CHAPTER IV
"I'M A RUSTLER AND A THIEF, AM I?"
Jim swept the cabin with a gesture. "Where can I hide you? Anyhow, thereare the horses in plain sight."
Phyllis took imperious control. "Get a coat on him, Jim," she ordered.
At the same time she caught up the basin of bloodstained water and flungits contents through the open window. The torn linen and the stainedhandkerchief she tossed into a corner and covered with a gunny sack.
"Not a word about the wound, Jim. Mr. Keller is here to help you do yourassessment work, remember. And whatever I say, don't give me away."
Yeager nodded. He had manoeuvred the wounded arm through the coat sleeveand was straightening out the shoulders. The nester's eyes were shiningwith excitement. Alone of the three, he was enjoying himself.
"Remember now. Don't talk too much. Let me run this," the girlcautioned, and with that she stepped to the door, caught sight of herbrother with a glad little cry of apparent relief, and ran swiftly tohim.
"Oh, Phil!" she almost sobbed, and the stress of her emotion was genuineenough, even if she dissembled as to the cause.
The boy patted her dark hair gently. They were twins, without other nearrelatives except their father, and the tie between them was close.
"What is it, Phyllie? Why didn't you stay where we left you?"
"I was afraid for you. And I rode a little nearer. Then he came straighttoward me--and I rode away. I could hear him crashing through themesquite. When I reached the trail of Jim's mine, I followed it, for Iknew he would be here."
"Sure. Course she was scared. What woman wouldn't be? We oughtn't bothto have left her. But there wasn't one chance in a thousand of hisstumbling on the very spot where she was," said Healy.
Phil gentled her with a caressing hand. "It's all right now, sis. Didyou happen to see the fellow at all?"
"Yes. At a distance."
"I don't suppose you would know him," Healy said.
She gave a strained little laugh. "I didn't wait to get a description ofhim. Didn't you boys recognize him?"
After Phil's answer she breathed freer. "We did not get near enough,though Brill got two shots at him as he pulled out. He was goinghell-for-leather and Brill missed both times." He lowered his voice andasked angrily: "What's _he_ doing here?"
For Keller had followed Yeager from the cabin and was standing in thedoorway with his hands in his pockets. He wore no hat, and had themanner of one very much at home.
"He's helping Jim with his assessment work," she answered in the samelow tone. "It's too bad you lost the rustler. He must have broken forthe hills."
Healy's eyes had narrowed to slits. Now he murmured a question: "Whatabout this man Keller? Was he here when you came, Phyl?"
The girl turned to Yeager, who had sauntered up. "Didn't you say he camethis morning, Jim?"
Yeager's eyes were like a stone wall. "Yep. This mo'ning. I needed somehusky guy to help me, so I got him."
"Funny you had to get a fellow from Bear Creek to help you, Jim."
"Are you looking for a job, Brill?"
"No. Why?"
"Because I ain't noticed any stampede this way among the boys to preemptthis job. I take a man where I can find him, Brill, and I don't ask youto O.K. him."
"I see you don't, Jim. The boys aren't going to like it very well,though."
"Then they know what they can do about it," Yeager answered evenly,level eyes steadily on those of his critic.
"What time did this nester get here, Jim?" broke in Phil.
Yeager's opaque eyes passed from Healy to Sanderson. "It might have beenabout eight."
"Then he couldn't be the man," the boy said to Healy, almost in awhisper.
"What man?" Jim asked.
"We ran on a rustler branding a C.O. calf. We got close enough to take ashot at him. Then he slid into some arroyo, and we lost him," Philexclaimed.
"How long ago was this?" asked Yeager.
"About an hour since we first saw him. Beats all how he ever made hisgetaway. We were right after him when he gave us the slip."
"Oh, he gave you the slip, did he?"
"Dropped into some hole and pulled it in after him. These hills arebuilt for hide and seek, looks like."
"Notice the color of his horse?"
"It was a roan, Jim. Something like that nester's." Phil nodded towardthe animal Keller had ridden.
All eyes focused hard on the horse with the white stockings.
"What brand was he putting on the calf? That'll tell you who the manwas."
Phil and Healy looked at each other, and the latter laughed. "That's oneon us. We didn't stay to look, but got right out for Mr. Rustler."
"Did he kill the cow?"
Phil nodded.
"Then you'll find the calf still hanging around there unless he had apal to drive it away."
"That's right. We'll go back now and look. Ready, Phyl?"
"Yes." She stepped to her horse, and swung to the saddle.
Meanwhile Healy rode forward to the cabin. Through narrowed lids helooked down at the man standing in the doorway. "Give that message toyour friends?" he demanded insolently.
There are men who have to look at each other only once to know thatthere is born between them a perpetual hostility. Each of these men hadfelt it at the first shock of meeting eyes. They would feel it again asoften as they looked at each other.
"No," the nester answered.
"Why not?"
"I didn't care to. You may carry your own messages."
"When I do I'll carry them with a gun."
"Interesting if true." Keller's gaze passed derisively over him anddismissed the man.
"And I hope when I come I'll meet Mr. Keller first."
The nester's attention was focused indolently upon the hills. He seemedto have forgotten that the cattleman was in Arizona.
Healy ripped out a sudden oath, drove the spurs in, and went down thetrail with his broncho on the buck.
Keller looked at Yeager and laughed, but that young man met him with afrosty eye.
"I've got some questions to ask you, Mr. Keller," he said.
"Unload 'em."
Yeager led the way inside, offered his guest the chair, and sat down onthe bed with his arms on the table which had been drawn close to it.
"In the first place, I'll announce myself. I don't hold with rustlers orwaddies. I'm a white man. That being understood, I want to know wherewe're at."
"Meaning?"
"Miss Phyllis unloads a story on me about you shooting yourself upaccidental. Soon as I looked at you that looked fishy to me. You ain'tthat kind of a durn fool. Would you mind handing me a dipper of water?Thanks." Yeager tossed the water out of the window, and the dipper backinto the pail. "I noticed you handed me that water with your right hand.Your gun is on your right side. Then how in Mexico, you beingright-handed, did you manage to shoot yourself _in the right arm belowthe elbow?_"
Keller laughed dryly, and offered no information. "Quite a SherlockHolmes, ain't you?"
"Hell, no! I got eyes in my head, though. Moreover, that bullet went inat right angles to your arm. How did you make out to do that?"
"Sleight of hand," suggested the other.
"No powder marks, either. And, lastly, it was, a rifle did it, not arevolver."
"Anything more?"
"Some. That side talk between you and Miss Phyllis wasn't over and aboveclear to me then. I _savez_ it now. She hates you like p'ison, butshe's too tender-hearted to give you up. Ain't that it?"
"That's it."
"She lied for you to me. She lied again to Phil. So did I. Oh, we didn'tlie in words, but it's the same thing. Now, I wouldn't lie to save myown skin. Why then should I for yours, and you a rustler and a thief?"
"I'm a rustler and a thief, am I?"
"Ain't you?"
"Would you believe me if I said I wasn't?"
Yeager debated an instant before he answered flatly, "No."
"Then I won't sa
y it."
The wounded man tossed his answer off so flippantly that Yeager scowledat him. "Mr. Keller, you're a newcomer here. I wonder if you know whatthe Malpais country would be liable to do to a man caught rustling now."
"I can guess."
"Let me tell what I know and your life wouldn't be worth a pluggedquarter."
"Why didn't you tell?"
Yeager brought his big fist down heavily on the table. "Because of PhylSanderson. That's why. She put it up to me, and I played her game. But Iain't sure I'm going to keep on playing it. I'm a Malpais man. My fatherhas a ranch down there, and I've rode the range all my life. Why shouldI throw down my friends to save a rustler caught in the act?"
"You've already tried and convicted me, I see."
"The facts convict you, seh."
"Your understanding of the facts, I reckon you mean."
"I haven't noticed that you're giving me any chance to understand themdifferent," Yeager cut back dryly.
The nester took from his pocket a little pearl-handled knife, picked upa potato from a basket beside him, and began to whittle on it absently.He looked across the table at the man sitting on the bed, and debated aquestion in his mind. Was it best to confess the whole truth? Or shouldhe keep his own counsel?
"I see you've got Miss Sanderson's knife. Did you forget to return it?"Yeager made comment.
For just an instant Keller's eye confessed amazement. "Miss Sanderson'sknife! Why--how did you know it was hers?" he asked, gathering himselftogether lamely.
"I ought to know, seeing as I gave it to her for a Christmas present.Sent to Denver for that knife, I did. Best lady's knife in the market,I'm told. Made in Sheffield, England."
"Ye-es. It's sure a good knife. I'll ce'tainly return it next time I seeher."
"Funny she ever let you get away with it. She's some particular who shelends that knife to," Jim said proudly.
Keller wiped the blade carefully, shut it, and put the knife back in hispocket. Nevertheless, he was worried in his mind. For what Yeager hadtold him changed wholly the problem before him. It suggested apossibility, even a probability, very distasteful to him. He was introuble himself, and before he was through he expected to get othersinto deep water, too. But not Phyllis Sanderson--surely not thisimpulsive girl with the blue-black hair and dark, scornful eyes.Wherefore he decided to keep silent now and let Yeager do what he would.
"I reckon, seh, you'll have to do your own guessing at the facts," hesaid gently.
"Just as you say, Mr. Keller. I reckon if you had anything to say foryourself you would say it. Now, I'll do what talking I've got to do. Youmay stay here twenty-four hours. After that you may hit the trail forBear Creek. I'm going down to Seven Mile to tell what I know."
"That's all right. I'll go along and return the pocketknife."
Yeager viewed him with stern disgust. "Don't make any mistake, seh. Ifyou go down it's an even chance you'll never go back."
"Sure. Life's full of chances. There's even a chance I'm not a rustler."
"Then I'd advise you not to go down to Seven Mile with me. I'd hate tofind out too late I'd helped hang the wrong man," Yeager dryly answered.