For Rand was a puzzle to them all. They whispered to one another that Rand had never killed a man; that he lacked the nerve to kill; there were some of them who even jeeringly remarked—always when Rand was not present — that he was "yellow"—a term descriptive of a cowardice too contemptible to merit attention.
And yet no man of Ocate — or of the surrounding country — ever had attempted personally to prove the charge; and all men treated him with frigid respect and deference — which indicated their brains had formed opinions which they dared not express in Rand's presence.
It was that way with them all — with all of Rand's enemies. They were puzzled, mystified — baffled by the lingering threat in his manner; by the uncertainty of him; they were awed by the dread thought that though he had — to their knowledge — never killed a man, he might at any time decide to do so. And no man of them cared to be the first.
Nor did Seddon care to be the first; it was an experiment from which he shrank in fear and trembling.
Chapter VIII. A Shattered Pipe
SITTING there in the chair now, Seddon knew he hated Rand more than he ever had hated him; and yet he was convinced that when Rand gave him the order to tell Eleanor that he had been mistaken in his estimation of Rand's character—that he had unknowingly lied about him — he would do it. And when, just before the hands of the clock pointed to six, Seddon heard a sound in the house, indicating that Eleanor had awakened and was moving about, he looked at Rand, to see the other watching him with cold level gaze.
"You'll call her now," said Rand.
Seddon got up slowly and walked to the inside door.
"Damn you!" he declared venomously. "I'll get even with you some day for this!"
Rand's grin was saturnine. "I'll know if you go to back-bitin' me to her," he said evenly. "You tellin' her now that you was wrong when you told her I was the mean man you said I was will make her treat me like a white man. An' if she gets treatin' me like an outlaw again I'll come for you. Then you'll have your chance to get even! Start yappin'!"
Standing in the open doorway, Seddon called gruffly: "If you've finished dressin', Ellie, come into the office — I've got a visitor!"
"There's tones of voice," came Rand's voice behind him warningly; "there's a vinegar voice an' a voice of honey. If you go to speakin' sour to her, she'll get wise — an' you'll croak, wonderin' why you didn't have more sense!"
Rand's voice had hardly died away when there was a rustle at the door, and Eleanor Seddon stood in the opening.
She caught her breath with a quick gasp when she saw Rand — who was now on his feet, bowing to her, his face expressionless, his eyes twinkling with some mysterious emotion — and then she stiffened, lifted her chin defiantly and spoke to her father, ignoring Rand.
"Is this your visitor?" she coldly inquired. "Beaudry Rand, the outlaw?"
And now she gazed at Rand with cold, steady hostility, which he met with a gravely gentle smile.
"I reckon things have been a bit mixed up, ma'am," he said. "I ain't much on the talk, an' so your father will do the explainin'." And he looked at Seddon.
Seddon fidgeted nervously. "Ellie," he said, "when I was talkin' to you the other day — about Rand, here — I made a mistake, I reckon. I told you he was the man who was stealin' stock right an' left, an' holdin' up the stage. I reckon I went too far. I was talkin' extravagant; the reason bein' that I'd missed a black outlaw horse, which we called Midnight — an' I'd seen Rand ridin' him. But since then I've found out that Rand didn't steal the horse — he bought him from Mellert — my range boss — an' everything is all regular an' straight. It was just a misunderstandin'. Rand ain't no outlaw."
The girl's face crimsoned; she looked from her father to Rand — who did not smile, though he felt much like smiling — and then back to her father, who reddened again and could not meet her gaze.
"Why, Daddy!" she said then. "How unjust of you! [You judged Mr. Rand before you knew! Was that the evidence you meant Mr. Compton was getting — evidence that Mr. Rand stole Midnight?"
"I reckon," muttered Seddon.
"And you had no other evidence against him — no evidence whatever, in fact?" she demanded.
The girl looked intently at him, assuming that his obvious distress was caused by remorse over his mistake; and then she walked straight to Rand and extended a hand to him, saying earnestly:
"I am sorry, Mr. Rand. But, you see —"
He interrupted her, for he saw the embarrassment shining in her eyes:
"Shucks! it ain't anything. I reckon you had cause to be mighty suspicious. When I think of how stiff an' mysterious I was when I took you into the house an' showed you the picture of my dad, I'm some surprised that I wasn't suspicious of myself."
"You see, what you'd said about me bein' an outlaw had kind of got under my skin, an' I was feelin' a bit flustered — an' mean. An' you had cause to run away — like you did." He looked at her, mirth in his eyes.
"I didn't run — so very fast!" she denied, meeting his eyes and wondering how, yesterday, she had decided they were like the eyes of the man of the photograph. For they were not like his father's; there was nothing cruel in them. On the contrary, they were wise, subtle, humorous eyes; the hard steel-gray of them softened by a luminous glow that hinted of gentleness.
But there was something more in them, too, she knew — a something that baffled her — a glint of recklessness mingled with the gentleness she knew was there — a slumbering something that convinced her he was an enigma not to be solved at a glance — or perhaps not to be solved at all.
"Well," he said, "mebbe your horse wasn't runnin'; but from where I stood it seemed to me he was doin' somethin' that looked mighty like runnin'."
"So you watched me?" she said.
"Why sure, ma'am," he grinned.
"You had been watching me in the timber, too!" she said, remembering that he had told her that; and remembering, too, that since it had turned out that he was not employed by her father he could have no excuse for spying upon her in the timber. She had not forgiven him for that!
"I reckon I've got to do some explainin' about that," he told her gravely. "I saw you comin' toward the timber. I was mendin' a saddle-cinch on Midnight, an' I saw you headin' for the timber. I didn't know then that you was Eleanor Seddon — though mebbe I had a mighty strong suspicion — you comin' from this direction, an' me havin' got a glimpse of you the day you left Ocate to go to school at Denver.
"That timber is alive with wolves, ma'am; an' you was alone. So I jumped on Midnight an' moseyed around, keepin' you in sight. But mostly, I was keep in' in sight that wolf I salivated. He'd picked up your trail mighty soon after you got into the timber, an' I wasn't allowin' I wanted him to get that kind of a dinner."
"He did look hungry," she said, shuddering.
He laughed lowly, and stepped toward the door, for now that Seddon had set him right with the girl he felt he had no right to linger longer—much as he wished he might.
For the girl had made a deep impression upon him. The lure of her had seized him; he felt its strength; he was aware of the gripping desire that had fastened upon him. His experience with women had been elemental — he had seen few good ones and had avoided the bad ones. However, his lack of experience with them had not prevented him visioning an ideal; and he knew the ideal was in the flesh before him.
As a matter of fact, it had been upon the glimpse of the girl, four years before, that he had fashioned his picture of the ideal that was to rule him, and during the elapsed interval she had achieved