Читать книгу Tales of Mystery & Suspense: 25+ Thrillers in One Edition - E. Phillips Oppenheim - Страница 121

The girl drew a low stool over to Craig’s side. He was sitting in a rough chair tilted back against the adobe wall of the saloon.

“As tired as ever?” she asked, laying her hand upon his for a moment.

He turned his head and looked at her.

“Always tired,” he answered listlessly.

She made a little grimace.

“But you are so strange,” she protested. “Over the hills there are the steam cars. They would take you to some of our beautiful cities where all is light and gaiety. You are safe here, whatever your troubles may have been. You say that you have money, and if you are lonely,” she added, dropping her voice, “you need not go alone.”

LENORA KNOWS THAT QUEST IS IN DANGER AND GOES TO FIND HIM.

MARTA TRIES TO MAKE FRIENDS WITH CRAIG.

He patted her hand affectionately but there was something a little forced about the action.

“Child,” he said, “it is so hard to make you understand. I might lose myself for a few minutes, it is true, over yonder. Perhaps, even,” he added, “you might help me to forget. And then there would be the awakening. That is always the same. Sometimes at night I sleep, and when I sleep I rest, and when my eyes are opened in the morning the weight comes back and sits upon my heart, and the strength seems to pass from my limbs and the will from my brain.”

Her eyes were soft and her voice shook a little as she leaned towards him. Something in his helplessness had kindled the protective spirit in her.

“Has life been so terrible for you?” she whispered. “Have you left behind—but no! you never could have been really wicked. You are not very old, are you? Why do you not stand up and be a man? If you have done wrong, then very likely people have done wrong things to you. Why should you brood over these memories? Why—… What are you looking at? Who are these people?”

The Professor, with Quest and Long Jim, suddenly appeared round the corner of the building. They walked towards Craig. He shrank back in his place.

“If these are your enemies,” the girl cried fiercely, “remember that they cannot touch you here. I’ll have the boys out in a minute, if they dare to try it.”

Craig struggled to his feet. He made no answer. His eyes were fixed upon the Professor’s. The girl passed her arm through his and dragged him into the saloon. They passed José in the doorway. He scoffed at them.

“Say, the boss will fire you, Marta, if you waste all your time with that Yankee,” he muttered.

Marta drew the red rose from the bosom of her dress and placed it in Craig’s buttonhole. Then she led him without a word to a seat.

“If these men try any tricks in here,” she said, “there’ll be trouble.”

Almost at that moment they all three entered. Long Jim nodded to Craig in friendly fashion.

“It’s all right, cookie,” he told them. “Don’t you look so scared. This is just a bit of parley-vous business, that’s all.”

The Professor held out a piece of paper. He handed it over to Craig.

“Craig,” he announced, “this is a dispatch which I found in Allguez with my letters. It is addressed to you, but under the circumstances you will scarcely wonder that I opened it. You had better read it.”

Craig accepted the cable-form and read it through slowly to himself:—

“To John Craig, c/o Professor Lord Ashleigh, Yonkers, New York:

“Your sister died to-day. Her daughter Mary sails on Tuesday to join you in New York. Please meet her.

“Compton, Solicitor, London.”

Craig sat for a moment as though stunned. The girl leaned over towards him.

“Are they trying to take you on a warrant?” she whispered. “Remember you don’t need to go unless you want to.”

Craig shook his head.

“This is something quite different,” he explained. “Leave me for a moment, Marta. I must talk to these people.”

She slipped regretfully away from his side and out into the darkness. He sat with his eyes fixed upon the cablegram. Then he turned towards Quest.

“Fate seems to be too strong for me,” he admitted. “Leave me alone and I promise you that I’ll go at once to New York, settle Mary’s future, and then make a full disclosure.”

Jim touched him on the shoulder.

“Remember,” he told him, “you ain’t no call to leave here unless you want to. Those deputies don’t go this side of the border. You’re safe as long as you like to stay.”

Craig nodded gratefully.

“All the same,” he said, “I fear that I must go.”

The Professor coughed.

“I am sure, Craig,” he declared, “that you have decided wisely.”

Craig looked gloomily away.

“There is nothing else for me to do,” he said. “The child must be met and looked after. Besides, I am sick of it all. You may as well know the truth.”

“Why not now?” Quest suggested softly.

“In New York,” Craig replied, “and not before.”

Quest and the Professor exchanged meaning glances.

“Very well,” the former decided, turning away, “in a week from to-day, Craig, I shall expect you to report at the Professor’s house.”

They left the room together. Long Jim lingered by Craig’s side.

“Those guys have been scaring you some, I guess,” he remarked. “Forget ’em, cookie. They can’t touch you here. Of course, if you go to New York it’s your own show.”

“I know that,” Craig replied gloomily.

One of the girls passed her arm through Long Jim’s.

“Just one dance,” she whispered.

He hesitated, looking out of the window. Then he shrugged his shoulders.

“I’m tired of those guys,” he remarked to Craig with a grin. “Guess I’ll stay here for a bit.”

Craig was left alone for a few minutes. Suddenly Marta glided in and sat by his side. Her eyes were flashing with anger.

“You know what they said, those two, as they passed out?” she whispered hoarsely. “I heard them. They are going to board the eight-thirty train to-morrow morning. The dark man turned and said to the other—‘If he is not on that, we’ll wait till we find him. Once we get him in New York, he’s our man.’”

A little exclamation of anger broke from Craig’s lips. The girl caught at his arm.

“Don’t go,” she begged. “Don’t go. There are plenty of places near here where you can hide, where we could go together and live quite simply. I’d work for you. Take me away from this, somewhere over the hills. Don’t go to New York. They are cruel, those men. They are hunting you—I can see it in their faces.”

Craig shook his head sadly.

“Little girl,” he said, “I should like to go with you along that valley and over the hills and forget that I had ever lived in any other world. But I can’t do it. There’s a child there now, on the ocean, nearer to New York every day, my sister’s own child and no one to meet her. And—there are the other things. I have sinned and I must pay…. My God!”

The room suddenly rang with Marta’s shriek. Through the open window by which they were sitting, an arm wrapped in a serape had suddenly hovered over them. Craig, in starting back, had just escaped the downward blow of the knife, which had buried itself in Marta’s arm. She fell back, screaming.

“It’s José!” she cried. “The brute! The beast!”

Craig swung to his feet, furious. Long Jim, cursing fiercely, drew his gun. At that moment the door of the saloon was thrown open. José came reeling in, his serape over his shoulder, a drunken grin on his face. He staggered towards them.

“José, you beast!” the girl called out, and fell back, fainting.

There was the sound of a revolver shot and José reeled backwards and fell with a cry across the sanded floor. Jim thrust his smoking gun into his belt and caught Craig by the arm.

“Say, we’d better get out of this, cookie!” he muttered.

They were hustled out. Apparently José was unpopular, for every one seemed only anxious to have them clear away.

“I’ll get you into the camp quietly,” Long Jim muttered. “You’ll be safer there for the night. Then you can make that eighty-thirty in the morning.”

Lenora, with her bed dragged to the opening of the tent, eagerly greeted the little party on their return. Quest at once came and sat by her side.

“Where’s Laura,” he asked, “and the Inspector?”

She smiled and pointed to the rising ground behind them. In the faint moonlight two forms were just visible.

“The Inspector isn’t taking ‘no’ for an answer,” Lenora remarked cheerfully, “and honestly, if you ask me, I believe that Laura is weakening a little. She pretended she didn’t want to go out for a walk, and mumbled something about leaving me, but she soon changed her mind when the Inspector pressed her. They have been up there for an hour or more.”

Quest smiled.

“French has got it bad,” he declared, “almost as badly as I have, Lenora.”

She laughed at him. Her face was a little drawn with pain but her eyes were very soft.

“I wonder if you have it very badly,” she murmured.

He held her hand for a moment.

“I think you know,” he said.

As they talked they heard the coyotes barking in the distance. Presently Laura and the Inspector returned.

“Nice sort of nurse I am,” the former grumbled. “It’s all the fault of this man. He would keep me out there talking rubbish.”

“We were watching you, dear,” Lenora said quietly. “Somehow it didn’t seem to us that you were particularly anxious to get away.”

The Inspector chuckled.

“That’s one for Miss Laura,” he declared, with an air of satisfaction. “Little bit hard on me generally.”

“Oh! I’m all right if I’m left alone,” Laura retorted, bustling around. “Come along, you folks, if we are going to have any supper to-night.”

They sat round the opening before Lenora’s tent till the moon was high in the heavens. Quest, who had been on the outside of the circle for some little time, suddenly rose to his feet and crossed over to the cook wagon. Long Jim, who was sitting on the steps, glanced up a little surlily.

“Who’s inside there?” Quest asked.

Long Jim removed his pipe from his teeth.

“That don’t sound none too civil a question for a guest,” he remarked, “but if you want to know, our new Chinese cookie is there.”

Quest nodded.

“Sorry if I seemed abrupt,” he apologised. “You’ve been very good to us and I’m sure we are uncommonly obliged to you, Jim. The only reason I asked the question was that I saw a face in the door there and it gave me a start. For a moment I thought it was Craig back again.”

“He’s gone to New York, or going to-morrow morning,” Jim replied. “I don’t think he’s so powerful fond of your company that he’d come round here looking for it.”

Quest strolled off again and glanced at his watch as he rejoined the little group.

“Well,” he said, “I think we’ll turn in. Seven o’clock to-morrow morning, Inspector. Jim’s sending one of the boys with us and we shall catch the Eastern Limited at the junction.”

The Inspector yawned.

“This open-air life makes me sleepy,” he confessed.

“To bed, all of us,” Quest concluded, turning away.