open his windbreaker with his free hand and draw out the money belt.
“You've had the money on you all the time?”
“Where else would I have it?”
Abruptly, Dagget laughed, and the sound was harsh and unpleasant. “I had you pegged for a fool, but not that much of a fool!” He shook his head angrily as he grabbed the money belt and began breaking the pockets open. “To think of all the trouble I went to trying to find out where you had die money hid! Lying about the serial numbers. Lying about Valois. And all the time you had the money strapped around your gut!” There was amazement in his eyes along with the anger. And he laughed again when he saw surprise in Grant's face.
“Don't think Territory law is less effective than any other kind. That hair, it's getting lighter by the minute, Grant, the color is dripping down your face! But I needed more than that; Ortway's yelling for his money. And all the time you had it in a money belt!”
Grant's back stiffened. “You didn't get the serial numbers from Joplin? You lied about that?”
“What bank clerk bothers to take serial numbers?” the marshal asked dryly. “But I knew you'd believe it. I knew you'd come running back when I told you that Lloyd and your girl friend...”
Without a word Grant shifted his gun to his left hand, stepped in quickly, and struck Dagget in the face.
Dagget, startled, went reeling back against the wall. Gently, he touched the corner of his bloodied mouth, his eyes blazing. “You don't like to think about that, do you? Lloyd's a hard case, takes what he wants. You don't like to think of him being alone with Miss Muller, do you?”
“Shut up!”
But the marshal shook his head and grinned. “Every man has his weakness; yours is a girl. I knew it the first time I saw the two of you together. Well, you never should have robbed that bank, Grant, because you are going to pay for it a long time.”
“Don't bet on it,” Grant snarled. He glanced quickly at Rhea and said, “Get me some rope, plenty of it.”
“It won't help you,” Dagget said, his anger cooling. “It'll only go harder when I catch you. And I
“We'll see about that.” He took a roll of rough hemp binding twine from Rhea, then motioned for the marshal to turn around. “Cross your hands behind your back.”
The marshal hesitated, then turned slowly, his face, to the wall. Grant lashed his hands together then, and whipped his feet together with another length of twine. As he finished with the job, he turned to see Rhea standing beside him.
“Joe, why did you do it?”
“Why,” he asked stiffly, “does a man do anything?” Then he turned to Lloyd. “As long as you're on the Muller pay roll, you might as well earn your wage. Nobody's watching the fire line, is there?”
Surprisingly, the gunman showed no anger. He shoved himself lazily away from the wall, still favoring his left side. “Dagget's goin' to be mighty put out about this,” and his thin mouth stretched in a humorless grin. “But it's your show, I guess.” He glanced blandly at Valois, then turned his gaze on Rhea and held it until she colored and turned away. “I'll be seein' you, Miss Muller,” he said dryly. “Later.”
Turk Valois stiffened with anger of his own as the gunman left them in the dugout. He turned abruptly toward the door, motioning for Grant to follow.
“I had you pegged right the first time I saw you,” the runner said flatly when they were outside. “You didn't come back here to clear an innocent man. You came because of Rhea.”
“Do you aim to keep working for the Mullers?”
“That's the reason you came back, isn't it, to make sure I stayed to keep an eye on Lloyd?”
Grant nodded, knowing that this was no time for subtleties. “Yes, I guess that's the way it is. He's dangerous.”
A quiet change appeared in Valois' expression, the old toughness that had not been apparent in the dugout was now set in the lines of his face. “I'm not afraid of Kirk Lloyd, but can you give me a good reason why I should risk getting shot over a girl like Rhea?”
Grant took a deep breath, risking everything on the turn of the first card. “I can't give you any reason at all. I guess maybe you've got reason to hate Rhea, but she's still a woman. I was hoping you'd do it because it was the decent thing.”
“If she's afraid of Lloyd, she can always fire him.”
But both men knew better than that. “You don't fire a man like Lloyd. He stays as long as he likes, and then he quits.”
A long moment of silence stretched out between them. At last the runner shook his head. “You've got it bad, but I like your guts. Not many men would stand up to Dagget and Lloyd together.”
“So you'll stay?”
“Until the well's spudded in. Rhea won't need any protection after that; she'll be able to buy anything she wants.”
Not until that moment did they become aware of Rhea standing on the top step of the dugout, her eyes wide, listening.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
IT SEEMED A long time that she stood there, the wind whipping her long dress against her slender body. She did not look so driven now with ambition and greed; she was alone and afraid. Suddenly she uttered a small sound and came flying across the weed-grown lot. At that moment she was more beautiful than Grant had ever seen her, but a core of hard-ness grew inside him, and he stood wooden and unmoving. “Joe, why did you do it!”
And Turk Valois said, with a kind of amused bitterness, “Because he loves you, Rhea. A man does some crazy things when he's in love—I ought to know!”
Grant turned sharply to look at the runner's face, but Valois had already wheeled and was walking stiffly toward the dugout. As if from a great distance he heard Rhea's voice, the words strangely stiff and awkward. “Joe, it's true, isn't it?”
“Who knows why a man does such things?” And with cold deliberateness he said, “Good-by, Rhea.”
“Joe, listen to me! You can't run from Dagget; he'll catch you, no matter where you go. Give yourself up. When the well comes in we'll have the money to hire the best lawyers in the Territory.”
He looked at her as though he had never seen her before. “No, thanks, Rhea. I'd rather look after myself.”
“It's Lloyd, isn't it? That's why you're angry. I'll fire him, I'll put him off the lease!”
Even in his woodenness he was puzzled. Why was she so concerned? He was through; just one short jump ahead of the law and prison. He couldn't possibly be of any use to her now.
He could only wonder what kind of trick it was this time, what more did she want of him? He became aware of the cold, and the slashing wind that whipped through the grasses of the draws and the naked thickets of blackjack, and he pulled himself deeper into his windbreaker and fastened the collar with thick fingers. He said again, “Good-by, Rhea,” and turned to go.
But she grabbed his sleeve. “What do I have to say to make you understand?”
“Nothing, Rhea. You'll get what you want, with a little luck; all the money you'll ever want. Your gun shark will protect you from Farley, and Valois will protect you from the gun shark. It's a nice arrangement, isn't it?”
“Valois!” she hissed. “I don't want his protection!” “Then fire him. But you'll find that Lloyd won't be so easy to deal with.”
Suddenly the fight seemed to go out of her. “What can I say? Once I thought I wanted money more than anything in the world; money and revenge. I wanted security, a place to five that didn't reek of oil; I was tired to death of living in the ground like a wolf, and I wanted to five like a woman. Is there anything wrong with that?”
Grant said nothing.
“I love you, Joe.”
He could not believe her.
“From the very first I think I loved you, but I wouldn't admit it, even to myself.”
He looked past her, to where Valois was waiting against the side of the dugout. Then he turned and walked away. And when he turned to look back, she was no longer there.
