His voice lowered to a tone which was almost awe.
“Speakin’ for myself, I don’t hanker after his hoss like Bill Kilduff; or his girl, like Lee Haines; or his life, like the chief. All I want is a shot at that wolf-dog, that Black Bart!”
“You look sort of het up, Hal.”
“He come near puttin’ his teeth into my leg down at Morgan’s place the day Barry cleaned up the chief.”
“Why, any dog is apt to take a snap at a feller.”
“This ain’t a dog. It’s a wolf. An’ Whistlin’ Dan—” he stopped.
“You look sort of queer, Hal. What’s up?”
“You won’t think I’m loco?”
“No.”
“They’s some folks away up north that thinks a man now an’ then turns into a wolf.”
Buck nodded and shrugged his shoulders. A little chill went up and down his back.
“Here’s my idea, Buck. I’ve been thinkin’—no, it’s more like dreamin’ than thinkin’—that Dan Barry is a wolf turned into a man, an’ Black Bart is a man turned into a wolf.”
“Hal, you been drinkin’.”
“Maybe.”
“What made you think—” began Buck, but the long rider put spurs to his horse and once more broke into a fast gallop.
CHAPTER XXX
“THE MANHANDLING”
It was close to sunset time when they reached the old Salton place, where they found Silent sitting on the porch with Haines, Kilduff, Jordan, and Rhinehart. They stood up at sight of the newcomers and shouted a welcome. Buck waved his hand, but his thoughts were not for them. The music he had heard Dan whistle formed in his throat. It reached his lips not in sound but as a smile.
At the house he swung from the saddle and shook hands with Jim Silent. The big outlaw retained Buck’s fingers.
“You’re comin’ in mighty late,” he growled, “Didn’t you get the signal?”
Buck managed to meet the searching eyes.
“I was doin’ better work for you by stayin’ around the house,” he said.
“How d’you mean?”
“I stayed there to pick up things you might want to know. It wasn’t easy. The boys are beginnin’ to suspect me.”
“The cowpunchers is gettin’ so thick around those parts,” broke in Purvis, “that Buck wouldn’t even let me go back to his house with him to get my gun.”
The keen eyes of Silent never left the face of Daniels.
“Don’t you know that Gus Morris gives us all the news we need, Buck?”
Rhinehart and Jordan, who were chatting together, stopped to listen. Buck smiled easily.
“I don’t no ways doubt that Morris tells you all he knows,” he said, “but the pint is that he don’t know everything.”
“How’s that?”
“The rangers is beginnin’ to look sidewise an’ whisper when Morris is around. He’s played his game with us too long, an’ the boys are startin’ to think. Thinkin’ is always dangerous.”
“You seem to have been doin’ some tall thinkin’ yourself,” said Silent drily; “you guess the cowpunchers are goin’ on our trail on their own hook?”
“There ain’t no doubt of it.”
“Where’d you hear it?”
“Young Seaton.”
“He’s one of them?”
“Yes.”
“I’ll remember him. By the way, I see you got a little token of Whistlin’ Dan on your arm.”
He pointed to the bandage on Buck’s right forearm.
“It ain’t nothin’,” said Buck, shrugging his shoulders. “The cuts are all healin’ up. The arm’s as good as ever now.”
“Anyway,” said Silent, “you got somethin’ comin’ to you for the play you made agin that devil.”
He reached into his pocket, drew out several twenty dollar gold pieces (money was never scarce with a lone rider) and passed them to Buck. The latter received the coin gingerly, hesitated, and then returned it to the hand of the chief.
“What the hell’s the matter?” snarled the big outlaw. “Ain’t it enough?”
“I don’t want no money till I earn it,” said Buck.
“Life’s gettin’ too peaceful for you, eh?” grinned Silent.
“Speakin’ of peace,” chimed in Purvis, with a liberal wink at the rest of the gang, “Buck allows he’s the boy who c’n bring the dove o’ the same into this camp. He says he knows the way to bring the girl over there to see reason.”
Buck followed the direction of Purvis’s eyes and saw Kate sitting on a rock at a little distance from the shanty in which she lived with her father. She made a pitiful figure, her chin cupped in her hand, and her eyes staring fixedly down the valley. He was recalled from her by the general laughter of the outlaws.
“You fellers laugh,” he said complacently, “because you don’t know no more about women than a cow knows about pictures.”
“What do you think we should do with her, Solomon?” Buck met the cold blue eye of Haines.
“Maybe I ain’t Solomon,” he admitted genially, “but I don’t need no million wives to learn all there is to know about women.”
“Don’t make a fool of yourself, Buck,” said Silent. “There ain’t no way of movin’ that damn girl. She’s gone on a hunger strike an’ she’ll die in it. We can’t send her out of the valley. It’s hell to have her dyin’ on our hands here. But there ain’t no way to make her change her mind. I’ve tried pleadin’ with her—I’ve even offered her money. It don’t do no good. Think of that!”
“Sure it don’t,” sneered Buck. “Why, you poor bunch of yearlin’ calves, she don’t need no coaxin’. What she needs is a manhandlin’. She wants a master, that’s what she wants.”
“I suppose,” said Haines, “you think you’re man enough to change her?”
“None of that!” broke in Silent. “D’you really think you could do somethin’ with her, Buck?”
“Can I do somethin’ with her?” repeated Buck scornfully. “Why, boys, there ain’t nothin’ I can’t do with a woman.”
“Is it because of your pretty face or your winnin’ smile?” growled the deep bass of Bill Kilduff.
“Both!” said Buck, promptly. “The wilder they are the harder they fall for me. I’ve had a thirty-year old maverick eatin’ out of my hand like she’d been trained for it all her life. The edyoucated ones say I’m ‘different’; the old maids allow that I’m ‘naïve’; the pretty ones jest say I’m a ‘man,’ but they spell the word with capital letters.”
“Daniels, you’re drunk,” said Haines.
“Am I? It’ll take a better man than you to make me sober, Haines!”
The intervening men jumped back, but the deep voice of Silent rang out like a pistol shot: “Don’t move for your six-guns, or you’ll be playin’ agin me!”
Haines transferred his glare to Silent, but his hand dropped from his gun. Daniels