CHAPTER VI
A GOOD FRIEND
How long she remained there Phyllis did not know. Fear drummed at herheart. She was sick with apprehension. At last her very terror drove herout to learn the worst. She walked round to the front of the house andsaw a light in the store. Swiftly she ran across and up the steps to theporch. Three men were inside examining the empty chair by the light of alantern one held in his hand.
"Did--did he get away?" the girl faltered.
The men turned. One of them was Slim. He held in his hand pieces of theslashed rope and the open pocket-knife that had freed the prisoner.
"Looks like it," Slim answered. "With some help from a friend. Now, Iwonder who that useful friend was and how in time he got in here?"
Her eyes betrayed her. Just for an instant they swept to the cellardoor, to make sure it was still shut. But that one glance was enough.Slim, about to speak, changed his mind, and stared at her with partedlips. She saw suspicion grow in his face and resolve itself tocertainty, helped to decision by the telltale color dyeing her cheeks.
"Does the cellar stairway from the store connect with the kitchencellar, Phyllie?" he asked.
"Ye-es."
He nodded, then laughed without mirth. "I reckon I can tell you, boys,who Mr. Keller's friend in need is."
"Who? I'd like right well to know." Brill Healy, in a pallid fury, hadjust come in and was listening.
Phyllis turned and faced him. "I was that friend, Brill."
"You!" He stared at her in astonishment. "You! Why, it was you sent meout to run him down."
"I didn't tell you that I wanted you to murder him, did I?"
"I guess there's a lot between him and you that you didn't tell me," hejeered.
Slim grinned, not at all maliciously. "I reckon that's right. I don'tneed to ask you now, Phyllie, who it was I found with you in thekitchen."
"He was just going," she protested.
"Sure, and I busted into the good-bys right inconsiderate."
"Go ahead, Slim. I'm only a girl. You and Brill say what you like," sheflashed at him, the nails of her fingers biting into the palms of herhands.
"Only don't say it out loud," cautioned a new voice. Jim Yeager was atthe door, and he was looking very pointedly at Healy.
"I say what I think, Jim," Brill retorted promptly.
"And you think?"
Healy slammed his fist down hard on the counter. "I think things ain'tright when a Malpais girl helps a hawss thief and a rustler to escapetwice."
"Take care, Brill," advised Phyllis.
"Not right how?" asked Yeager quietly, but in an ominous tone.
"Don't you two go to twisting my meaning. All Malpais knows that nobetter girl than Phyl Sanderson ever breathed."
The young woman's lip curled. "I'm grateful for this indorsement, sir,"she murmured with mock humility.
"Do I understand that Keller has made his getaway?" Jim Yeager asked.
"He sure has--clean as a whistle."
"Then you idiots want to be plumb grateful to Phyllie. He ain't any morea rustler than I am. If you had hanged him you would have hanged aninnocent man."
"Prove it," cried Healy.
Jim looked at him quietly. "I cayn't prove it just now. You'll have totake my word for it."
"Yore word goes with me, Jim, even if I am an idiot by yore say-so," hisfather announced promptly.
Jim smiled and let an arm fall across the shoulders of James Yeager,Senior. "I ain't countin' you in on that class, dad. You got to trailingwith bad company. I'll have to bring you up stricter."
"I hate to be a knocker, Jim, but I've got to trust my own eyes beforeyour indorsement," Healy sneered.
"That's your privilege, Brill."
"I reckon Jim knows what he's talking about," said Yeager, Senior, withintent to conciliate.
"Of course I know you're right friendly with him, Jim. There's nobodymore competent to pass an opinion on him. Like enough you know all abouthis affairs," conceded Healy with polite malice.
The two young men were looking at each other steadily. They never hadbeen friends, and lately they had been a good deal less than that. Rivalleaders of the range for years, another cause had lately fanned theirrivalry to a flame. Now a challenge had been flung down and accepted.
"I expect I know more about them than you do, Brill."
"Sure you do. Ain't he just got through being your guest? Didn't he comevisiting you in a hurry? Didn't you tie up his wound? And when Phil andI came asking questions didn't you antedate his arrival about six hours?I'm not denying you know all about him. What I'm wondering is why youdidn't tell all you knew. Of course, I understand they are yourreasons, though, not mine."
"You've said it. They're my reasons."
"I ain't saying they are not good reasons. Whyfor should a man round onhis friend?"
The innuendo was plain, and Yeager put it into words. "I'd be rightproud to have him for a friend. But we all know what you mean, Brill. Goright ahead. Try and persuade the boys I'm a rustler, too. They haven'tknown me on an average much over twenty years. But that doesn't matter.They're so durned teachable to-day maybe you can get them to swallowthat with the rest."
With which parting shot he followed Phyllis out of the store. She turnedon him at the top of the porch steps leading to the house.
"Did he tell you that Phil was the rustler?"
"You mean did Keller tell me?" he said, surprised.
"Yes. 'Rastus was in the live oak and heard all you said."
"No. He didn't tell me that. We neither of us think it was Phil. Itcouldn't be, for he was riding with you at the time. But he found yourknife there by the dead cow. Now, how did it come there? You let Philhave the knife. Had he lent his knife to some one?"
"I don't know." She went on, after a momentary hesitation: "Are youquite sure, Jim, that he really found the knife there?"
"He said so. I believe him."
She sighed softly, as if she would have liked to feel as sure. "Thereason I spoke of it was that I accused him of trying to throw the blameon Phil, and he told me to ask you about it."
Jim shook his head. "Nothing to it. If you want my opinion, Keller iswhite clear enough. He wouldn't try a trick like that."
The girl's face lit, and she held out an impulsive hand. "Anyhow, you'rea good friend, Jim."
"I've been that ever since you was knee high to a duck, Phyl."
"Yes--yes, you have. The best I've got, next to Phil and Dad." Her heartjust now was very warm to him.
"Don't you reckon maybe a good friend might make a good--somethingelse."
She gasped. "Oh, Jim! You don't mean----"
"Yep. That's what I do mean. Course I'm not good enough. I know that."
"Good. You're the best ever. It isn't that. Only I don't like you thatway."
"Maybe you might some day."
She shook her head slowly. "I wish I could, Jim. But I never will."
"Is there--someone else, Phyl?"
If it had been light enough he could have seen a wave of color sweep herface.
"No. Of course there isn't. How could there be? I'm only a girl."
"It ain't Brill then?"
"No. It's--it isn't anybody." She carried the war, womanlike, into hiscamp. "And I don't believe you care for me--that way. It's just afancy."
"One I've had two years, little girl."
"Oh, I'm sorry. I _do_ like you, better than any one else. You knowthat, dear old Jim."
He smiled wistfully. "If you didn't like me so well I reckon I'd have abetter chance. Well, I mustn't keep you here. Good night."
Her ringers were lost in his big fist. "Good night, Jim." And again sheadded, "I'm so sorry."
"Don't you be. It's all right with me, Phyl. I just thought I'd mentionit. You never can tell, though I most knew how it would be. _Buenosnoches, nina._"
He released her hand, and without once looking back strode to his horse,swung to the saddle, and rode into the night.
She
carried into the house with her a memory of his cheerful smile. Ithad been meant as a reassurance to her. It told her he would get overit, and she knew he would. For he was no puling schoolboy, but a man,game to the core.
The face of another man rose before her, saturnine and engaging anddebonair. With the picture came wave on wave of shame. He was a detectedvillain, and she had let him kiss her. But beneath the self-scorn wassomething new, something that stung her blood, that left her flushed andtingling with her first experience of sex relations.
A week ago she had not yet emerged fully from the chrysalis ofchildhood. But in the Southland flowers ripen fast. Adolescence stealshard upon the heels of infancy. Nature was pushing her relentlesslytoward a womanhood for which her splendid vitality and unschooledimpulses but scantily safeguarded her. The lank, shy innocence of thefawn still wrapped her, but in the heart of this frank daughter of thedesert had been born a poignant shyness, a vague, delightful tremblingthat marked a change. A quality which had lain banked in her nature likea fire since childhood now threw forth its first flame of heat. Atsunset she had been still treading the primrose path of youth; atsunrise she had entered upon the world-old heritage of her sex.