the infallibility of his presentiments. As he and Columbine halted in the trail, Belllounds's hurried stride lengthened until he almost ran. He carried the rifle forward in a most significant manner. Black as a thunder-cloud was his face. Alas for the dignity and pain and resolve that had only recently showed there!
Belllounds reached them. He was frothing at the mouth. He cocked the rifle and thrust it toward Wade, holding low down.
“You—meddling sneak! If you open your trap I'll bore you!” he shouted, almost incoherently.
Wade knew when danger of life loomed imminent. He fixed his glance upon the glaring eyes of Belllounds.
“Jack, seein' I'm not packin' a gun, it'd look sorta natural, along with your other tricks, if you bored me.”
His gentle voice, his cool mien, his satire, were as giant's arms to drag Belllounds back from murder. The rifle was raised, the hammer reset, the butt lowered to the ground, while Belllounds, snarling and choking, fought for speech.
“I'll get even—with you,” he said, huskily. “I'm on to your game now. I'll fix you later. But—I'll do you harm now if you mix in with this!”
Then he wheeled to Columbine, and as if he had just recognized her, a change that was pitiful and shocking convulsed his face. He leaned toward her, pointing with shaking, accusing hand.
“I saw you—up there. I watched—you,” he panted.
Columbine faced him, white and mute.
“It was you—wasn't it?” he yelled.
“Yes, of course it was.”
She might have struck him, for the way he flinched.
“What was that—a trick—a game—a play all fixed up for my benefit?”
“I don't understand you,” she replied.
“Bah! You—you white-faced cat!... I saw you! Saw you in Moore's arms! Saw him hug you—kiss you!... Then—I saw—you put up your arms—round his neck—kiss him—kiss him—kiss him!... I saw all that—didn't I?”
“You must have, since you say so,” she returned, with perfect composure.
“But
“Yes, I did,” she flashed. There was primitive woman uppermost in her now, and a spirit no man might provoke with impunity.
“
Then Wade saw the glory of her—saw her mother again in that proud, fierce uplift of face, that flamed red and then blazed white—saw hate and passion and love in all their primal nakedness.
“Love him! Love Wilson Moore? Yes, you fool! I love him! Yes!
That voice would have pierced the heart of a wooden image, so Wade thought, as all his strung nerves quivered and thrilled.
Belllounds uttered a low cry of realization, and all his instinctive energy seemed on the verge of collapse. He grew limp, he sagged, he tottered. His sensorial perceptions seemed momentarily blunted.
Wade divined the tragedy, and a pang of great compassion overcame him. Whatever Jack Belllounds was in character, he had inherited his father's power to love, and he was human. Wade felt the death in that stricken soul, and it was the last flash of pity he ever had for Jack Belllounds.
“You—you—” muttered Belllounds, raising a hand that gathered speed and strength in the action. The moment of a great blow had passed, like a storm-blast through a leafless tree. Now the thousand devils of his nature leaped into ascendancy. “You!—” He could not articulate. Dark and terrible became his energy. It was like a resistless current forced through leaping thought and leaping muscle.
He struck her on the mouth, a cruel blow that would have felled her but for Wade: and then he lunged away, bowed and trembling, yet with fierce, instinctive motion, as if driven to run with the spirit of his rage.
CHAPTER XV
Wade noticed that after her trying experience with him and Wilson and Belllounds Columbine did not ride frequently.
He managed to get a word or two with her whenever he went to the ranch-house, and he needed only look at her to read her sensitive mind. All was well with Columbine, despite her trouble. She remained upheld in spirit, while yet she seemed to brood over an unsolvable problem. She had said, “But—let what will come!”—and she was waiting.
Wade hunted for more than lions and wolves these days. Like an Indian scout who scented peril or heard an unknown step upon his trail, Wade rode the hills, and spent long hours hidden on the lonely slopes, watching with somber, keen eyes. They were eyes that knew what they were looking for. They had marked the strange sight of the son of Bill Belllounds, gliding along that trail where Moore had met Columbine, sneaking and stooping, at last with many a covert glance about, to kneel in the trail and compare the horse tracks there with horseshoes he took from his pocket. That alone made Bent Wade eternally vigilant. He kept his counsel. He worked more swiftly, so that he might have leisure for his peculiar seeking. He spent an hour each night with the cowboys, listening to their recounting of the day and to their homely and shrewd opinions. He haunted the vicinity of the ranch-house at night, watching and listening for that moment which was to aid him in the crisis that was impending. Many a time he had been near when Columbine passed from the living-room to her corner of the house. He had heard her sigh and could almost have touched her.
Buster Jack had suffered a regurgitation of the old driving and insatiate temper, and there was gloom in the
