Page:The Cross Pull.pdf/199

 Moran sat on the bunk beside the girl.

“What was it, Betty?” he asked. “What hold did he have to drive you far enough to marry him?”

“He had wanted me to for years,” she said. “I loathed him. Dad was away. Then he told me that my father had built this cabin over thirty years ago—told me why and showed the proofs; said he would publish them and the officers would be waiting when Dad came home. I lied to him; promised without ever intending to go through with it. I played for time but he said he would turn the proofs over to the law that day unless I complied at once; that he would give them to me if I did.” She produced two papers, yellowed with age, from the crack between the bunk and wall and handed them to Moran.

She watched him anxiously, giving frequent words of explanation as he sat before the fire and studied them.

One was a map without a single word, merely one small sheet covered with queer lines. Moran oriented it and knew it for the stream lines of the Land of Many Rivers. One portion was filled in with a sketch of even the smallest tributary creeks. In that part there was a single square dot and from