uncut hair at his temples.
'Tom said you were hard and mean the way you killed Buck so quick. Why… you're not that way at all, Lew,' she said, a new note of wonder in her voice as she sank down on the edge of the bed. He seated himself beside her, and she touched him again as though she still couldn't believe it.
'I couldn't stop writing you letters, Lew, and at night I cried about me and about you down there in prison. It got so bad Tom made the warden send back my letters. He said you were in for life. And then he wanted to take me back East where I belonged. Lew, did I do something so terribly bad?'
'I suppose it would all depend upon what kind of people look at things, Kitty. I expect my viewpoint would be different from, say Judge Eaton's or Joe Stovers'.'
'You mean they think I'm bad—not like Clara, who was married to her husband?'
'And Miss Wilkerson, who was raised a lady, she might think differently from me.'
'Clara never said a single word of reproof after I went to Dalyville and went to work for Tom. That's the way she is. But I don't care what anybody else in the world thinks about me any more. I just want to have you say what you feel, Lew.'
'Take a look at my right hand, Kitty,' he said, and opened it to her, palm up. 'A gun in that hand has killed six men here in Arizona. I've got quite a lot of mud on me to be wiping it off others.'
'There were others in Texas, Lew?'
'Five brothers in Texas, who tried to kill my father and shot my mother to death by accident. They're all dead. I've no right to censure you, Kitty, any more than I've a right to censure Harrow for assuming another name. I've got the blood of eleven dead men on my hands and Kerrigan isn't my real name.'
Her hand slid inside his and she looked up with hope in her eyes. 'You mean I'm not like Clara and Miss Wilkerson downstairs and you're not like Joe Stovers? That we're two of a kind? Is that what you came to tell me? If it is, I'll go anywhere you want, Lew.'
'I want you to go back East, Kitty,' he told her quietly. 'You don't belong out here alone. That's why I came up. I might not get out of Pirtman alive, and even if I do, I'll still have to run for it. When I went to prison Joe Stovers came back from Yuma and sold off the hundred head of cattle I had up in the basin. He's been holding the money for me all this time. If I get out of here alive, I want you to have five hundred of it. Start fresh somewhere new. I left Texas for that reason, came over here and changed my name and went to work. But I got a bad break at Tom Harrow's hands. Now I'm going to finish a job I have to do and try it once more. I think it'll work next time.'
'But you don't want me?' She choked a little on the words.
He rose to his moccasined feet, at a loss for words. What could you say to a woman like Kitty, alone and grabbing at any straw?
'I've just told you how the chips fell my way, Kitty,' he said kindly. 'For all I know, the last card in the deck is about to be dealt. You've got a long hand ahead of you to play. This game is too far along to deal yourself in.'
'Could I go downstairs with you and get some coffee, Lew? I don't think Clara would mind.'
'Wipe your eyes a bit first.' He grinned at her. 'Clara is a very understanding woman.'
He took her by the arm and they went down together.
But his mind was still puzzling over the strange actions of Ace Saunders. The slim gunman had got the drop on him flat-footedly after helping trail him all the way from Yuma. He could have forced Kerrigan out of the house, or smashed him over the head and got him away in the hopes of finding the secret of Apache renegade gold.
Instead, he'd appeared to be more concerned about Kitty. He'd found out to his satisfaction what he wanted to know. Then, instead of killing Kerrigan on the spot, he'd turned his back and gone downstairs and out through the kitchen.
It made one thing certain in Kerrigan's mind anyhow: Saunders was confident that when they met again under even circumstances he'd still be on his feet with a gun in his hand afterward.
Joe Stovers, looking straight ahead, had not spoken a word to his prisoner as they moved away from the former parade ground. With the reins of his led horse in one hand he walked beside a man now fully revealed as a criminal.
Harrow had regained his aplomb and now he looked over at the sheriff with a faintly amused smile. 'No use to get yourself upset, Joe,' he remarked suavely. 'If it will help remove that outraged thundercloud from your slightly apoplectic features, I'm glad I didn't kill Lew Kerrigan.'
'I'll bet!' Stovers almost spat out. 'Still haven't given up hope about grabbing yourself another Dalyville, eh?'
'I regret it, of course. With another such strike to back me up I could go East again and sell a cool million dollars' worth of stock. I could make you rich, Joe.'
'I know where you're going and it ain't east. It's south, where Lew just came from with your crummy pack of wolves on his trail.'
'That's where you're very much wrong, my righteous friend. I'm not going to any penitentiary. I paid the governor of the territory a twenty-thousand-dollar bribe to get Kerrigan out of prison. Regardless of what charges I'm brought to trial for, I'll have full freedom within two or three days. Just long enough to get word to the right person.'
'Maybe,' grunted Stovers shortly.
He knew Harrow probably was right. The Territorial Governor had sold offices right and left during his administration, receiving a kickback percentage of their state salaries for the favors. But if every paper in the territory knew the full story of Tom Harrow, freedom for him under any legal technicalities would be tantamount to political suicide.
And there was Judge Eaton. The ex-minister had the complete approval of far-seeing men in Arizona who were backing him in his avowed campaign to clean the northern part of the territory of every tough character who came before him while riding circuit court. Stovers had always thought that Eaton was just a mite crazy, but this was one time it might pay off. The Governor already had Harrow's bribe for freeing Kerrigan, and Dalyville was finished as a source of further income. Harrow was through as a mining man with money, and a wily politician afraid of his next election might be somewhat reluctant to give Harrow a clean bill when the facts were laid before him.
Stovers walked on, suddenly feeling very much better.
Under the trees beside the old road several men, armed and nervous, waited. The sheriff told them what had happened, and added a blunt warning to stay on guard at their cabins in case he needed them.
'Where's Judge Eaton?' he demanded.
'Over there in the Pine Knot, Joe,' a man replied and nodded toward a low building of chinked logs. 'Having a brandy and bellowing about lawlessness in the territory.'
'I reckon he'll have a chance to bellow some more,' Stovers growled. 'Get going, Tom.'
'Take these handcuffs off me,' Harrow replied angrily. 'I'm no common criminal, and I'm not going to run away.'
'You ain't no common criminal,' the sheriff agreed, 'and you damn' sure ain't going to run away.'
They walked over to the crude pole porch and found the tall, black-coated figure of the judge. Beside him stood Jeb Donnelly. It was hard to tell what lay back of those eyes above the dirty bandage covering the lower part of the ex-marshal's heavy face. But he looked uneasy.
Stovers said to him almost belligerently, 'That shooting over in the old fort was Lew Kerrigan settling accounts with LeRoy and Pete Orr. Seems like he had a friend among them bronco Apaches and didn't get his hair singed. LeRoy and Pete are both dead and Lew is over at Clara's, a place you damn' well better stay away from. That badge you're wearin' don't mean a thing up here, Donnelly. You make one false step after what I've just found out and I'll have you behind log walls.'
'You say the murderer Kerrigan is over at Clara's house?' demanded Judge Eaton ominously.
'Yep,' replied Stovers.
'Then why haven't you arrested him?' thundered the judge, his thin face darkening. 'I appointed you a U.S.
