Tharon of Lost Valley Part 7

"Read that," she said, and held it up, face out.

Printed neatly upon its s.h.i.+ning surface, in the jet-black ink that old Anita made from the berries of a certain bush which grew at the foot of the cliffs across the Valley, were these words:

"This well is planted. I hope it blows up the first thief who tries to destroy it. Tharon Last."

Conford took the slab, scratched his head, holding his hat between thumb and finger, read it over, read it again, smiled, and then looked up.

"Might work," he said, "an' you're givin' out your stand an' knowledge broadcast, ain't you?"

"Certainly am," said Tharon briefly. "I said I'd fight, an' I want th'

whole Valley t' know it."

"It does," said Conford with conviction. "I heard in Corvan yesterday that John Dement has rode th' range continuous since he finished brandin' his new herd to tell th' settlers about it."

"Good," said Tharon, "couldn't be better. There's got to be a change in Lost Valley sooner or later. Might as well be sooner."

And with that thought the girl let her quick mind sweep out to take in the future. She sent Conford off to post her placard and herself went rummaging among the possibilities which her defy had placed before her. She knew that Courtrey would be coldly furious. He had lived his life as suited him, had taken what and where he listed, by fair means or foul, and though every soul in the Valley knew him and his methods, none had spoken the convicting word. It was the pen-stroke at the end of the death-warrant to do so.

She knew that the faction of the settlers hated him and his with a vitriolic pa.s.sion, that they were in the minority, that they were no tin G.o.ds themselves, and that they were being beaten out, one by one.

Year by year Courtrey had added to his vast acreage, and it was a matter of common knowledge how he had done it. He was rich, powerful, bullying, a man whose self-aggrandizement knew no limit, whose merest whim was his law, whose will must not be thwarted. Year by year his _vaqueros_ drove down the Wall herds of fat cattle, their brands blurred, insolently raw and careless. Many a hapless man had stood and seen his own stock go by in Courtrey's band and dared not open his mouth. In fact Courtrey had been known to stop and chat with such a one, smiling his evil smile and enjoying the helpless chagrin of his victim.

"Insolent ruffian!" muttered Tharon this day, frowning above her daddy's pipes on the desk top. "He's goin' t' get one run for his money from now till one of us is whipped. It may be me, but I'll leave my mark on him, so help me!

"Straight killin's too good for him. I want to smash him first."

"Tharon, mi _Corazon_," said Anita, stopping soft-foot beside her, "it is bad for one to talk so, to himself. The Evil One works on the mind that way."

Tharon laughed.

"Perhaps, Anita," she said shortly, "it is with the Evil One I have t'

do, an' no mistake."

The old woman crossed herself and went away, her wrinkled face dim with care. And Tharon dressed herself neatly, put a ribbon on her hair, set her wide hat carefully on her head, buckled on her heavy gun-belt, and went to the corral for El Rey. Her daddy's saddle was her own now, a huge affair carved and ornamented, profusely studded with silver.

Along the right side below the pommel ran a darker stain, Jim Last's blood, set before his daughter like a star.

She mounted the silver stallion and went away down along the summer land, a shaft of light shooting through the green of the ranges.

Far over to her left she could see her cattle, beautiful bunches spread like figures in a tapestry. The figures of her riders were small dots on the outskirts.

El Rey, always hard on the bit, always strong-headed, wanted to run and she swung loose her rein and let him go. But run as he might, there was always in his speed that rising note, that seeming of reserve power.

She pa.s.sed the head of Black Coulee, swung out across the edge of Rolling Cove, thundered down to the ford of the Broken Bend. Here she let the stallion drink, deep draughts that would have slowed a lesser horse. El Rey went up the bank beyond the ford like a charging engine, squared away and stretched out to finish his run. He was within three miles of Corvan, set like a stone in a smooth green surface, before he came down and lifted his shoulders into his gait. With the first rock and swing of the singlefoot, Tharon smiled and settled herself more comfortably in the saddle. This was joy to her, this beautiful syncopation, this poetic marked time that reeled off the miles beneath her and would scarcely have shaken a pebble from her hat-brim.

As she struck the outskirts of the little town the unmistakable sound of El Rey's iron-shod hoofs brought heads into doors, children at the house corners to look upon her. She came down the main street at a smart clip, to bring up with a slide at the hitch-rail before Baston's store where the monthly mail was handled. There were horses tied there, and among them she saw what caused her to look twice with a narrowing of her keen eyes--a huge, raw-boned, black, rusty and slug-headed, among the Ironwood bays from Courtrey's Stronghold.

"H'm," she told herself quietly, "so there's where he was expected."

She tied El Rey to himself, far from the rest, for she knew his imperious temper and that trouble would ensue if he was near strange horses.

Then she went into Baston's with her meal-sack on her arm. This meal-sack was a part of her accoutrement, a regular carry-all for such small purchases as she must take home--a roll of print for Paula, some tobacco for the men, a dozen spools of the linen thread which was so much prized among the women of Lost Valley.

As she stepped in the open door her quick glance went over the big room with a comprehensiveness which catalogued its inmates accurately and instinctively. Courtrey was not there, though his great bay, Bolt, stood outside. However, Wylackie Bob was there. This man, sitting at a canvas covered table in a corner, idly fingering a pack of cards, was not one to be pa.s.sed over easily. He was notorious.

Tall, slow of action, sleepy-eyed, he was treacherous as a snake, as swift to move when necessary. He had been known to sit as he was now, idly playing, to leap up, crouch, draw and kill a man, and be down again at his place, idly playing, before the breath was done in his victim.

He was a past-master of his gun, and unlike most men of the time and place, he carried only one.

He was a quarter-blood Wylackie Indian. Near him sat the stranger who had ridden the slug-head black into Lost Valley. They both looked up as the girl entered and regarded her with smiles.

Tharon did not look at them again. She saw, however, that they were together, of one interest. There were two or three of the settlers in the store, Jameson from over under the Rockface at the south, Hill from farther up, Thomas from Rolling Cove. She spoke to these men quietly and noticed with an inward thrill the eagerness with which they responded.

There was an electric something between them which told her that her promise had, indeed, gone up and down the country, that in a subtle, unheralded manner she stood in Jim Last's place, a head, a leader.

She made her purchases without undue speech, got two letters in her father's name--and these brought a smarting under her eyelids--tied up her sack and went out without so much as a glance at the two men in the corner. Laughter followed her, however, which set the red blood of anger pulsing in her cheeks.

At the end of the store porch she came face to face with Courtrey and Steptoe Service, the sheriff of Menlo county. She swung to one side to descend the rough steps, vouchsafing them no word or look, but Service blocked her way. She raised her eyes and looked him full in the face, scanning his coa.r.s.e red features coolly.

"Well?" she said sharply.

"What's this I hear, Tharon?" asked Service, "about you a-makin'

threats?"

"What have you heard?" she wanted to know.

"W'y, that you're a-makin' threats."

"Yes?"

"Yes, sir."

"Well?"

The sheriff flushed darker.

"Look here, young woman,"--he raised his voice suddenly and on the instant there was a sound of boots on the store floor and the settlers, the two men in the corner, Baston and two clerks came crowding out to hear, "you look a-here--don't you know it's a-gin th'

law for any one t' make a threat like you done, open an' above board, in th' Golden Cloud th' other night?"

Tharon s.h.i.+fted the meal-sack higher on her left arm. Courtrey's eyes went down to her right hand and stayed there.

The girl's upper lip lifted from her teeth in a sneer that was the acme of insult. The fire was beginning to play in her blue eyes.

"Law?" she said. "My G.o.d! Law!"

"Yes, _law_! you young hussy, an' don't you fergit that I represent it."

The girl threw down the sack and flashed both hands on the gun-b.u.t.ts.

Courtrey, watching, was half-a-second behind her and stopped with his hands hovering.