The Plunderer Part 26

d.i.c.k tried to speak, but his throat restricted until he clutched it with his fingers, and his lips were white and hard.

"I did not believe that what he said was true," the voice went on, coming as from depths of desolation and misery, and with dead levels dulled by grief beyond emotion. "I have believed in my father! I thought there must be some mistake. I demanded of your partner that he lay off his own s.h.i.+ft, and bring me here where we might listen. Oh, it was true--it was true!"

She suddenly turned and caught the steel handle of a candlestick in her hand, and tore its long steel point from the crevice.

"But I've found the way," she said. "I've found the way. You must come with me--now! Right now, I say. We shall have this over with, and then--and then--I shall go away from here; for always!"

"Not that," d.i.c.k said, holding his hands toward her. "Not that, Joan!

What are you going to do?"

"I'm going to my father. He, too, must be spared. He must give it back. It must never be known. I must save him disgrace. It must be done to-night--now!"

She started down the drift toward the cage, walking determinedly, and d.i.c.k's lips opened again to beg her to come back; but Bill's hand was on his shoulder, and his grave and kindly voice in his ear.

"Go with her, boy. She's right. It's the only way. Have it over with to-night. If you don't you'll break her heart, as well as your own."

They followed her to the cage, and the big miner gave the hoisting bell. The cage floated upward, and into the pale twilight. Heedless of anything around, they walked across the yard, and turned into the roadway leading down the gulch.

"Will you come?" she asked, turning toward Bill.

"No," he said slowly. "I'm not needed. Besides, I couldn't stand another blow to-day!"

It was the only reference he ever made to it, but it went through d.i.c.k with more pain than he had administered. Almost sullenly he followed her down the road, wordless, bewildered, and despairing. Unable to spare her, unable to s.h.i.+eld her, unable to comfort her, and unable to be other than true to his benefactor, he plodded after her into the deeper shadows of the lower gulch, across the log bridge spanning the brawling mountain stream, and up into the Rattler camp. Her steps never faltered as she advanced straight to the office door, and stepped inside.

The bookkeepers were gone, and the inner door ajar. She threw it open, walked in, and closed it after d.i.c.k, who sustained a deadly anger against the man who sat at his desk, and as they entered looked up with a sharp stare of surprise.

Something in the att.i.tude of the two appeared to render him more alert, more hard, more uncompromising and he frowned, as d.i.c.k had seen him frown before when angry men made way for him and his dominant mastery. His daughter had stopped in front of the closed door, and eyed him with eyes no less determined than his own.

"Your men are working under the Croix d'Or," she said coldly, without wasting words in preliminary.

His face hardened instantly, and his eyes flamed, dull and defiant.

The lines of his heavy jaw appeared to deepen, his shoulders lifted a trifle, as if the muscles of him had suddenly tensed for combat, and his lips had a trace of the imperious sneer.

"Oh, you're certain of that, are you, my girl?"

"I am," she retorted. "I was in their lower level when the Rattler's shots were fired. I heard them."

For an instant he seemed about to leap from his chair, and then, recovering himself, said with sarcastic emphasis, and a deadly calmness: "And pray what were you doing there? Was the young mine owner, Townsend, there with you? Was he so kind----?"

"Is there any need for an exchange of insults?" d.i.c.k demanded, taking a step toward him, and prevented from going farther only by recollection of his previous loss of temper.

For an instant the mine owner defiantly met his look, and then half-rose from his chair, and stared more coldly across the litter of papers, plans, and impedimenta on his desk.

"Then why are you here together?" he demanded. "Weren't you man enough to come yourself, instead of taking my daughter underground? Did you want to compel her to be the chief witness in your claim? What right had you to--?"

"Father!" admonished Joan's voice.

It served a double purpose, for had she not interrupted d.i.c.k might have answered with a heat that he would have regretted, and Bully Presby dropped back into his chair, and drummed with his fingers on the desk.

"You took the ore. You must pay. You must!" went on the dull voice of his daughter.

"But how should I know how much it amounts to, even if I do find out that some of my men drove into the Cross pay?" he answered, fixing her with his flaming eyes.

"But you must know," she insisted dully. "I know you know. I know you knew where the ore was coming from. It must be paid back."

For an instant they eyed each other defiantly, and her brave att.i.tude, uncompromising, seemed to lower the flood-gates of his anger. His cheeks flushed, and he lowered his head still farther, and stared more coldly from under the brim of his square-set hat. There were not many men who would have faced Bully Presby when he was in that mood; but before him stood his daughter, as brave and uncompromising as he, and fortified by something that he had allowed to run dwarf in his soul--a white conscience, burning undimmed, a true knowledge of what was right and what was wrong. Her inheritance of brain and blood had all the strength of his, and her fearlessness was his own. She did not waver, or bend.

"It must be paid back," she reiterated, a little more firmly.

He suddenly jerked himself to his feet, his tremendous shoulders thrust forward across the desk, and raised his hand with a commanding finger.

"Joan," he ordered harshly, "you get out of here. Go to your room!

Leave this affair to this man and me. This is none of your business.

Go!"

"I shall not!" she defied him.

"I think it is best," d.i.c.k said, taking a step toward her. "I can take care of my own and Mr. Sloan's interests. Please go."

The word "Joan" almost slipped from his lips. She faced him, and backed against the door. "Yours and Mr. Sloan's interests? What of mine? What of my conscience? What of my own father? What of me?"

She stepped hastily to the desk, and tapped on it with her firm fingers, and faced the mine master.

"I said you must pay!" she declared, her voice rising and trembling in her stress. "And you must! You shall!"

He was in a fury of temper by now, and brought the flat of his heavy, strong hand down on its top, sending the inkwell and the electric stand lamp dancing upward with a bound.

"And I shall do as I please!" he roared. "And it doesn't please me to pay until these men"--and between the words he brought his hand down in heavy emphasis--"until--these--men--of the Cross mine prove it!

I'll make them get experts and put men in my mine, and put you yourself on the stand before I'll give them one d.a.m.ned dollar! I'll fight every step of the road before I'll lay my hand down. I'll pay nothing!"

She stood there above him, fixing him with her clear, honest, accusing eyes, and never faltered. Neither his words nor his rage had altered her determination. She was like a statue of justice, fixed and demanding the right. d.i.c.k had rushed forward to try and dissuade her from further speech, and stood at the end of the desk in the halo of light from the lamp, and there was a tense stillness in the room which rendered every outward sound more distinct. The voice of a boy driving mules to their stable and singing as he went, the clank and jingle of the chain tugs across the animals' backs, and the ceaseless monotone of the mill, all came through the open windows, and a.s.sailed their ears in that pent moment.

"Please let me have my way," Joan said, turning to d.i.c.k, and in her voice was infinite sorrow and tragedy. "It is more my affair than yours now. Father, I shall not permit you to go any farther. It is useless. I know! I can't do it! I can't keep the money you gave me. It isn't mine! It is theirs! You say you will not pay. Well, then, I shall, to the last dollar!"

"But I shall accept nothing--not a cent--from you, if we never get a penny from the Cross!" declared d.i.c.k, half-turning, as if to end the interview.

She did not seem to hear him. She was still facing the hard, twisting face of Bully Presby, who had suddenly drawn back, as if confronted by a greater spirit than his own. She went on speaking to him as if d.i.c.k was not in the room.

"You stole their ore. You know you stole it. Somehow, it all hurts so that I cannot put it in words; for, Dad, I have loved you so much--so much! Oh, Dad! Dad! Dad!"

She dropped to her knees, as if collapsed, to the outer edge of the desk, and her head fell forward on her hands. The unutterable wail of her voice as she broke, betrayed the desperate grief of her heart, the destruction of an idol. It was as if she told the man across the desk that he had been her ideal, and that his actions had brought this ruin about them; as if all the sorrows of the world had c.u.mulated in that ruin of faith.

d.i.c.k looked down at her, and his nails bit into his palms as he fought off his desire to reach down and lift her to his arms. Bully Presby's chair went clas.h.i.+ng back against the wall, where he kicked it as he leaped to his feet. He ran around the end of the desk, throwing d.i.c.k aside as he did so with one fierce sweep of his arm.

"Joan!" he said brokenly, laying his hand on her head. "Joan! My little Joan! Get up, girl, and come here to your Dad!"

She did not move. The excess of her grief was betrayed by her bent head and quivering shoulders. The light, gleaming above her, threw stray shadows into the depths of her hair, and softened the white, strained tips of her fingers.