that, Leah?”
She turned her head and faced the other way. Elizabeth returned to bring her husband to the table, but she paused when she saw the look of concentration on Owen's face. “Owen, do you know this girl?”
“I think so,” he said. “Her father was a preacher. He quit the Cherokee mission before statehood and moved into the hills with his family. He was a good man, as I remember.”
The girl turned her head again and looked at Owen out of those wild, animal-like eyes. She was frightened, and Owen did not know how to reassure her. She was bitter with grief, angry, sick, and alone. And Owen could not think of any word that would comfort her. The girl had raised a barrier of distrust between them and Owen could not break it down.
Leah Stringer stayed with them eight days. On the morning of the ninth day, when Elizabeth opened the door to take the girl her breakfast, she was gone.
Chapter Seven
Two days later Owen was surprised to see Arch Deland riding across the farmyard toward the barn. It was near sundown, that time of long shadows and of pine-smelling breezes sweeping down from the wooded hills.
Owen came forward with two large buckets heavy with strained milk.
“Pretty late for you to be riding these hills alone, isn't it?” he kidded Deland.
The deputy grinned. “I'm not as thickheaded as some people think. Since I had to come this way on business, I figured I might as well make it close to suppertime.”
Owen was always glad to see his old friend. He helped Arch stable his horse in the barn, then the two men took the buckets of milk back to the house. Arch joked with Elizabeth, and teased the children until they were almost wild before finally handing over a bag of striped peppermint sticks. The old man seemed perfectly at ease and happy, but Owen, who knew him well, could look behind those pale blue eyes and see that Deland was worried.
At last, when they were alone in the parlor, smoking their pipes, Owen said, “You mentioned you had business out this way, Arch. What kind?”
“Routine investigation of a gunshot wound. Your patient still here?”
Owen shook his head, then told the deputy everything he could remember about the girl and the boy who called himself Dunc Lester.
“To tell the truth,” he finished, “I was glad when we woke up that morning and found that Leah Stringer had left us. She wasn't the easiest girl in the world to live with.”
“What about the Lester boy?” Arch asked. “Have you seen any more of him?”
Owen shook his head. “And I don't expect to.”
“Was this boy a member of the Brunner gang?”
The bluntness of the question surprised Owen. “I don't know. What makes you ask?”
“Doc Linnwood's report that he turned in to the sheriffs office. He said the boy looked suspicious, and the girl was spouting some pretty queer things while she was out of her head. He recommended that both of them be held for investigation.”
Owen was puzzled and faintly angry. “Linnwood didn't say any of this to me.” Then he felt the cold finger of uneasiness on his neck. Had Linnwood thought that he was deliberately giving aid to members of the Brunner gang? Was that the reason he had kept his report to the sheriff secret?
Now he could understand the worry behind Arch Deland's eyes. “Well,” he said, “you've waited too long to make an investigation, because they're both gone. Why didn't Will Cushman go to work on this sooner?”
The deputy smiled. “The report was put on the sheriff's desk, but Will was off visitin' in Talequah until this mornin'.”
“That's Will's bad luck. There's no way I can help him now.
“I know,” Arch said heavily. “But I wish there was...” There was something on his mind and he was searching for a way to say it. At last he said, “Owen, do you figure to come to town next Saturday?”
“Yes. The Stringer girl had us tied down this week, but we'll have to go in Saturday to buy supplies.”
Deland shook his head. “Don't do it, Owen,” he said soberly. “Anyway, don't bring Elizabeth and the children. You don't know how worked up the town is gettin' about this thing.” He chewed on his pipestem, his face bleak and expressionless.
Owen could feel slow anger tighten the muscles of his throat. “What are they saying?” he asked quietly.
The deputy shifted uncomfortably in the chair, avoiding Owen's eyes. Then, showing his own anger for the first time, Deland blurted, “It's a raw deal all around! Ben McKeever started it, I guess, but he couldn't have kept it goin' by himself. The people wanted to believe it. They have to have somebody to be mad at, so they picked you. If they're mad enough at somebody, I guess they figure they can forget the wide yellow stripes down their own backs!”
“What are they saying?” Owen asked again, softly.
“They're sayin' that you're still mad about Will Cushman beatin' you out for the sheriff's office. They're sayin' that you're givin' help to the Brunners just to make Will's job tougher.”
That was as far as Arch Deland could go. He looked up and saw Elizabeth standing in the doorway, her eyes flashing with indignation and anger. She came into the room and stood behind her husband's chair. “Mr. Deland,” she said icily, “did you come here to start trouble?”
The deputy blinked. “No, Elizabeth. I came to stop the trouble before it started, if I could.”
“It doesn't sound like it, from what I heard. It sounds to me as though you're more interested in spreading
