“Then he IS hiding about here?” said Masterton, with assumed calmness.
The man paused, lowered his voice, and said: “I wouldn’t swear he wasn’t a mile from whar we’re talkin’ now. Why, they do allow that he’s taken a drink at this very bar SINCE the news came!—and that thar’s a hoss kept handy in the stable already saddled just to tempt him ef he was inclined to scoot.”
“That’s only a bluff to start him goin’ so that they kin shoot him in his tracks,” said a bystander.
“That ain’t no good ef he has, as they SAY he has, papers stowed away with a friend that would frighten some mighty partickler men out o’ their boots,” returned the first speaker. “But he’s got his spies too, and thar ain’t a man that crosses the Divide as ain’t spotted by them. The officers brag about havin’ put a cordon around the district, and yet they’ve just found out that he managed to send a telegraphic dispatch from Black Rock station right under their noses. Why, only an hour or so arter the detectives and the news arrived here, thar kem along one o’ them emigrant teams from Pike, and the driver said that a smart-lookin’ chap in store-clothes had come out of an old prospector’s cabin up thar on the rise about a mile away and asked for a newspaper. And the description the teamster gave just fitted Trixit to a T. Well, the information was give so public like that the detectives HAD to make a rush over thar, and b’gosh! although thar wasn’t a soul passed them but a file of Chinese coolies, when they got thar they found NOTHIN’,—nothin’ but them Chinamen cookin’ their rice by the roadside.”
Masterton smiled carelessly, and walked to the window, as if intent upon the still falling snow. But he had at once grasped the situation that seemed now almost providential for his inexperience and his mission. The man he was seeking was within his possible reach, if the story he had heard was true. The detectives would not be likely to interfere with his plans, for he was the only man who really wished to meet the fugitive. The presence of Poole made him uneasy, though he had never met the man before. Was it barely possible that he was on the same mission on behalf of others? IF what he heard was true, there might be others equally involved with the absconding manager. But then the spies—how could the deputy sheriff elude them, and how could HE?
He was turning impatiently away from the window when his eye caught sight of a straggling file of Chinamen breasting the storm on their way up the hill. A sudden idea seized him. Perhaps THEY were the spies in question. He remembered the driver’s story. A sudden flash of intuition made him now understand the singular way the file of coolies which they met had diverted their course after passing the wagon. They had recognized the deputy on the box. Stay!—there was another Chinaman in the coach; HE might have given them the signal. He glanced hurriedly around the room for him; he was gone. Perhaps he had already joined the file he had just seen. His only hope was to follow them—but how? and how to do it quietly? The afternoon was waning; it would be three or four hours before the down coach would arrive, from which the driver expected assistance. Now, if ever, was his opportunity.
He made his way through the back door, and found himself among the straw and chips of the stable-yard and woodshed. Still uncertain what to do, he mechanically passed before the long shed which served as temporary stalls for the steaming wagon horses. At the further end, to his surprise, was a tethered mustang ready saddled and bridled—the opportune horse left for the fugitive, according to the lounger’s story. Masterton cast a quick glance around the stable; it was deserted by all save the feeding animals.
He was new to adventures of this kind, or he would probably have weighed the possibilities and consequences. He was ordinarily a thoughtful, reflective man, but like most men of intellect, he was also imaginative and superstitious, and this crowning accident of the providential situation in which he found himself was superior to his logic. There would also be a grim irony in his taking this horse for such a purpose. He again looked and listened. There was no one within sight or hearing. He untied the rope from the bit-ring, leaped into the saddle, and emerged cautiously from the shed. The wet snow muffled the sound of the horse’s hoofs. Moving round to the rear of the stable so as to bring it between himself and the station, he clapped his heels into the mustang’s flanks and dashed into the open.
At first he was confused and bewildered by the half hidden boulders and snow-shrouded bushes that beset the broken ground, and dazzled by the still driving storm. But he knew that they would also divert attention from his flight, and beyond, he could now see a white slope slowly rising before him, near whose crest a few dark spots were crawling in file, like Alpine climbers. They were the Chinamen he was seeking. He had reasoned that when they discovered they were followed they would, in the absence of any chance of signaling through the storm, detach one of their number to give the alarm. HIM he would follow. He felt his revolver safe on his hip; he would use it only if necessary to intimidate the spies.
For some moments his ascent through the wet snow was slow and difficult, but as he advanced, he felt a change of temperature corresponding to that he had experienced that afternoon on the wagon coming down. The air grew keener, the snow drier and finer. He kept a sharp lookout for the moving figures, and scanned the horizon for some indication of the prospector’s deserted hut. Suddenly the line of figures he was watching seemed to be broken, and then gathered together as a group. Had they detected him? Evidently they had, for, as he had expected, one of them had been detached, and was now moving at right angles from the party towards the right. With a thrill of excitement he urged his horse forward; the group was far to the left, and he was nearing the solitary figure. But to his astonishment, as he approached the top of the slope he now observed another figure, as far to the left of the group as he was to the right, and that figure he could see, even at that distance, was NOT a Chinaman. He halted for a better observation; for an instant he thought it might be the fugitive himself, but as quickly he recognized it was another man—the deputy. It was HE whom the Chinaman had discovered; it was HE who had caused the diversion and the dispatch of the vedette to warn the fugitive. His own figure had evidently not yet been detected. His heart beat high with hope; he again dashed forward after the flying messenger, who was undoubtedly seeking the prospector’s ruined hut and—Trixit.
But it was no easy matter. At this elevation the snow had formed a crust, over which the single Chinaman—a lithe young figure—skimmed like a skater, while Masterton’s horse crashed though it into unexpected depths. Again, the runner could deviate by a shorter cut, while the horseman was condemned to the one half obliterated trail. The only thing in Masterton’s favor, however, was that he was steadily increasing his distance from the group and the deputy sheriff, and so cutting off their connection with the messenger. But the trail grew more and more indistinct as it neared the summit, until at last it utterly vanished. Still he kept up his speed toward the active little figure—which now seemed to be that of a mere boy—skimming over the frozen snow. Twice a stumble and flounder of the mustang through the broken crust ought to have warned him of his recklessness, but now a distinct glimpse of a low, blackened shanty, the prospector’s ruined hut, toward which the messenger was making, made him forget all else. The distance was lessening between them; he could see the long pigtail of the fugitive standing out from his bent head, when suddenly his horse plunged forward and downward. In an awful instant of suspense and twilight, such as he might have seen in a dream, he felt himself pitched headlong into suffocating depths, followed by a shock, the crushing weight and steaming flank of his horse across his shoulder, utter darkness, and—merciful unconsciousness.
How long he lay there thus he never knew. With his returning consciousness came this strange twilight again,—the twilight of a dream. He was sitting in the new church at Canada City, as he had sat the first Sunday of his arrival there, gazing at the pretty face of Cissy Trixit in the pew opposite him, and wondering who she was. Again he saw the startled, awakened light that came into her adorable eyes, the faint blush that suffused her cheek as she met his inquiring gaze, and the conscious, half conceited, half girlish toss of her little head as she turned her eyes away, and then a file of brown Chinamen, muttering some harsh, uncouth gibberish, interposed between them. This was followed by what seemed to be the crashing in of the church roof, a stifling heat succeeded by a long, deadly chill. But he knew that THIS last was all a dream, and he tried to struggle to his feet to see Cissy’s face again,—a reality that he felt would take him out of this horrible trance,—and he called to her across the pew and heard her sweet voice again in answer, and then a wave of unconsciousness once more submerged him.
He came back to life with a sharp tingling of his whole frame as if pierced with a thousand needles. He knew he was being rubbed, and in his attempts to throw his torturers aside, he saw faintly by the light of a flickering fire that they were Chinamen, and he was lying on the floor of a rude hut. With his first movements they ceased, and, wrapping him like a mummy in warm blankets, dragged him out of the heap of loose snow with which they had been rubbing him, toward the fire that glowed upon the large adobe hearth. The stinging pain was succeeded by a warm glow; a pleasant languor, which made even thought a burden, came over him, and yet his perceptions were keenly alive to his surroundings. He heard the Chinamen mutter something and then depart, leaving him alone. But presently he was aware of another figure that had entered, and was now sitting with its back to him at a rude table, roughly extemporized from a packing-box, apparently engaged in writing. It was a small Chinaman, evidently the one he had chased! The events of the past few hours—his mission, his intentions, and every incident of the pursuit—flashed back upon him. Where was he? What was he doing here? Had Trixit escaped him?
In his exhausted state he was unable to formulate a question which even then he doubted if the Chinaman could understand. So he simply watched him lazily, and with a certain kind of fascination, until he should finish his writing and turn round. His long pigtail, which seemed ridiculously disproportionate to his size,—the pigtail which he remembered had streamed into the air in his flight,—had partly escaped from the discovered hat under which it had been coiled. But what was singular, it was not the wiry black pigtail of his Mongolian fellows, but soft and silky, and as the firelight played upon it, it seemed of a shining chestnut brown! It was like—like—he stopped—was he dreaming again? A long sigh escaped him.
The figure instantly turned. He started. It was Cissy Trixit! There was no mistaking that charming, sensitive face, glowing with health and excitement, albeit showing here and there the mark of the pigment with which it had been stained, now hurriedly washed off. A little of it had run into the corners of her eyelids, and enhanced the brilliancy of her eyes.
He found his tongue with an effort. “What are you doing here?” he asked with a faint voice, and a fainter attempt to smile.
“That’s what I might ask about you,” she said pertly, but with a slight touch of scorn; “but I guess I know as well as I do about the others. I came here to see my father,” she added defiantly.
“And you are the—the—one—I chased?”
“Yes; and I’d have outrun you easily, even with your horse to help you,” she said proudly, “only I turned back when you went down into that prospector’s hole with your horse and his broken neck atop of you.”
He groaned slightly, but more from shame than pain. The young girl took up a glass of whiskey ready on the table and brought it to him. “Take that; it will fetch you all right in a moment. Popper says no bones are broken.”
Masterton waived the proffered glass. “Your father—is he here?” he asked hurriedly, recalling his mission.
“Not now; he’s gone to the station—to—fetch—my clothes,” she said, with a little laugh.
“To the station?” repeated Masterton, bewildered.
“Yes,” she replied, “to the station. Of course you don’t know the news,” she added, with an air of girlish importance. “They’ve stopped all proceedings against him, and he’s as free as you are.”
Masterton tried to rise, but another groan escaped him. He was really in pain. Cissy’s bright eyes softened. She knelt beside him, her soft breath fanning his hair, and lifted him gently to a sitting position.
“Oh, I’ve done it before,” she laughed, as she read his wonder, with his gratitude, in his eyes. “The horse was already stiff, and you were nearly so, by the time I came up to you and got”—she laughed again—“the OTHER Chinaman to help me pull you out of that hole.”
“I know I owe you my life,” he said, his face flushing.
“It was lucky I was there,” she returned naively; “perhaps lucky you were chasing me.”
“I’m afraid that of the many who would run after you I should be the least lucky,” he said, with an attempt to laugh that did not, however, conceal his mortification; “but I assure you that I only wished to have an interview with your father,—a BUSINESS interview, perhaps as much in his interest as my own.”
The old look of audacity came back to her face. “I guess that’s what they all came here for, except one, but it didn’t keep them from believing and saying he was a thief behind his back. Yet they all wanted his—confidence,” she added bitterly.
Masterton felt that his burning cheeks were confessing the truth of this. “You excepted one,” he said hesitatingly.
“Yes—the deputy sheriff. He came to help ME.”
“You!”
“Yes, ME!” A coquettish little toss of her head added to his confusion. “He threw up his job just to follow me, without my knowing it, to see that I didn’t come to any harm. He saw me only once, too, at the house when he came to take possession. He said he thought I was ‘clear grit’ to risk everything to find father, and he said he saw it in me when he was there; that’s how he guessed where I was gone when I ran away, and followed me.”
“He was as right as he was lucky,” said Masterton gravely. “But how did you get here?”
She slipped down on the floor beside him with an unconscious movement that her masculine garments only made the more quaintly girlish, and, clasping her knee with both hands, looked at the fire as she rocked herself slightly backward and forward as she spoke.
“It will shock a proper man like you, I know,” she began demurely, “but I came ALONE, with only a Chinaman to guide me. I got these clothes from our laundryman, so that I shouldn’t attract attention. I would have got a Chinese lady’s dress, but I couldn’t walk in THEIR shoes,”—she looked down at her little feet encased in wooden sandals,—“and I had a long way to walk. But even if I didn’t look quite right to Chinamen, no white man was able to detect the difference. You passed me twice in the stage, and you didn’t know me. I traveled night and day, most of the time walking, and being passed along from one Chinaman to another, or, when we were alone, being slung on a pole between two coolies like a bale of goods. I ate what they could give me, for I dared not go into a shop or a restaurant; I couldn’t shut my eyes in their dens, so I stayed awake all night. Yet I got ahead of you and the sheriff,—though I didn’t know at the time what YOU were after,” she added presently.
He was overcome with wondering admiration of her courage, and of self-reproach at his own short-sightedness. This was the girl he had looked upon as a spoiled village beauty, satisfied with her small triumphs and provincial elevation, and vacant of all other purpose. Here was she—the all-unconscious heroine—and he her critic helpless at her feet! It was not a cheerful reflection, and yet he took a certain delight in his expiation. Perhaps he had half believed in her without knowing it. What could he do or say? I regret to say he dodged the question meanly.
“And you think your disguise escaped detection?” he said, looking markedly at her escaped braid of hair.
She followed his eyes rather than his words, half pettishly caught up the loosened braid, swiftly coiled it around the top of her head, and, clapping the weather-beaten and battered conical hat back again upon it, defiantly said: “Yes! Everybody isn’t as critical as you are, and even you wouldn’t be—of a Chinaman!”
He had never seen her except when she was arrayed with the full intention to affect the beholders and perfectly conscious of her attractions; he was utterly unprepared for this complete ignoring of adornment now, albeit he was for the first time aware how her real prettiness made it unnecessary. She looked fully as charming in this grotesque head-covering as she had in that paragon of fashion, the new hat, which had excited his tolerant amusement.
“I’m afraid I’m a very poor critic,” he said bluntly. “I never conceived that this sort of thing was at all to your taste.”
“I came to see my father because I wanted to,” she said, with equal bluntness.
“And I came to see him though I DIDN’T want to,” he said, with a cynical laugh.
She turned, and fixed her brown eyes inquiringly upon him.
“Why did you come, then?”
“I was ordered by my directors.”
“Then you did not believe he was a thief?” she asked, her eyes softening.
“It would ill become me to accuse your father or my directors,” he answered diplomatically.
She was quick enough to detect the suggestion of moral superiority in his tone, but woman enough to forgive it. “You’re no friend of Windibrook,” she said, “I know.”
“I am not,” he replied frankly.
“If you would like to see my popper, I can manage it,” she said hesitatingly. “He’ll do anything for me,” she added, with a touch of her old pride.
“Who could blame him?” returned Masterton gravely. “But if he is a free man now, and able to go where he likes, and to see whom he likes, he may not care to give an audience to a mere messenger.”
“You wait and let me see him first,” said the girl quickly. Then, as the sound of sleigh-bells came from the road outside, she added, “Here he is. I’ll get your clothes; they are out here drying by the fire in the shed.” She disappeared through a back door, and returned presently bearing his dried garments. “Dress yourself while I take popper into the shed,” she said quickly, and ran out into the road.
Masterton dressed himself with difficulty. Although circulation was now restored, and he felt a glow through his warmed clothes, he had been sorely bruised and shaken by his fall. He had scarcely finished dressing when Montagu Trixit entered from the shed. Masterton looked at him with a new interest and a respect he had never felt before. There certainly was little of the daughter in this keen-faced, resolute-lipped man, though his brown eyes, like hers, had the same frank, steadfast audacity. With a business brevity that was hurried but not unkindly, he hoped Masterton had fully recovered.
“Thanks to your daughter, I’m all right now,” said Masterton. “I need not tell you that I believe I owe my life to her energy and courage, for I think you have experienced what she can do in that way. But YOU have had the advantage of those who have only enjoyed her social acquaintance in knowing all the time what she was capable of,” he added significantly.
“She is a good girl,” said Trixit briefly, yet with a slight rise in color on his dark, sallow cheek, and a sudden wavering of his steadfast eyes. “She tells me you have a message from your directors. I think I know what it is, but we won’t discuss it now. As I am going directly to Sacramento, I shall not see them, but I will give you an answer to take to them when we reach the station. I am going to give you a lift there when my daughter is ready. And here she is.”
It was the old Cissy that stepped into the room, dressed as she was when she left her father’s house two days before. Oddly enough, he fancied that something of her old conscious manner had returned with her clothes, and as he stepped with her into the back seat of the covered sleigh in waiting, he could not help saying, “I really think I understand you better in your other clothes.”
A slight blush mounted to Cissy’s cheek, but her eyes were still audacious. “All the same, I don’t think you’d like to walk down Main Street with me in that rig, although you once thought nothing of taking me over your old mill in your blue blouse and overalls.” And having apparently greatly relieved her proud little heart by this enigmatic statement, she grew so chatty and confidential that the young man was satisfied that he had been in love with her from the first!
When they reached the station, Trixit drew him aside. Taking an envelope marked “Private Contracts” from his pocket, he opened it and displayed some papers. “These are the securities. Tell your directors that you have seen them safe in my hands, and that no one else has seen them. Tell them that if they will send me their renewed notes, dated from to-day, to Sacramento within the next three days, I will return the securities. That is my message.”
The young man bowed. But before the coach started he managed to draw near to Cissy. “You are not returning to Canada City,” he said.
The young girl made a gesture of indignation. “No! I am never going there again. I go with my popper to Sacramento.”
“Then I suppose I must say ‘good-by.’”
The girl looked at him in surprise. “Popper says you are coming to Sacramento in three days!”
“Am I?”
He looked at her fixedly. She returned his glance audaciously, steadfastly.
“You are,” she said, in her low but distinct voice.
“I will.”
And he did.