"But it was his business. Don't you know he's sheriff? He had to do it." Melissy turned to the outlaw impetuously.
"So. And I have to play my hand out, too. It wipes out Mr. Flatray. Sorry, but business is business."
"But--but----" Melissy grew pale as the icy fear gripped her heart that the man meant to go on with the crime. "Don't you see? He's the sheriff?"
"And I never did love sheriffs," drawled MacQueen.
The girl repeated herself helplessly. "It was his sworn duty. That was how he looked at it."
A ghost of an ironic smile flitted across the face of the outlaw chief. "Rosario's sworn duty is to avenge her son's death. That is how she looks at it. The rest of us swore the oath with her."
"But Lieutenant O'Connor had the law back of him. This is murder!"
"Not at all. It is the law of the valley--a life for a life."
"But---- Oh, no--no--no!"
"Yes."
The finality of it appalled her. She felt as if she were butting her head against a stone wall. She knew that argument and entreaty were of no avail, yet she desperately besought first one and then another of them to save the prisoner. Each in turn shook his head. She could see that none of them, save Rosario, bore him a grudge; yet none would move to break the valley oath. At the last, she was through with her promises and her prayers. She had spent them all, and had come up against the wall of blank despair.
Then Jack's grave smile thanked her. "You've done what you could, Melissy."
She clung to him wildly. "Oh, no--no! I can't let you go, Jack. I can't. I can't."
"I reckon it's got to be, dear," he told her gently.
But her breaking heart could not stand that. There must somehow be a way to save him. She cast about desperately for one, and had not found it when she begged the outlaw chief to see her alone.
"No use." He shook his head.
"But just for five minutes! That can't do any harm, can it?"
"And no good, either."
"Yet I ask it. You might do that much for me," she pleaded.
Her despair had moved him; for he was human, after all. That he was troubled about it annoyed him a good deal. Her arrival on the scene had made things unpleasant for everybody. Ungraciously he assented, as the easiest way out of the difficulty.
The two moved off to the corral. It was perhaps thirty yards distant, and they reached it before either of them spoke. She was the first to break the silence.
"You won't do this dreadful thing--surely, you won't do it."
"No use saying another word about it. I told you that," he answered doggedly.
"But---- Oh, don't you see? It's one of those things no white man can do. Once it's done, you have put the bars up against decency for the rest of your life."
"I reckon I'll have to risk that--and down in your heart you don't believe it, because you think I've had the bars up for years."
She had come to an impasse already. She tried another turn. "And you said you cared for me! Yet you are willing to make me unhappy for the rest of my life."
"Why, no! I'm willing to make you happy. There's fish in the sea just as good as any that ever were caught," he smirked.
"But it would help you to free him. Don't you see? It's your chance. You can begin again, now. You can make him your friend."
His eyes were hard and grim. "I don't want him for a friend, and you're dead wrong if you think I could make this a lever to square myself with the law. I couldn't. He wouldn't let me, for one thing--he isn't that kind."
"And you said you cared for me!" she repeated helplessly, wringing her hands in her despair. "But at the first chance you fail me."
"Can't you see it isn't a personal matter? I've got nothing against him--nothing to speak of. I'd give him to you, if I could. But it's not my say-so. The thing is out of my hands."
"You could save him, if you set yourself to."
"Sure, I could--if I would pay the price. But I won't pay."
"That's it. You would have to give Rosario something--make some concession," she said eagerly.
"And I'm not willing to pay the price," he told her. "His life's forfeit. Hasn't he been hunting us for a week?"
"Let me pay it," she cried. "I have money in my own right--seven thousand dollars. I'll give it all to save him."
He shook his head. "No use. We've turned down a big offer from West. Your seven thousand isn't a drop in the bucket."
She beat her hands together wildly. "There must be some way to save him."
The outlaw was looking at her with narrowed eyes. He saw a way, and was working it out in his mind. "You're willing to pay, are you?" he asked.
"Yes--yes! All I have."
He put his arms akimbo on the corral fence, and looked long at her. "Suppose the price can't be paid in money, Miss Lee."
"What do you mean?"
"Money isn't the only thing in this world. There are lots of things it won't buy that other things will," he said slowly.
She groped for his meaning, her wide eyes fixed on his, and still did not find it. "Be plainer, please. What can I do to save him?"
"You might marry me."
"Never!"
"Just as you say. You were looking for a way, and I suggested one. Anyhow, you're mine."
"I won't do it!"
"You wanted me to pay the price; but you don't want to pay yourself."
"I couldn't do it. It would be horrible!" But she knew she could and must.
"Why couldn't you? I'm ready to cut loose from this way of living. When I pull off this one big thing, I'll quit. We'll go somewhere and begin life again. You said I could. Well, I will. You'll help me to keep straight. It won't be only his life you are saving. It will be mine, too."
"No--I don't love you! How could a girl marry a man she didn't care for and didn't respect?"
"I'll make you do both before long. I'm the kind of man women love."
"You're the kind I hate," she flashed bitterly.
"I'll risk your hate, my dear," he laughed easily.
She did not look at him. Her eyes were on the horizon line, where sky and pine tops met. He knew that she was fighting it out to a decision, and he did not speak again.
After all, she was only a girl. Right and wrong were inextricably mixed in her mind. It was not right to marry this man. It was not right to let the sheriff die while she could save him. She was generous to the core. But there was something deeper than generosity. Her banked love for Flatray flooded her in a great cry of protest against his death. She loved him. She loved him. Much as she detested this man, revolting as she found the thought of being linked to him, the impulse to sacrifice herself was the stronger feeling of the two. Deep in her heart she knew that she could not let Jack go to his death so long as it was possible to prevent it.
Her grave eyes came back to MacQueen. "I'll have to tell you one thing--I'll hate you worse than ever after this. Don't think I'll ever change my mind about that. I won't."
He twirled his little mustache complacently.
"I'll have to risk that, as I said."
"You'll take me to Mesa to-day. As soon as we get there a justice of the peace will marry us. From his house we'll go directly to father's. You won't lie to me."
"No. I'll play out the game square, if you do."
"And after we're