The Argosy, Vol. 75, No. 4 — page 119: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

MESQUITE RANCH, the Mesquite bunch, an’ all by my fone- some, I’d a tuk after him again as he went off west.” ‘West? He went off west! West!” Natalie kept saying over in her own mind. It was certain Tom Sykes knew nothing more of Radford than that he had ridden off west. If Gill knew any- thing he had not told the companion of his efforts to secure the deed. Ted had broken the locks himself. In the noise and the night when the cattle were being driven into the cor- rals, none of the Mesquiters had seen him any more than they had seen the Double X-er. And Ted had ridden west. Had he secured the paper from his trunk and made off with it? And where had he gone? Why had she not heard from him if he were safe and well? He could not be well. That ex- plained his silence. The wild ride with Skyes—who rode like a centaur when he was calm, and like a devil when he was angry—in pursuit, had exhausted him after his illness. He might have fallen from his horse off there among the rocks and crevices. His strained leg might-#ave given way as he rode; and he might have pitched to the bottom of some deep fissure. He might be lying there now, dead of star- vation and exposure. Natalie had fought against every feeling that tried to show itself in her face. She had tried with all the energy of her keen mind and the body to win from Sykes word of Radford. Now she had it. But it was little comfort. And, as if it had but waited to rise and assert itself at a moment when she was weak and full of fear, that doubt that Dr. Stratton had voiced came uppermost in her mind, MRad- ford had run away from the danger of being caught as an accessory to Nick Bullen’s death. She gasped suddenly and tottered. Sykes’s arm went out and about her. “Whut’s the matter?” he asked quickly. 821 She forced a laugh and exclaimed, making every atom of power she could summon contribute to the effect of her words: ‘‘ Eeet ees so fonny to theenk how you scare M. Radford!” Sykes, delighted with her apprecia- tion of his achievement, laughed loud- ly. His exultant amusement produced the strangest effect. It angered Nata- lie to the very ends of her toes. “You laugh, perhaps, too sooi! Maybe eet ees on you ees the joke!” Sykes stopped in the very midst of his roar. He stared at her with his mouth still open. | ‘Perhaps M. Radford ride fas’ theenking you go for the paper! He keek the door down an’ get eet an’ ride away off under your very nose!” she exclaimed. “Paper? Whut? You mean he ‘hes got that deed Gill wants?” he asked with sudden roughness. ““I—I say—perhaps!” Natalie re- plied with a shrug. She saw what she had done; she tried to smooth it over.. But Sykes was on the alert. “He hes got it! I knew it, soime- how! But I let you make me believe— confound it, I told Gill for sure he didn’t hev it! J might ’a’ made a cool thousand ef ye hadn't made me think—” “ But I just play! I only say that because you act so smart! J—” But it was useless for her to deny what she had virtually confessed. Without a word to her Sykes ran to- ward the trail. She heard him stum- bling down it. Then the clatter of his horse’s hoofs as it started off on a gal- lop came to her, The very ones she had supposed were holding Radford or had done for him had not even known where he was. But now she had started them on a trail they would not forsake till it led to Radford and the deed. West! West! He had ridden west. He had the deed with him, if it had been as he thought, in the trunk. Sykes would ride to the Double X and tell Gomichbooks (E@)