That Girl Montana Part 35

"Yes, I would load a gun for him to use on you if he were able to hold it," she answered, and he seemed to think her words amusing.

"You have mighty little regard for your duty to me," he observed.

"Duty? I can't owe you any duty when I never received any from you. I am nearly seventeen, and in all the years I remember you, I can't recall any good act you have ever done for me."

"Nearly seventeen," and he smiled at her in the way she hated. "Didn't your new uncle, Haydon, tell you better than that? You are nearly eighteen years old."

"Eighteen!" and she rose in astonishment. "I?"

"You--though you don't look it. You always were small for your age, so I just told you a white lie about it in order to manage you better. But that is over; I don't care what you do in the future. All I want of you is money to get to South America; so fix it up for me."

"I ought to refuse, and call them in to arrest you."

"But you won't," he rejoined. "You can't afford it."

He watched her, though, with some uncertainty, as she sat silent, thinking.

"No, I can't afford it," she said, at last. "I will be doing wrong to help you, just as if I let a poison snake loose where people travel--for that is what you are. But I am not strong enough to let these friends go and start over again; so I will help you away this once."

He drew a breath of relief, and gathered up his blanket.

"That is the way to talk. You've got a level head--"

"That will do," she said, curtly. "I don't want praise from a coward, a thief, or a murderer. You are all three. I have no money here. You will have to come again for it to-morrow night."

"A trick--is it?"

"It is no trick. I haven't got it, that is all. Maybe I can't get it in money, but I will get it in free gold by to-morrow at dusk. I will put it here under the pillow, and will manage to keep the rest away at that time.

You can come as you came this evening, and get it; but I will neither take it nor send it to you. You will have to risk your freedom and your life to come for it. But while I can't quite decide to give you up or to kill you, myself, I hope some one else will."

"Hope what you please," he returned, indifferently. "So long as you get the dust for me, I can stand your opinion. And you will have it here?"

"I will have it here."

"I trust you only because I know you can't afford to go back on me," he said, as he wrapped the blanket around him, and dropped his taller form to the height of Akkomi. "It is a bargain, then, my dear. Good-night."

"I don't wish you a good-night," she answered. "I hope I shall never see you alive again."

And she never did.

CHAPTER XX.

'TANA'S ENGAGEMENT

"And she wants a thousand dollars in money or free gold--a thousand dollars to-day?"

"No use asking me what for, Dan, for I don't know," confessed Lyster. "I can't see why she don't tell you herself; but you know she has been a little queer since the fever--childish, whimsical, and all that. Maybe as she has not yet handled any specie from your bonanza, she wants some only to play with, and a.s.sure herself it is real."

"Less than a thousand in money and dust would do for a plaything,"

remarked Overton. "Of course she has a right to get what she wants; but that amount will be of no use to her here in camp, where there is not a thing in the world to spend it for."

"Maybe she wants to pension off some of her Indian friends before she leaves," suggested Max--"old Akkomi and Flap-Jacks, perhaps. I am a little like Miss Sloc.u.m in my wonder as to how she endures them, though, of course, the squaw is a necessity."

"Oh, well, she was not brought up in the world of Miss Sloc.u.m--or your world, either," answered Overton. "You should make allowance for that."

"Make allowance--I?" and Lyster looked at him curiously. "Are you trying to justify her to me? Why, man, you ought to know by this time what keeps me here a regular lounger around camp, and there is no need to make excuses for her to me. I thought you knew."

"You mean you--like her?"

"Worse than that," said Max, with his cheery, confident smile. "I'm trying to get her to say she likes me."

"And she?"

"Well, she won't meet me as near half-way as I would like," he confessed; "talks a lot of stuff about not being brought up right, and not suited to our style of life at home, and all that. But she did seem rather partial to me when she was ill and off guard. Don't you think so? That is all I have to go on; but it encourages me to remember it."

Overton did not speak, and Lyster continued speculating on his chances, when he noticed his companion's silence.

"Why don't you speak, Dan? I did hope you would help me rather than be indifferent."

"Help you!" and Lyster was taken aback at the fierce straightening of the brows and the strange tone in which the words were uttered. The older man could not but see his surprised look, for he recovered himself, and dropped his hand in the old familiar way on Lyster's shoulder.

"Not much chance of my helping you when she employs you as an agent when she wants any service, rather than exchange words with me herself. Now, that is the way it looks, Max."

"I know," agreed Lyster. "And to tell the truth, Dan, the only thing she does that really vexes me is her queer att.i.tude toward you of late. I can't think she means to be ungrateful, but--"

"Don't bother about that. Everything has changed for her lately, and she has her own troubles to think of. Don't you doubt her on my account. Just remember that. And if--she says 'yes' to you, Max, be sure I would rather see her go to you than any other man I know."

"That is all right," observed Lyster, laughingly; "but if you only had a love affair or two of your own, you could perhaps get up more enthusiasm over mine."

Then he sauntered off to report the financial interview to 'Tana, and laughed as he went at the impatient look flung at him by Overton.

He found 'Tana visiting at the tent of the cousins, who were using all arguments to persuade her to share their new abode. Each was horrified to learn that she had dismissed the squaw at sleeping time, and had remained in the cabin alone.

"Not quite alone," she corrected, "for Harris was just on the other side of the door."

"Much protection he would be."

"Well, then, Dan Overton was with him. How is he for protection?"

"Thoroughly competent, no doubt," agreed Miss Lavina, with a rather scandalized look. "But, my dear, the propriety?"

"Do you think Flap-Jacks would help any one out in propriety?" retorted 'Tana. "But we won't stumble over that question long, for I want to leave the camp and go back to the Ferry."

"And then, 'Tana?"