Page:J Allan Dunn--The Girl of Ghost Mountain.djvu/275

Rh to be anything but grateful for her efforts to make him comfortable. Besides, Romance dealt the cards that night. It all fitted in with the roaring fire, the sparks dancing up to where the stars showed in the cleft of the cliffs, the happenings in the cave. No one had talked much while the meal was cooked and eaten, the wounds tended. Sheridan had gathered that they had come from Metzal on short order, with barely gasoline enough in their tanks to reach the Painted Rocks and return. He was satisfied to let the remnant of the tongmen go. But now, with his pipe drawing freely, he asked the question that was rising to the lips of all the defenders of the cave, save Quong the Imperturbable. To watch Quong, cooking, detached from all but his immediate task, made the knife-fight appear like a dream.

"How did you get here, in the nick of time, Mary?" he asked. He called her Mary frankly enough before all of them. Any other title would have seemed inadequate. The fact was patent that he was her lover, equally so that she would not resent it, and he knew that all the group, riders, sheriff, Quong, were gentlemen.

Mary Burrows looked around at the faces turned towards her, thrown into high relief by the flames that fought off the cold of the night. Then, without preamble, she told her story simply.

"Thora and I went into Pioche—to file papers for the Hidden Homestead—and for some other matters." Just a hint of self-consciousness crept into her voice and vanished again as she referred to the papers. "I wanted to get some Mexican lace;