The Law-Breakers

“Thanks, Bill,” she said quietly. And her last suggestion of displeasure seemed to pass with her expression of gratitude. “I’m glad you were here, and” – she smiled – “you can fight. You nearly killed him.” Then, after a pause: “It’s been a lesson to me. I – shan’t forget it.”

“What have you – done to him?” cried Helen suddenly.

But Kate shook her head.

“Let’s talk of something else. There’s things far more important than – him. Anyway, he won’t do that again.”

She rose from her seat and moved to the window, where she stood looking out. But she had no interest in what she beheld. She was thinking moodily of other things.

Bill stirred in his chair. He was glad enough to put the episode behind him.

“Yes,” he said, taking up Kate’s remark at once. “There certainly are troubles enough to go around.” He was thinking of his scene of the previous day with his brother. “But – but what’s gone wrong with you, Kate? What are the more important things?”

“You haven’t fallen out with Mrs. Day?” Helen put in quickly.

Kate shook her head.

“No one falls out with Mrs. Day,” she said quietly. “Mrs. Day does the falling out. It isn’t only Mrs. Day, it’s – it’s everybody. I think the whole village is – is mad.” She turned back from the window and returned to her seat. But she did not sit down. She stood resting her folded arms on its back and leaned upon it. “They’re all mad. Everybody. I’m mad.” She glanced from one to the other, smiling in the sanest fashion, but behind her smile was obvious anxiety and trouble. “They’ve practically decided to cut down the old pine.”

Bill sat up. He laughed at the tone of her announcement.

But Helen gasped.

“The old pine?” She had caught some of her sister’s alarm.

Kate nodded.

“You can laugh, Bill,” she cried. “That’s what they’re all doing. They’re laughing at – the old superstition. But – it’s not a laughing matter to folks who think right along the lines of the essence of our human natures, which is superstition. The worst of it is I’ve brought it about. I told the meeting about a stupid argument about the building of the church which Billy and Dy had. Billy wants the tree for a ridge pole, because the church is disproportionately long. Well, I told the folks because I thought they wouldn’t hear of the tree being cut. But Mrs. Day rounded on me, and the meeting followed her like a flock of sheep. Still, I wasn’t done by that. I’ve been canvassing the village since, and, would you believe it, they all say it’s a good job to cut the tree down. Maybe it’ll rid the place of its evil influence, and so rid us of the attentions of the police. I tell you, Billy and Dy are perfect fools, and the folks are all mad. And I’m the greatest idiot ever escaped a home for imbeciles. There! That’s how I feel. It’s – it’s scandalous.”

Bill laughed good-naturedly.

“Say, cheer up, Kate,” he cried. “You surely don’t need to worry any. It can’t hurt you. Besides – .” He broke off abruptly, and, sitting up, looked out of the window. “Say, here comes Fyles.” He almost leaped out of his seat.

“What’s the matter?” demanded Kate sharply. Then she looked around at her sister, who had moved away from the table.

Bill laughed again in his inconsequent fashion.

“Matter?” he cried. “Nothin’s the matter, only – only – . Say, did you ever have folks get on your nerves?”

“Plenty in Rocky Springs,” said Kate bitterly.

Bill nodded.

“That’s it. Say, I’ve just remembered I’ve got an appointment that was never made with somebody who don’t exist. I’m going to keep it.”

Helen laughed, and clapped her hands.

“Say, that’s really funny. And I’ve just remembered something I’d never forgotten, that’s too late to do anyway. Come on, Bill, let’s go and see about these things, and,” she added slyly, “leave Kate to settle Fyles – by herself.”

“Helen!”

But Kate’s remonstrance fell upon empty air. The lovers had fled through the open doorway, and out the back way. Nor had she time to call them back, for, at that moment, Fyles’s horse drew up at the front door, and she heard the officer leap out of the saddle.

“Have you made your peace with – headquarters?”

Kate and Stanley Fyles were standing out in the warm shade of the house. The woman’s hand was gently caressing the velvety muzzle of Peter’s long, fiddle face. It was a different woman talking to the police officer from the bitter, discontented creature of a few minutes ago. For the time, at least, all regrets, all thoughts of an unpleasant nature seemed to have been lost in the delight of a woman wholesomely in love.

As she put her question her big eyes looked up into the man’s keen face with just the faintest suspicion of raillery in their glowing depths. But her rich tones were full of a genuine eagerness that belied the look.

The man was good to look upon. The strength of his face appealed to her, as did the big, loose shoulders and limbs, as strength must always appeal to a real woman. Her love inspired a subtle tenderness, even anxiety.

“I hope so, but – I don’t know yet.”

Fyles made no attempt to conceal his doubts. Somehow the official side of the man was becoming less and less sustained before this woman, who had come to occupy such a big portion of his life.

“You mean you’ve sent in your report, and are now awaiting the – verdict?”

Fyles nodded.

“Like so many of the criminals I have brought before the courts,” he said, bitterly.

“And the chances?”

“About equal to those of a convicted felon.”

The smile died out of Kate’s eyes. They were full of regretful sympathy.

“It’s pretty tough,” she said, turning from him. “It isn’t as if you had made a mistake, or neglected your duty.”

“No, I was beaten.”

The man turned away coldly. But his coldness was not for her.

“Is there no hope?” Kate asked presently, in a low tone.

Fyles shrugged.

“There might be if I had something definite to promise for the future. I mean a chance of – redeeming myself.”

Kate made no answer. The whole thing to her mind seemed impossible if it depended upon that. The thought of this strong man being broken through the police system, for no particular fault of his own, seemed very hard. Harder now than ever. She strove desperately to find a gleam of light in the darkness of his future. She would have given worlds to discover some light, and show him the way. But one thing seemed impossible, and he – well, he only made it harder. His very decision and obstinacy, she considered, were his chief undoing.

“If you could reasonably hold out a prospect to them,” she said, her dark eyes full of thought – strong and earnest thought. “Can’t you?”

She watched him closely. She saw him suddenly straighten himself up, throwing back his powerful shoulders as though to rid himself of the burden which had been oppressing him so long.

He drew a step nearer. Kate’s heart beat fast. Then her eyes drooped before the passion shining in his.

“Maybe you don’t realize why I am here, Kate,” he said, in a low thrilling voice, while a warm smile grew in his eyes. “You see, weeks ago I made a mistake, a bad mistake – just such as I have made here. The liquor was run under my nose, while I – well, I just stood around looking on like some fool babe. That liquor was – for this place. After that I asked the chief to give me a free hand, and to allow me to come right along, and round this place up. My object was twofold. I knew I had to make good, and – I knew you were here. Guess you don’t remember our first meeting? I do. It was up on the hillside, near the old pine. I’ve always wanted to get back here – ever since then. Well, I’ve had my wish. I’m here, sure. But I’ve not made good. The folks, here, have beaten me, and you – why, I’ve just contrived to make you my sworn adversary. Failure, eh? Failure in my work, and in my – love.”

For an instant the woman’s eyes were raised to his face. She was trembling as no physical fear could have made her tremble. Peter nuzzled the palm of her hand with his velvety nose, and she quickly lowered her gaze, and appeared to watch his efforts.

After a moment’s pause the man went on in a voice full of a great passionate love. All the official side of him had gone utterly. He stood before the woman he loved baring his soul. For the moment he had put his other failures behind him. He wanted only her.

“I came here because I loved you, Kate. I came here dreaming all those dreams which we smile at in others. I dreamed of a life at your side, with you ever before me to spur me on to the greater heights which I have thought about, dreamed about. And all my work, all my striving, was to be for you. I saw visions of the days, when, together, we might fill high office in our country’s affairs, with an ambition ever growing, as, together, we mounted the ladder of success. Vain enough thought, eh? Guess it was not long before I brought the roof of my castle crashing about my ears. I have failed in my work a second time, and only succeeded in making you my enemy.”

Kate’s eyes were shining. A great light of happiness was in them. But she kept them turned from him.

“Not enemy – only adversary,” she said, in a low voice.

The man shook his head.

“It is such a small distinction,” he said bitterly. “Antagonists. How can I ever hope that you can care for me? Kate, Kate,” he burst out passionately, “if you would marry me, none of the rest would matter. I love you so, dear. If you would marry me I should not care what the answer from headquarters might be. Why should I? I should then have all I cared for in the world, and the world itself would still be before us. I have money saved. All we should need to start us. My God, the very thought of it fills me with the lust of conquest. There would be nothing too great to aspire to. Kate, Kate!” He held his arms out toward her in supplication.

The woman shook her head, but offered no verbal refusal. The man’s arms dropped once more to his sides, and, for a moment, the silence was only broken by the champing of Peter’s bit. Then once more the man’s eyes lit.

“Tell me,” he cried, almost fiercely. “Tell me, had we not come into conflict over this man, Bryant, would – would it – could it have been different?” Then his voice grew soft and persuasive. “I know you don’t dislike me, Kate.” He smiled. “I know it, and you must forgive my – vanity. I have watched, and studied you, and – convinced myself. I felt I had the right to hope. The right of every decently honest man. Our one disagreement has been this man, Bryant. I had thought maybe you loved him, but that you have denied. You do not? There is no one else?”

Again Kate silently shook her head. The man was pressing her hard. All her woman’s soul was crying out for her to fling every consideration to the winds, and yield to the impulse of the love stirring within her. But something held her back, something so strong as to be quite irresistible.

The man went on. He was fighting that last forlorn hope amid what, to him, seemed to be a sea of disaster.

“No. You have told me that before,” he said, almost to himself. “Then why,” he went on, his voice rising with the intensity of his feelings. “Why – why – ? But no, it’s absurd. You tell me you don’t – you can’t love me.”

For one brief instant Kate’s eyes were shyly raised to his. They dropped again at once to the brown head of the horse beside her.

“I have told you nothing – yet,” she said, in a low voice.

The man snatched a brief hope.

“You mean – ?”

Kate looked up again, fearlessly now.

“I mean just what I say.”

“You have told me nothing – yet,” the man repeated. “Then you have something – to tell me?”

Kate nodded and pushed Peter’s head aside almost roughly.

“The man I can care for, the man I marry must have no thought of hurt for Charlie Bryant in his mind.”

“Then you – ”

Kate made a movement of impatience.

“Again, I mean just what I say – no more, no less.”

But it was Fyles’s turn to become impatient.

“Bryant – Charlie Bryant? It is always Charlie Bryant – before all things!”

Kate’s eyes looked steadily into his.

“Yes – before even myself.”

The man returned her look.

“Yet you do not love him as – I would have you love me?”

“Yet I do not love him, as you would have me love you.”

The man thrust out his arms.

“Then, for God’s sake, tell me some more.”

The insistent Peter claimed Kate once more. His long face was once more thrust against her arm, and his soft lips began to nibble at the wrist frill of her sleeve. She turned to him with a laugh, and placed an arm about his crested neck.

“Oh, Peter, Peter,” she said smiling, and gently caressing the friendly creature. “He wants me to tell him some more. Shall I? Shall I tell him something of the many things I manage to learn in this valley? Shall I try and explain that I contrive to get hold of secrets that the police, with all their cleverness, can never hope to get hold of? Shall I tell him, that, if only he will put Charlie out of his mind, and leave him alone, and not try to fix this – this crime on him, I can put him on the track of the real criminal? Shall I point out to him the absurdity of fixing on this one man when there are such men as O’Brien, and Stormy Longton, and my two boys, and Holy Dick, and Kid Blaney in the place? Shall I? Shall I tell him of the things I’ve found out? Yes, Peter, I will, if he’ll promise me to put Charlie out of his mind. But not unless. Eh? Not unless.”

The man shook his head.

“You make the condition impossible,” he cried. “You have faith in that man. Good. I have overwhelming evidence that he is the man we are after. Until he is caught the whisky-running in this place will never cease.”

Kate refused to display impatience. She went on talking to the horse.

“Isn’t he obstinate? Isn’t he? And here am I offering to show him how he can get the real criminals.”

Fyles suddenly broke into a laugh. It was not a joyous laugh. It was cynical, almost bitter.

“You are seeking to defend Bryant, and yet you can, and will, put me on the track of the whisky-runners. It’s farcical. You would be closing the door of the penitentiary upon your – friend.”

Kate’s eyes flashed.

“Should I? I don’t think so. The others I don’t care that for.” She flicked her fingers. “They must look to themselves. I promise you I shall not be risking Charlie’s liberty.”

“I’ll wager if you show me how I can get these people, and I succeed – you will.”

The angry sparkle in the woman’s eyes died out, to be replaced with a sudden light of inspiration.

“You’ll wager?” she cried, with an excited laugh. “You will?”

The policeman nodded.

“Yes – anything you like.”

Kate’s laugh died out, and she stood considering.

“But you said my conditions were – impossible. You will leave Charlie alone until you capture him running the whisky? You will call your men off his track – until you catch him red-handed? You will accept that condition, if I show you how you can – make good with your – headquarters?”

The man suddenly found himself caught in the spirit of Kate’s mood.

“But the conditions must not be all with you,” he cried, with a short laugh. “You are too generous to make it that way. If I accept your conditions, against my better judgment, will you allow me to make one?”

“But I am conferring the benefit,” Kate protested.

“All of it? What about your desire to protect Bryant?”

Kate nodded.

“What is your condition?”

Fyles drew a deep breath.

“Will you marry me after I have caught the leader of the gang, if he be this man, Bryant? That must be your payment – for being wrong.”

In a moment all Kate’s lightness vanished. She stared at him for some wide-eyed moments. Then, again, all in a moment, she began to laugh.

“Done!” she cried. “I accept, and you accept! It’s a wager!”

But her ready acceptance of his offer for the first time made the police officer doubt his own convictions as to the identity of the head of the gang.

“You are accepting my condition because you believe Bryant is not the man, and so you hope to escape marrying me,” he said almost roughly.

“I accept your condition,” cried Kate staunchly.

Slowly a deep flush mounted to the man’s cheeks and spread over his brow. His eyes lit, and his strong mouth set firmly.

“But you will marry me,” he cried, with sudden force. “Whatever lies behind your condition, Kate, you’ll marry me, as a result of this. The conditions are agreed. I take your wager. I shall get the man Bryant, and he’ll get no mercy from me. He’s stood in my way long enough. I’m going to win out, Kate,” he cried; “I know it, I feel it. Because I want you. I’d go through hell itself to do that. Quick. Tell me. Show me how I can get these people, and I promise you they shan’t escape me this time.”

But Kate displayed no haste. Now that the wager was made she seemed less delighted. After a moment’s thought, however, she gave him the information he required.

“I’ve learned definitely that on Monday next, that’s nearly a week to-day, there’s a cargo coming in along the river trail, from the east. The gang will set out to meet it at midnight, and will bring it into the village about two o’clock in the morning. How, I can’t say.”

Fyles’s desperate eyes seemed literally to bore their way through her.

“That’s – the truth?”

“True as – death.”

CHAPTER XXIX

BILL’S FRESH BLUNDERING

The change in the man that rode away from Kate Seton’s home as compared with the man who had arrived there less than an hour earlier was so remarkable as to be almost absurd in a man of Stanley Fyles’s reputation for stern discipline and uncompromising methods. There was an almost boyish light of excited anticipation and hope in the usually cold eyes that looked out down the valley as he rode away. There was no doubt, no question. His look suggested the confidence of the victor. And so Charlie Bryant read it as he passed him on the trail.

Charlie was in a discontented mood. He had seen Fyles approach Kate’s home from his eyrie on the valley slope, and that hopeless impulse belonging to a weakly nature, that self-pitying desire to further lacerate his own feelings, had sent him seeking to intercept the man whom he felt in his inmost heart was his successful rival for all that which he most desired on earth.

So he walked past Fyles, who was on the back of his faithful Peter, and hungrily read the expression of his face, that he might further assure himself of the truth of his convictions.

The men passed each other without the exchange of a word. Fyles eyed the slight figure with contempt and dislike. Nor could he help such feelings for one whom he knew possessed so much of Kate’s warmest sympathy and liking. Besides, was he not a man whose doings placed him against the law, in the administration of which it was his duty to share?

Charlie’s eyes were full of an undisguised hatred. His interpretation of the officer’s expression left him no room for doubting. Delight, victory, were hall-marked all over it. And victory for Fyles could only mean defeat for him.

He passed on. His way took him along the main village trail, and, presently, he encountered two people whom he would willingly have avoided. Helen and his brother were returning toward the house across the river.

Helen’s quick eyes saw him at once, and she pointed him out to the big man at her side.

“It’s Charlie,” she cried, “let’s hurry, or he’ll give us the slip. I must tell him.”

“Tell him what?”

But Helen deigned no answer. She hurried on, and called to the dejected figure, which, to her imagination, seemed to shuffle rather than walk along the trail.

Charlie Bryant had no alternative. He came up. He felt a desperate desire to curse their evident happiness in each other’s society. Why should these two know nothing but the joys of life, while he – he was forbidden even a shadow of the happiness for which he yearned?

But Helen gave him little enough chance to further castigate himself with self-pity. She was full of her desire to impart her news, and her desire promptly set her tongue rattling out her story.

“Oh, Charlie,” she cried, “I’ve had such a shock. Say, did you ever have a cyclone strike you when – when there wasn’t a cyclone within a hundred miles of you?” Then she laughed. “That surely don’t sound right, does it? It’s – it’s kind of mixed metaphor. Anyway, you know what I mean. I had that to-day. Bill’s nearly killed one of our boys – Pete Clancy. Say, I once saw a dog fight. It was a terrier, and one of those heavy, slow British bulldogs. Well, I guess when he starts the bully is greased lightning. Bill’s that bully. That’s all. Pete tried to kiss me. He was drunk. They’re always drunk when they get gay like that. Bill guessed he wasn’t going to succeed, and now I sort of fancy he’s sitting back there by our barn trying to sort out his face. My, Bill nearly killed him!”

But the girl’s dancing-eyed enjoyment found no reflection in Bill’s brother. In a moment Charlie’s whole manner underwent a change, and his dark eyes stared incredulously up into Bill’s face, which, surely enough, still bore the marks of his encounter.

“You – thrashed Pete?” he inquired slowly, in the manner of a man painfully digesting unpleasant facts.

But Bill was in no mood to accept any sort of chiding on the point.

“I wish I’d – killed him,” he retorted fiercely.

Charlie’s eyes turned slowly from the contemplation of his brother’s war-scarred features.

“I guess he deserved it – all right,” he said thoughtfully.

Helen protested indignantly.

“Deserved it? My word, he deserved – anything,” she cried. Then her indignation merged again into her usual laughter. “Say,” she went on. “I – I don’t believe you’re a bit glad, a bit thankful to Bill. I – I don’t believe you mind that – that I was insulted. Oh, but if you’d only seen it you’d have been proud of Big Brother Bill. He – he was just greased lightning. I don’t think I’d be scared of anything with him around.”

But her praise was too much for the modest Bill. He flushed as he clumsily endeavored to change the subject.

“Where are you going, Charlie?” he inquired. “We’re going on over the river. Kate’s there. You coming?”

Just for a moment a look of hesitation crept into his brother’s eyes. He glanced across the river as though he were yearning to accept the invitation. But, a moment later, his eyes came back to his brother with a look of almost cold decision.

“I’m afraid I can’t,” he said. Then he added, “I’ve got something to see to – in the village.”

Bill made no attempt to question him further, and Helen had no desire to. She felt that she had somehow blundered, and her busy mind was speculating as to how.

They parted. And as Charlie moved on he called back to Bill.

“I’ll be back soon. Will you be home?”

“I can be. In an hour?”

Charlie nodded and went on.

The moment they were out of earshot Helen turned to her lover.

“Say, Bill,” she exclaimed. “What have I done wrong?”

The laughter had gone out of her eyes and left them full of anxiety.

Bill shrugged gloomily.

“Nothing,” he said. “It’s me – again.” Then he added, still more gloomily, “Pete’s one of the whisky gang, and – I’m Charlie’s brother. Say,” he finished up with a ponderous sigh. “I’ve mussed things – surely.”

“I’m sorry for that scrap, Bill.”

Charlie Bryant was leaning against a veranda post with his hands in his pockets, and his gaze, as usual, fixed on the far side of the valley. Bill completely filled a chair, where he basked in the evening sunlight.

“So am I – now, Charlie.”

The big man’s agreement brought the other’s eyes to his battered face.

“Why?” he demanded quickly.

Bill looked up into the dark eyes above him, and his own were full of concern.

“Why? Is there need to ask that?”

A shadowy smile spread slowly over the other’s face.

“No, I don’t guess you need to ask why.”

There was just the slightest emphasis on the pronoun.

“You’ve remembered he’s one of the gang – my gang. You sort of feel there’s danger ahead – in consequence. Yes, there is danger. That’s why I’m sorry. But – somehow I wouldn’t have had you act different – even though there’s danger. I’m glad it was you, and not me, though. You could hammer him with your two big fists. I couldn’t. I should have shot him – dead.”