Beyond the Law/Chapter 7

HE days passed swiftly and pleasantly for them—too pleasantly, Dick Farley told himself with something of bitterness. For what right had he to live from day to day in this quiet haven, lured out of himself, out of his black lonesomeness for his partner with that partner not a week dead?

It was true that his bruised side must have kept him in a forced inactivity, that he must have waited even as he was waiting. But he should have spent day and night with his thoughts of "squaring things poor old Johnny," not in wandering through the woods with a girl.

He told himself, as he lay unsleeping in the quiet night, that he should go; that he should go now that he could drag himself away from her; that he had no right to stay longer. Yet, where should he go? To pick up the trail which he had followed to the margin of the lake, and to follow it—where?

Would it bring him, after miles of winding, back to the cabin perched upon the tableland? Would he find at the end of that trail James Dalton, her father? Where was Dalton now? Why had he gone away so suddenly? Why had he said to her the other day, the day before Johnny was killed, that at last they could go back into the world which so long ago he had left behind him? Had he killed Johnny Watson? If not he, who then?

If Dalton had killed Watson, then Farley must kill Dalton. There was no other way; there could be no other way. He must kill the father of the girl who had brought him here and cared for him, who had saved him from dying alone and miserable—must kill her "dear old Daddy," whom she loved so much, who had always been so good to her, who was all that she had in the world.

And to stay here made matters worse. To linger on in the home of the man whom, perhaps, he was to kill; to listen to the ingenuous, happy voice of the daughter; to grow to see how wonderful a thing Nature had built of this child of the wildwood; to feel that day by day they were being drawn closer together, that they were crossing a frontier which in a little they could not retrace

"If her father is the man who did it, have I the right to take her father from her?" he muttered. And again, "Has the man who killed Johnny Watson a right to live?"

So those five days were short days, fleeing so swiftly for man and maid, filled with sunshine and the girl's soft laughter and the vague promise of life. And the nights were long nights for the man; crowded with ugly images, torn with doubts, beset with threats of the future, thronged with questions to which he could find no answer. Now there was nothing to do but to wait.

But there was no waiting, no staying, into the path into which their feet were wandering, Dick Farley's and Virginia Dalton's. It was the old, old story of a man and a maid. And with the first great throb of understanding in the man's heart there came, too, a contraction and a pain, and he tore himself abruptly from the girl's presence and went to stand frowning toward the mountains into which Dalton had gone. And her eyes, following him, were filled with a tender light which was new to them, her lips parted in a half-smile, her breast rising and falling rapidly. For into her heart, too, had come the throb, but not the pain of the knowledge he had.

It was the sixth day. They had been together so much; had talked of self and of the other so frankly; had been so lost to the world and drawn close to each other in the solitude of the still mountains; had come to find a new peace and contentment as they were silent together watching the coming of the dawn, the passing of the day, the slow voyages of the moon through clouds and stars; had been so all-sufficient each to each that the short five days seemed like long, bursting years when they looked back upon them. It was only natural that the thing which was happening with them should happen.

Now, upon the morning of the sixth day, the day which was to bring Dalton home, their talk had died down suddenly. Farley had fallen into an abrupt silence, his eyes refusing to come back to hers. And in a little the girl's mood followed his, and with a faint trouble in her eyes she moved about the cabin, as silent as he. The forenoon passed; they lunched, with now and then a fitful burst of conversation which ended wretchedly, forced and unnatural, and the afternoon wore on. It was nearly dusk when James Dalton came home.

He was a very big man, tall, heavy, broad of shoulder, and very dark; with sharp black eyes under bushy brows, black hair and beard shot with gray. He came upon them from the lake, walking swiftly, his rifle caught up under his arm. The girl was sitting upon the doorstep, Farley upon a rock a few feet away. Dalton's eyes went quickly from the young man to his daughter, very keen, with a glint of surprise in them.

"Daddy!" the girl cried, running to meet him, throwing her two arms about his neck. "So you have finally got tired of roving and have come back, have you?"

He ran an arm about her, and then, with no reply to her bantering, demanded quietly—

"Who is that?"

Farley was on his feet now, missing nothing that the big man said, no gesture he made.

"My name is Farley," he returned for himself. "A miner. I came into this country prospecting. Had a bad fall, and your daughter took care of me."

"Prospecting?" Dalton laughed unpleasantly. "Don't you know, young man, that this country, every foot of it, has been gone over and over during the last twenty years, and nothing ever found? Prospecting!" He strode by Farley towards the cabin, muttering, "So they come right under our nose and prospect!"

S HE went, Farley's eager eyes saw the hunting-knife which swung unscabbarded from his belt—a knife more than usually broad-bladed; and his heart sank. Little as he liked the looks of this man, he had prayed that he prove to be innocent of Johnny Watson's blood. At the door Dalton stopped and swung about, looking steadily, deep into Farley's eyes.

"When did you get here?" he asked shortly. "How long have you been here?"

"I came five days ago—the day you left."

"Where did you come from?"

"From the coast. Then from Three Sisters and the Yellow Queen country, where I've been prospecting."

"What brought you in here? Don't you know that this country has been combed over a hundred times—that there is nothing here?"

"I believed," Farley retorted quietly, "that there was gold in these mountains. Since my fall I have not had a chance to get about. So I haven't learned yet that there isn't."

Virginia Dalton had stepped a little from her father's side, and now stood with troubled face looking from one man to the other. There was an atmosphere of distrust, almost of open hostility, and she could not understand.

Dalton turned slowly from Farley to the girl. As he moved the iron rigidity left his face, the cold glint passed from his eyes. It was wonderful how the man's whole expression softened.

"Come here, Virginia," he said gently. "I want to talk with you a little. Mr. Farley," with grave courtesy, "will pardon us?"

Farley bowed. Dalton, with his arm about his daughter, entered the cabin, closing the door behind them, leaving the younger man alone with his doubts, his suspicions, his fears. Their voices came to him, confused, indistinct. He supposed that the lather was asking all about this intruder in their quiet Eden; whence he had come, what she knew of him and his purposes.

Finally the door opened and Dalton stood on the threshold looking steadily out at Farley.

"I trust that you will overlook my rather scant courtesy in greeting a guest, Mr. Farley." The tone was open, frank, pleasant. "I am afraid that living a sort of exile in the wilderness so many years has made me forget the social usages. Will you come in for a pipe? We can talk things over."

"I think," Farley replied, his eyes running past the broad form so nearly filling the doorway to the form of the slender girl standing within the room, "that I have already allowed myself to become a nuisance.

"Miss Dalton has been very kind to me. But for her, I imagine, I should never have come so easily out of my accident. Now I am able to be about again, and I think that I'll take up the thing which brought me here. I have some work to do. But—" the two men's eyes meeting again, each studying the other—"I shall see you again before I leave the valley for good. And"—with slow significance—"I shall tell you all about what brought me here before I go next time."

He lifted his hat to the girl, said a brief word of thanks and of good-by, and limped away toward the lake. And his heart was very bitter as he went, and there was little hope in him.