chances were, of course, that the man was what he gave himself out for — an arrested case of tuberculosis sent out to complete a cure in the dry air of Arizona.
But Stevens was in another category. He was a menace to them all. Word had been phoned to Black from Big Bridge that the M K man had gathered evidence of the murder of the spy Watts, had been over the ground where the fellow was killed and checked up tracks. They had to get rid of him, and it had to be done soon.
WHEN HAL STEVENS and Tom Wall got out of the plane, they saw Dale coming across the field from the house to meet them. In her light swift tread, each step modeling the long slender thighs beneath the summer dress, was the unconscious pride of undefeated youth. All through the ages, Hal thought, there must have been women like that, free and untrammeled, with a fine animal vigor that showed the warm color blooming under the summer tan.
'You left Frank all right?' she called to them while still a dozen yards away.
Hal drew his heels together and saluted. 'We report Private Lovell in the pink at last report,' he said.
'You don't think they will try to bother him now?'
'They would have to be better than the Japs or the Germans to reach him. He is in camp with a good many thousand others, and I'm told he won't have a chance to get outside the gates for several weeks. I can't see Tick Black's gunmen getting through that interference.'
'No,' she admitted. 'It's a pity the army didn't draft you and Mr. Wall while you were there.'
'My turn is coming in a few weeks,' Wall said.
Hal said nothing. Dale knew he was not over age and wondered why he was not in the service. He could probably have had a commission by going after it. It could hardly be a physical disability that kept him at home. She would have expected his reckless courage to take him in early. Maybe he would rather stay on the ranch and make a cleaning during the war years. She was aware of a lurking sense of disappointment.
'I don't suppose you saw anything of Black's gang while you were in town,' Dale said as they walked back to the house.
'Yes, we saw them at the Frontera just after I phoned you,' Hal answered. 'We left them in the lobby and went to our rooms.'
'And you didn't see them after that?'
'Twice. Once as they were driving away, and again as we were starting for the air field.'
'But you had no trouble with them?'
Hal smiled. 'We're here. Sound as two silver dollars.'
Dale intercepted the grin Wall flashed at his friend.
'What's the catch?' she asked sharply.
'Might as well tell her, Tom,' Hal said. 'Miss Lovell could drag a secret out of a clam.'
'Only if it's one I'm entitled to know,' she differed.
'Well, they knocked on our room door and said it was a bellhop with ice water,' Wall explained. 'We didn't fall for that one, so they sent their calling cards through the door and then beat it.'
'You mean that they shot through the door?'
'That's right.'
She was astounded at the boldness of their enemies. 'With the hotel full of people? What did the manager say?'
'Plenty. He raised quite some cane. Said that sort of horseplay gives a hotel a bad name. The guests don't like it. Hal told him he ought not to let drunken cowboys cavort around like that, but he promised not to sue the hotel if it didn't happen again.'
'The manager was rather nonplused at that,' Hal mentioned, with a reminiscent smile. 'The drunken cowboy idea struck him as a bit fishy. He had heard a rumor of the Big Bridge incident. We paid for another door, but I doubt if he wants us as guests again.'
Dale did not respond to their humor. This was too serious for jesting. 'I told you to come back last night,' she said shortly. 'But you knew best.'
'So you did.' Hal's cool, amused eyes rested on the girl. 'And of course you are a hundred per cent right, Miss Lovell. I ought to do as teacher tells me.'
She felt the color mounting into her cheeks. 'You like to stir up trouble. But it's none of my business.'
'Still a hundred per cent right,' he murmured.
'We tried to get a plane last night,' Wall cut in. 'But the pilot had never tried landing here and wouldn't tackle it in the dark. So we had to wait.'
Dale was annoyed, both at herself and at Stevens. It was just like him to stand back chuckling and watch her catch herself in a trap. She spoke to Wall, ignoring Hal. 'They are determined to kill you. Mr. Stevens seems to think this is some kind of a game. It isn't. If you hadn't been fortunate, you would both be dead now.'
'We don't aim to throw down on ourselves,' Wall replied. 'Till this rookus is over, I'm going to be one of Hal's hired hands.'
'You mustn't go out into the pastures, either of you,' Dale insisted.
'No, ma'am,' Hal said meekly.
'I think the M K is too close to their district anyhow,' the girl continued, disregarding her neighbor's ironic submission. 'And the country is so brushy they could easily ambush you. The boys can make room for you in our bunkhouse until the danger is past.'
'Don't you think we would be safer in a young ladies' seminary somewhere?' Hal asked.
She clamped her lips, to keep back an angry retort. When she spoke, it was to say in a dry, colorless voice, 'I see I'm still not minding my own business.'
But all through the breakfast they found waiting for them at the house, she wanted to renew the battle. Looking at this lean brown man with the slim whipcord figure and the reckless eyes, she felt a chill wind blow through her. Back of her anger at him was fear. He was so bold and careless. He would ride out from his ranch some morning. There would sound the crack of a rifle from the brush, his knees would lose their grip on the saddle, and the strong body would plunge down into the sand to lie there slack and lifeless. For the moment the picture was so vivid that the shock of it held her breathless, even while she sat opposite to him as he described with gay animation her brother getting into a uniform four sizes too large for him.
He would go his own way. There was nothing she could do or say to restrain him. They were not even friends, and even if she had been close to him, it would have made no difference. He was not a man to be swayed by a woman in matters of importance.
They stayed all day and left after dark, on horseback, riding across the south pasture to the boundary of the valley. From here they would ascend Frenchy's Draw into the hills.
Dale watched them go, war in her heart. All her life she had hated the Stevens outfit, lock, stock, and barrel. They had been enemies of her father, to whose memory she was devoted. She was furious at Hal, and all day had been barely civil to him, a fact of which he had been apparently quite oblivious. And all through the hours she had been torn by the knowledge that he possessed her heart wholly. The lean head so live, so strong. The rhythmic motions of his body, smooth and sure. The careless indomitable spirit. They drew her to this gay turbulent foe straight as filings to a magnet. Yet his ways were not hers. They could never be. Both the past and the present were impassable barriers between them. There was, too, the crowning humiliation that his only interest in her was as a source of amusement She ministered to his satiric humor. This alone was enough to keep resentment churning in her.
RANDOLPH ARNOLD rode the west fence of the M K. He had come to repair a break in it reported by one of the men. That was his ostensible motive, but there was another more important one. He wanted to meet and establish contact with some of the men nesting in the tangle of gulches between the M K and Rabbit Ear
