“And yet—you came?”
“Don't you see?” pleaded Kate. “He's in a corner. He's about to go—bad!”
“Miss Pollard, how do you know these things?”
“Because I'm the daughter of the leader of the gang!”
She said it without shame, proudly.
“I've tried to keep him from the life he intends leading,” said Kate. “I can't turn him. He laughs at me. I'm nothing to him, you see? And he loves the new life. He loves the freedom. Besides, he thinks that there's no hope. That he has to be what his father was before him. Do you know why he thinks that? Because you turned him out. You thought he would turn bad. And he respects you. He still turns to you. Ah, if you could hear him speak of you! He loves you still!”
Elizabeth Cornish dropped back into her chair, grown suddenly weak, and Kate fell on her knees beside her.
“Don't you see,” she said softly, “that no strength can turn Terry back now? He's done nothing wrong. He shot down the man who killed his father. He has killed another man who was a professional bully and mankiller. And he's broken into a bank and taken money from a man who deserved to lose it—a wolf of a man everybody hates. He's done nothing really wrong yet, but he will before long. Just because he's stronger than other men. And he doesn't know his strength. And he's fine, Miss Cornish. Isn't he always gentle and—”
“Hush!” said Elizabeth Cornish.
“He's just a boy; you can't bend him with strength, but you can win him with love.”
“What,” gasped Elizabeth, “do you want me to do?”
“Bring him back. Bring him back, Miss Cornish!”
Elizabeth Cornish was trembling.
“But I—if you can't influence him, how can I? You with your beautiful— you are very beautiful, dear child. Ah, very lovely!”
She barely touched the bright hair.
“He doesn't even think of me,” said the girl sadly. “But I have no shame. I have let you know everything. It isn't for me. It's for Terry, Miss Cornish. And you'll come? You'll come as quickly as you can? You'll come to my father's house? You'll ask Terry to come back? One word will do it! And I'll hurry back and—keep him there till you come. God give me strength! I'll keep him till you come!”
Outside the door, his ear pressed to the crack, Vance Cornish did not wait to hear more. He knew the answer of Elizabeth before she spoke. And all his high-built schemes he saw topple about his ears. Grief had been breaking the heart of his sister, he knew. Grief had been bringing her close to the grave. With Terry back, she would regain ten years of life. With Terry back, the old life would begin again.
He straightened and staggered down the stairs like a drunken man, clinging to the banister. It was an old-faced man who came out onto the veranda, where Waters was chewing his cigar angrily. At sight of his host he started up. He was a keen man, was Waters. He could sense money a thousand miles away. And it was this buzzard keenness which had brought him to the Cornish ranch and made him Vance's right-hand man. There was much money to be spent; Waters would direct and plan the spending, and his commission would not be small.
In the face of Vance he saw his own doom.
“Waters,” said Vance Cornish, “everything is going up in smoke. That damned girl—Waters, we're ruined.”
“Tush!” said Waters, smiling, though he had grown gray. “No one girl can ruin two middle-aged men with our senses developed. Sit down, man, and we'll figure a way out of this.”
CHAPTER 38
The fine gray head, the hawklike, aristocratic face, and the superior manner of Waters procured him admission to many places where the ordinary man was barred. It secured him admission on this day to the office of Sheriff McGuire, though McGuire had refused to see his best friends.
A proof of the perturbed state of his mind was that he accepted the proffered fresh cigar of Waters without comment or thanks. His mental troubles made him crisp to the point of rudeness.
“I'm a tolerable busy man, Mr.—Waters, I think they said your name was. Tell me what you want, and make it short, if you don't mind.”
“Not a bit, sir. I rarely waste many words. But I think on this occasion we have a subject in common that will interest you.”
Waters had come on what he felt was more or less of a wild-goose chase. The great object was to keep young Hollis from coming in contact with Elizabeth Cornish again. One such interview, as Vance Cornish had assured him, would restore the boy to the ranch, make him the heir to the estate, and turn Vance and his high ambitions out of doors. Also, the high commission of Mr. Waters would cease. With no plan in mind, he had rushed to the point of contact, and hoped to find some scheme after he arrived there. As for Vance, the latter would promise money; otherwise he was a shaken wreck of a man and of no use. But with money, Mr. Waters felt that he had the key to this world and he was not without hope.
Three hours in the hotel of the town gave him many clues. Three hours of casual gossip on the veranda of the same hotel had placed him in possession of about every fact, true or presumably true, that could be learned, and with the knowledge a plan sprang into his fertile brain. The worn, worried face of the sheriff had been like water on a dry field; he felt that the seed of his plan would immediately spring up and bear fruit.
“And that thing we got in common?” said the sheriff tersely.
“It's this—young Terry Hollis.”
He let that shot go home without a follow-up and was pleased to see the sheriff's forehead wrinkle with pain.
“He's like a ghost hauntin' me,” declared McGuire, with an attempted laugh that failed flatly. “Every time I turn around, somebody throws this Hollis in my face. What is it now?”
“Do you mind if I run over the situation briefly, as I understand it?”
“Fire away!”
The sheriff settled back; he had forgotten his rush of business.
“As I understand it, you, Mr. McGuire, have the reputation of keeping your county clean of crime and scenes of violence.”
“Huh!” grunted the sheriff.
“Everyone says,” went on Waters, “that no one except a man named Minter has done such work in meeting the criminal element on their own ground. You have kept your county peaceful. I believe that is true?”
“Huh,” repeated McGuire. “Kind of soft-soapy, but it ain't all wrong. They ain't been much doing in these parts since I started to clean things up.”
“Until recently,” suggested Waters.
The face of the sheriff darkened. “Well?” he asked aggressively.
“And then two crimes in a row. First, a gun brawl in broad daylight— young Hollis shot a fellow named—er—”
“Larrimer,” snapped the sheriff viciously. “It was a square fight. Larrimer forced the scrap.”
“I suppose so. Nevertheless, it was a gunfight. And next, two men raid the bank in the middle of your town, and in spite of you and of special guards, blow the door off a safe and gut the safe of its contents. Am I right?”
The sheriff merely scowled.
“It ain't clear to me yet,” he declared, “how you and me get together on any topic we got in common. Looks sort of like we was just hearing one old yarn over and over agin.”