The Odds - Ethel May Dell (read full novel .TXT) 📗

Got that?"
"I can see myself doing it," said Fletcher Hill.
"Yes, you will do it." A sudden deep note of savagery sounded in Warden's voice. "Not to save your own skin, Mr. Fletcher Hill, but for the sake of--something more valuable than that--something more precious even than your cussed pride. You'll do it for the sake of the girl you're going to marry. And you'll do it--now."
"Shall I?" said Fletcher Hill.
Bill Warden's hand suddenly came forth and gripped him by the shoulder. "Damn you!" he said. "Do you think I want to save your life?"
The words were low, spoken with a concentrated passion more terrible than open violence. He looked closely into Hill's eyes, and his own were flaming like the eyes of a baited animal.
Hill looked straight back at him without the stirring of an eyelid. "Take your hand off me!" he said.
It was the word of the superior officer. Warden's hand fell as it were mechanically. There followed a tense silence.
Warden made a sharp movement. "I did it to save your life," he said. "You'd have died like a dog within ten seconds if I hadn't turned you back."
A curious expression crossed Hill's strong countenance. It was almost a smile of understanding. "I am--indebted to you--boss," he said, and with the words very calmly he took his revolver by the muzzle and held it out. "I surrender to you--without conditions."
Bill Warden gave a sharp start of surprise. For an instant he hesitated, then in silence he took the weapon and dropped it into his pocket. A moment longer he looked Fletcher Hill straight in the eyes, then swung upon his heel.
"We'll get out of this infernal hole straight away," he said, and, stooping, gripped his fingers upon a ridge of stone that ran close to the floor. The stone swung inward under his grasp, leaving a dark aperture gaping at his feet. Bill glanced backwards at his prisoner.
The smile still hovered in the latter's eye. "After you, Mr. Buckskin Bill!" he said, ceremoniously.
And in silence Bill led the way.


CHAPTER XII
THE BOSS OF BARREN VALLEY

"Oh, my dear!" gasped Adela. "I've had the most terrifying adventure. I thought I should never see you again. The men are all on strike, and they've sworn to kill Fletcher Hill, only no one knows where he is. What became of him? Has he got away?"
"I don't know," Dot said.
She sank into the nearest chair in the ill-lighted manager's office, and leaned her white face in her hand.
"Perhaps he has been murdered already," said Adela. "Mr. Harley is very anxious about him. He can't hold them. And--Dot--just think of it!--Warden--the man we saw yesterday, the sub-manager--is at their head. I saw him myself. He had a revolver in his hand. You were with Fletcher Hill. You must know what became of him!"
"No, I don't know," said Dot. "We--parted--a long time ago."
"How odd you are!" said Adela. "Why, what is the matter? Are you going to faint?" She went to the girl and bent over her, frightened by her look. "What is the matter, Dot? What has happened to you? You haven't been hurt?"
"I am--all right," Dot said, with an effort. "Did Mr. Harley bring you here?"
"Yes. And you? How did you get here?"
"He--brought me most of the way--Mr. Warden," Dot said. "He has gone now to save--Fletcher Hill."
"To shoot him, more likely," said Adela. "He has posted sentinels all round the mine to catch him. I wonder if we are safe here! Mr. Harley said it was a safe place. But I wonder. Shall we make a bolt for it, Dot? Shall we? Shall we?"
"I shall stay here," Dot answered.
Adela was not even listening. "We are only two defenceless women, and there isn't a man to look after us. What shall we do if--Ah! Heavens! What is that?"
A fearful sound had cut short her speculations--a fiendish yelling as of a pack of wolves leaping upon their prey. Dot sat up swiftly. Adela cowered in a corner.
The terrible noise continued, appalling in its violence. It swept like a wave towards the building, drowning the roar of the stream below. The girl at the table rose and went to the closed door. She gripped a revolver in her right hand. With her left she reached for the latch.
"Don't open it!" gasped Adela.
But Dot paid no heed. She lifted the latch and flung wide the door. Her slim figure stood outlined against the lamp-light behind her. Before her in a white glare of moonlight lay the vault-like entrance of the mine at the head of Barren Valley, and surging along the black, scarred side of the hill there came a yelling crowd of miners. They were making straight for the open door, but at the sight of the girl standing there they checked momentarily and the shouting died down.
She faced the foremost of them without a tremor. "What is it?" she demanded, in a clear, ringing voice. "What are you wanting?"
A man with the shaggy face of a baboon answered her. "You've got that blasted policeman in there. You stick up that gun of yours and let us pass! We've got guns of our own, so that won't help."
She confronted him with scorn. "Do you imagine I'm afraid of you and your guns? There's no one here except another woman. Are you out to fight women to-night?"
"That's a lie!" he made prompt response. "You've got Fletcher Hill in there, or I'm a nigger. You let us pass!"
But still she blocked the way, her revolver pointing straight at him. "Fletcher Hill is not here. And you won't come in unless Mr. Warden says so. He is not here either at present. But he is coming. And I will shoot any man who tries to force his way in first."
"Damnation!" growled the shaggy-faced one and wheeled upon his comrades. "What do you say to that, boys? Going to let a woman run this show?"
A chorus of curses answered him, but still no one raised a revolver against the slender figure that opposed them. Only, after a moment, a cur in the background picked up a stone and flung it. It struck the doorpost, narrowly missing her shoulder. Dot did not flinch, but immediately, with tightened lips, she raised the revolver and fired over their heads.
A furious outburst followed the explosion, and in an instant a dozen revolvers were levelled at her. But in that same instant there came a sound like the roar of a lion from behind the building, and with it Warden's great figure leapt out into the moonlight.
"You damned ruffians!" he yelled. "You devils! What are you doing?"
His anger was in a fashion superb. It dwarfed the anger of the crowd. They gave way before him like a herd of beasts. He sprang in front of the girl, raging like a man possessed.
"You gang of murderers! You hounds! You dirty swine! Get back, do you hear? I'm the boss of this show, and what I say goes, or, if it doesn't, I'll know the reason why. Benson--you dog! What's the meaning of this? Do you think I'll have under me any coward that will badger a woman?"
The man he addressed looked at him with a cowed expression on his hairy face. "I never wanted to interfere with her," he growled. "But she's protecting that damned policeman. It's her own fault for getting in our way."
"You're wrong then!" flashed back Warden. "Fletcher Hill is under my protection, not hers. He has surrendered to me as my prisoner."
"You've, got him?" shouted a score of voices.
"Yes, I've got him." Rapidly Warden made answer. "But I'm not going to hand him over to you to be murdered out of hand. If I'm boss of Barren Valley, I'll be boss. So if any of you are dissatisfied you'll have to reckon with me first. Fletcher Hill is my prisoner, and I'll see to it that he has a fair trial. Got that?"
A low murmur went round. The magnetism of the man was making itself felt. He had that electric force which sways the multitude against all reason. Single-handed, he gripped them with colossal assurance. They shrank from the flame of his wrath like beaten dogs.
"And before we deal with him," he went on, "there's someone else to be reckoned with. And that's Harley. Does anyone know where Harley is?"
"What do you want with Harley?" asked Benson, glad of this diversion.
"Oh, just to tell him what I think of him, and then--to kick him out!" With curt contempt Warden threw his answer. "He's a traitor and a skunk--smuggles spirits one minute and goes to the police to sell his chums the next; then back to his chums again to sell the police. I know. I've been watching him for some time, the cur. He'd shoot me if he dared."
"He'd better!" yelled a huge miner in the middle of the crowd.
Warden laughed. "That you, Nixon? Come over here! I've got something to tell you--and the other boys. It's the story of this blasted mine." He turned suddenly to the girl who still stood behind him in the lighted doorway. "Miss Burton, I'd like you to hear it too. Shut the door and stand by me!"
Her shining eyes were on his face. She obeyed him mutely, with a submission as unquestioning as that of the rough crowd in front of them.
Very gently he took the revolver from her, drew one out of his own pocket also, and handed both to the big man called Nixon who had come to his side.
"You look after these!" he said.
"One is my property. The other belongs to Fletcher Hill--who is my prisoner. Now, boys, you're armed. I'm not. You won't shoot the lady, I know. And for myself I'll take my chance."
"Guess you won't be any the worse for that," grinned Nixon, at his elbow.
Warden's smile gleamed for an instant in answer, but he passed swiftly on. "Did you ever hear of a cattle-thief called Buckskin Bill? He flourished in these parts some five years ago. There was no mine in Barren Valley then. It was just--a smugglers' stronghold."
Some of the men in front of him stirred uneasily. "What's this to do with Fletcher Hill?" asked one.
"I'll tell you," said Warden. "Buckskin Bill, the cattle-thief, was in a tight corner, and he took refuge in Barren Valley. He found the smugglers' _cache_--and he found something else that the smugglers didn't know of. He found--gold. It's a queer thing, boys, but he'd decided--for private reasons--to give up the cattle-lifting just two days before. The police were hot after him, but they didn't catch him and the smugglers didn't catch him either. He dodged 'em all, and when he left he said to himself, 'I'll be the boss of Barren Valley when I come back.' After that he went West and starved a bit in the Australian desert till the cattle episode had had time to blow over. Then--it's nearly two years ago now--he came back. The first person he ran into was--Fletcher Hill, the policeman."
He paused with that dramatic instinct which was surely part-secret of his fascination. He had caught the full attention of the crowd, and held them spellbound.
In a moment he went on. "That gave him an idea. Hill, of course, was after other game by that time and didn't spot him. Hill was a magistrate and a civil power at Wallacetown. So Bill went to him, knowing he was straight, anyway, and told him about the gold in Barren Valley, explaining, bold as brass, that he couldn't run the show himself for lack of money. Boys, it was a rank speculation, but