“Yep,” said Hal Dunbar, nodding, “you show some sense. You want Mary to own the ranch one of these days, and so do I. She’s the one for the place. She’s the lady to do it. But”and here he began to beat out his points by striking his fist into the palm of his other hand”she’ll never marry me while Bull Hunter is alive. Hood, for your sake and my sake and, in the long run, for Mary’s sake, too, that fellow has got to die!”
Jack Hood wiped his perspiring forehead.
“Talk softer, Hal,” he said pleadingly. “You don’t mean what you just said, and if you do mean it, it’s just because you’re wrought up over finding this here locket, and”
“Send for Mary, and I’ll prove I’m right.”
“How? By asking her questions?”
“I’m not a fool. I don’t pretend to be as clever as she is. That’s one reason I want to marry herbecause I’m proud of her, Jack.”
The foreman smiled and nodded. He had no real affection for Hal Dunbar, but he had a deep and abiding love for the Dunbar ranch which he had run for so many years, and the bright dream of his life was to see Mary Hood the mistress of those wide lands.
“If it comes to the pinch, Hal,” he said, “I can make Mary marry you, and I’ll do it. She’s learned one thing - and that’s to obey me. I’m not a soft man. I’ve taught my girl to do what I tell her to do, and if it comes to the pinch, I’ll order her to marry you. Ain’t it the best for her? Could she ever do better? No, sir! She couldn’t!”
“Maybe she couldn’t,” said Hal Dunbar, greatly mollified. “And - you go as far as you like about persuading her, Jack. I’ve tried my hand long enough. Here it is three years since I first started to get Mary to marry me, and now I’m further away from it than ever. But I aim to find out where I stand. Will you call her in here?”
Jack Hood looked at him earnestly for a moment and then went to the door. “Mary!” he called.
His voice rang through the hall, and finally the answer came, thin, and small, from a distance, swelling suddenly out at them as a door was opened.
“Coming, dad.”
They could hear her feet tapping swiftly down the stairs.
At the door she paused before she came in and smiled at them, very beautiful with her dark hair and her dark eyes. Hal Dunbar lowered his own glance quickly.
“Jim Laurel just come over from White River way,” he said carelessly, “and Jim gave us some news that might interest you. You remember the name of the gent that stole your locket from Jack?”
“Dunkin was the name, wasn’t it?”
“That was it. You got a mighty good memory, Mary. Well, Jim says that Dunkin’s been caught.”
“Oh,” said the girl, “and did they get my locket from him?”
Hal Dunbar looked up at her in open admiration. For a moment his own conviction that she knew all about the locket was shaken, but he went on.
“No; didn’t hear Jim speak about any locket. But it’s quite a story - that yarn about the taking of Dunkin. There was another fellow with him, an outlaw, of course. They got cornered. The other gent was filled full of lead, and Dunkin surrendered.”
“Who was the other man?” she asked without too much interest, for many such tales had she heard, and this was by no means violent compared with some.
“The other man?” said Dunbar, apparently trying to remember, but in reality watching her like a hawk. “His name,” he finally drawled, “is Bull Hunter!”
Dunbar had expected some slight paling, some infinitesimal start, for Mary was always well poised; but the result of his bluff was astonishing. Every sinew in her body seemed to be suddenly unstrung. She dropped into the chair behind her and sat watching them with a deadly white face and numb lips that kept repeating the name of Bull Hunter soundlessly. There could have been no greater proof than that sudden change of expression. She loved Bull Hunter! Her father bowed his head. Hal Dunbar stared at her as one who has lost his last hope in life.
“It was a joke, Mary,” he said gloomily. “It was just a trick to find out where you stood, and it worked a lot better than I expected - or a lot worse!”
The color struck back into her face in a wonderful manner.
“Are you telling true, Hal?” she cried. “They - they didn’t kill him?”
He shook his head, sick at heart.
“Thank God!” cried Mary Hood.
And then she realized how completely she had betrayed herself. She saw it in the bowed head of her father and the drawn face of Hal Dunbar. She rose to escape, but at the door she turned and faced them.
“It was a cowardly thing to do,” she said. “It was a base, base thing to do. But I thank you for it, Hal. Do you know that I’ve been in doubt of how I really felt about him? But now you’ve helped me to know the truth. I love him. I’m proud of it!”
Chapter XXIV
Imprisoned
For a long moment after she left, the two men struggled to recover from the shock, and then Jack Hood rose and began to pace the room.
“I don’t believe it,” he said. “I can’t believe it. Think of throwing her away on an outlaw and ...”
“You were defending him a minute ago,” said Dunbar bitterly.
“Curse him!” said Jack Hood with emphasis. “To sneak in here and take her away from you like a thief - why, he hasn’t seen her more than three times!”
Hal Dunbar writhed as much in shame as in anger, crying: “What did he do? How did he talk to her? That great, stupid, block of a man! A child has more sense!”
“It’s what is called an infatuation,” decided Jack Hood. “I’m going up to try to talk her into her right senses. If I can’t do that ...”
“Well?”
“I’ll take her away, to begin with. There are ways of teaching girls obedience. I’ll find one that will work!”
“What would you do?”
“Leave that to me. I guess you want me to go far enough?”
“As far as you like,” said Dunbar miserably.
Jack Hood grasped his hand and then hurried from the room with the will to do or die.
Straight to the door of Mary’s chamber he went and found it locked. In return for his noisy rapping she finally opened it a fraction of an inch.
“What” she began, but he violently pushed the door open the rest of the way and entered.
It was his way of asserting his mastery.
When he came in, however, he received another shock. His daughter’s face was flushed, and tears were on her cheeks.
He interpreted this to suit himself, manlike.
“I’m glad to see you’ve got your senses back,” he said. “You made a fool of yourself down there. But it ain’t so bad that you can’t make up for it. Hal still wants youHeaven knows why, after the way you’ve acted!”
“But I don’t want him,” she answered disdainfully. “I detest him.”
“Eh?” sputtered her father, amazed.
“Suppose it had been true?” she gasped out. “Suppose they had really cornered Charlie Hunter? He’d fight to the last drop of blood in him. Oh, don’t I know the sort of a man he is? But suppose it were true? How do I know what’s happening to him? Dad, we’ve got to get him away from”
“Look here!” interrupted her father angrily. “D’you mean to tell me that you been up here crying like a baby because of what might happen to Bull Hunter?”
He shook her arm, but there was no resistance. The spitfire he had known as his daughter was gone, and in her place stood a misty-eyed girl he hardly recognized. Some strange thing had happened to change her, and the grim old fellow very shrewdly guessed that it was love indeed. It abashed him and puzzled him. Also, it profoundly enraged him.
”You’ve played the idiot once too often,” he said sternly. “Hal knows about everything. He has the locket that Bull Hunter brought back to you and ...”