlora Schuyler, seeing his face, which showed a moment fierce and brutishas he turned, felt that she could not forget it, and most illogicallyhated him.
For almost a minute there was silence. Nobody moved in the big room, wherethe shadows wavered as the faint flickering lamplight rose and fell, andthere was no sound but the doleful wail of the night wind from theprairie. It was broken by a dull crash that was repeated a moment later,and the men looked at one another.
"They've brought their axes along," said somebody. "If there's any of theMichigan boys around they'll drive that door in."
"Watch it, two of you," said Torrance. "Jake, can't you get a shot atthem?"
A man crouched by the open window, which was some little height from theground, his arms upon the sill, and his head showing against the darknessjust above them. He was, it seemed to Miss Schuyler, horribly deliberate,and she held her breath while she watched, as if fascinated, the longbarrel move a little. Then its muzzle tilted suddenly, a train of redsparks blew out, and something that hummed through the smoke struck thewall. The man dropped below the sill, and called hoarsely through thecrash of the falling axes.
"Got the pillar instead of him. There's a streak of light behind me. Well,I'll try for him again."
Hetty emptied the box of cartridges, and, with hands that did not seem totremble, stood it up before the lamp. Once more the man crouched by thewindow, a blurred, huddled object with head down on the rifle stock, andthere was another streak of flame. Then, the thud of the axes suddenlyceased, and he laughed a little discordant laugh.
"Got him this time. The other one's lit out," he said.
Miss Schuyler shuddered, and clutched at the table, while, though Hettywas very still, she fancied she heard a stifled gasp. The silence was evenmore disconcerting than the pounding of the axes or the crash of thefiring. Flora Schuyler could see the shadowy figures about the window, andjust distinguish some of them. The one standing close in front of it, asthough disdainful of the risk he ran, was Torrance; the other, who now andthen moved lithely, and once rested a rifle on the sill, was Clavering;another, the man who had fired the last shot; but the rest were blurred,formless objects, a little darker than the cedar panelling. Now and thenthe streak of radiance widened behind the box, and the cold grew numbingas the icy wind flowed in.
Suddenly a voice rose up outside. "You can't keep us out, Torrance. We'rebound to get in; but I'll try to hold the boys now if you'll let us haveour wounded man, and light out quietly."
Torrance laughed. "You are not making much of a show, and I'm quite readyto do the best I can," he said. "If there's any life in him we want yourman for the Sheriff."
Then he turned to the others. "I was 'most forgetting the fellow outsidethere. We'll hold them off from the window while you bring him in."
It appeared horribly risky, but Torrance spoke with a curiousunconcernedness, and Clavering laughed as, signing to two men, he preparedto do his bidding. There was a creaking and rattling, and the great doorat one end of the hall swung open, and Flora Schuyler, staring at thedarkness, expected to see a rush of shadowy figures out of it. But she sawonly the blurred outline of two men who stooped and dragged something in,and then the door swung to again.
They lifted their burden higher. Torrance, approaching the table, took upthe lamp, and Miss Schuyler had a passing glimpse of a hanging head and adrawn grey face as they tramped past her heavily. She opened her blue lipsand closed them again, for she was dazed with cold, and the cry that wouldhave been a relief to her never came. It was several minutes later whenTorrance's voice rose from by the stove.
"We'll leave him here in the meanwhile, where he can't freeze," he said."Shot right through the shoulder, but there's no great bleeding. The coldwould stop it."
Hetty was at her father's side the next moment. "Flo," she said, "we haveto do something now."
Torrance waved them back. "The longer that man stops as he is, the betterchances he's going to have." He glanced towards the window. "Boys, can yousee what they're doing now?"
"Hauling out prairie hay," said Clavering. "They've broken into the store,and from what one fellow shouted they've found the kerosene."
Torrance said nothing whatever, and his silence was significant. Listeningwith st
rained attention, Flora Schuyler could hear a faint hum of voices,and now and then vague sounds amidst a patter of hurrying steps. They toldher very little, but the tension in the attitude of the half-seen men hadits meaning. It was evident that their assailants purposed to burn themout.
Ten minutes passed, as it were interminably, and still nobody moved. Thevoices had grown a little louder, and there was a rattle as though menunseen behind the buildings were dragging up a wagon. Suddenly a rhythmicdrumming came softly through it, and Clavering glanced at Torrance.
"Somebody riding this way at a gallop," he said.
The beat of hoofs grew louder. The men without seemed to be running to andfro, and shouting to one another, while those in the hall clustered aboutthe window, reckless of the risk they ran. Standing a little behind themHetty saw a dim mounted figure sweep out of the waste of snow, and ahoarse shout went up. "Hold on! Throw down that rifle! It's Larry Grant."