It would be a surrender to turn back—now.
And like a defeated man who rides in a lost cause, he swung the grey to the south and rode back over the trail, his head bowed.
CHAPTER XXXVII
“TODO ES PERDO”
It was not long after the departure of Bard that Sally Fortune awoke. For a step had creaked on the floor, and she looked up to find Steve Nash standing in the centre of the room with the firelight gloomily about him; behind, blocking the door with his squat figure, stood Shorty Kilrain.
“Where’s your side-kicker?” asked Nash. “Where’s Bard?”
And looking across the room, she saw that the other bunk was empty. She raised her arms quickly, as if to stifle a yawn, and sat up in the bunk, holding the blanket close about her shoulders. The face she showed to Nash was calmly contemptuous.
“The bird seems to be flown, eh?” she queried.
“Where is he?” he repeated, and made a step nearer.
She knew at last that her power over him as a woman was gone; she caught the danger of his tone, saw it in the steadiness of the eyes he fixed upon her. Behind was a great, vague feeling of loss, the old hollowness about the heart. It made her reckless of consequences; and when Nash asked, “Is he hangin’ around behind the corner, maybe?” she cried:
“If he was that close you’d have sense enough to run, Steve.”
The snarl of Nash showed his teeth.
“Out with it. The tenderfoot ain’t left his woman fur away. Where’s he gone? Who’s he gone to shoot in the back? Where’s the hoss he started out to rustle?”
“Kind of peeved, Nash, eh?”
One step more he made, towering above her.
“I’ve done bein’ polite, Sally. I’ve asked you a question.”
“And I’ve answered you: I don’t know.”
“Sally, I’m patient; I don’t mean no wrong to you. What you’ve been to me I’m goin’ to bust myself tryin’ to forget; but don’t lie to me now.”
Such a far greater woe kept up a throbbing ache in the hollow of her throat that now she laughed, laughed slowly, deliberately. He leaned, caught her wrist in a crushing pressure.
“You demon; you she-devil!”
She whirled out of the bunk, the blanket caught about her like the toga of some ancient Roman girl; and as she moved she had swept up something heavy and bright from the floor.
All this, and still his grip was on her left arm.
“Drop your hand, Nash.”
With a falling of the heart, she knew that he did not fear her gun; instead, a light of pleasure gleamed in his eyes and his lower jaw thrust out.
She would never forget his face as he looked that moment.
“Will you tell me?”
“I’ll see you in hell first.”
By that wrist he drew her resistlessly toward him, and his other arm went about her and crushed her close; hate, shame, rage, love were in the contorted face above her. She pressed the muzzle of her revolver against his side.
“You’re in beckoning distance of that hell, Steve!”
“You she-wolf—shoot and be damned! I’d live long enough to strangle you.”
“You know me, Steve; don’t be a fool.”
“Know you? Nobody knows you. And God Almighty, Sally, I love you worse’n ever; love the very way you hate me. Come here!”
He jerked her closer still, leaned; and she remembered then that Anthony had never kissed her. She said:
“You’re safe; you know he can’t see you.”
He threw her from him and stood snarling like a dog growling for the bone it fears to touch because there may be poison in the taste—a starving dog, and a bone full of toothsome marrow which has only to be crushed in order that it may be enjoyed.
“I’m wishin’ nothin’ more than that he could see me.”
“Then you’re a worse fool than I took you for, Steve. You know he’d go through ten like you.”
“There ain’t no man has gone through me yet.”
“But he would. You know it. He’s not stronger, maybe not so strong. But he was born to win, Steve; he’s like—he’s like Drew, in a way. He can’t fail.”
“If I wrung that throat of yours,” he said, “I know I couldn’t get out of you where he’s gone.”
“Because I don’t know, you see.”
“Don’t know?”
“He’s given me the slip.”
“You!”
“Funny, ain’t it? But he has. Thought I couldn’t ride fast enough to keep up with him, maybe. He’s gone on east, of course.”
“That’s another lie.”
“Well, you know.”
“I do.”
His voice changed.
“Has he really beat it away from you, Sally?”
She watched him with a strange, sneering smile. Then she stepped close.
“Lean your ear down to me, Steve.”
He obeyed.
“I’ll tell you what ought to make you happy. He don’t care for me no more than I care for—you, Steve.”
He straightened again, wondering.
“And you?”
“I threw myself at him. I dunno why I’m tellin’ you, except it’s right that you should know. But he don’t want me; he’s gone on without me.”
“An’ you like him still?”
She merely stared, with a sick smile.
“My God!” he murmured, shaken deep with wonder. “What’s he made of?”
“Steel and fire—that’s all.”
“Listen, Sally, forget what I’ve done, and—”
“Would you drop his trail, Steve?”
He cursed through his set teeth.
“If that’s it—no. It’s him or me, and I’m sure to beat him out. Afterwards you’ll forget him.”
“Try me.”
“Girls have said that before. I’ll wait. There ain’t no one but you for me—damn you—I know that. I’ll get him first, and then I’ll wait.”
“Ten like you couldn’t get him.”
“I’ve six men behind me.”
She was still defiant, but her colour changed.
“Six, Sally, and he’s out here among the hills, not knowing his right from his left. I ask you: has he got a chance?”
She answered: “No; not one.”
He turned on his heel, beckoned to Kilrain, who had stood moveless through the strange dialogue, and went out into the night.
As they mounted he said: “We’re going straight for the place where I told Butch Conklin I’d meet him. Then the bunch of us will come back.”