Jim sat up. "yu did it?" he cried, jolted out of his impassivity.
"Yeah, but I didn't wanta kill the fool," Rogue said. "I got the drop on him an' I'm steppin' in to take his gun when he jumps his hoss at me. I try to wing him but he's movin' yu see, an' ." He shrugged his shoulderst There was no regret in his voice ; rather there was blame for a murdered man who had not played the game properly, and paid the penalty. "I was a plain fool to come into town but I figured him finished. I had to have the coin ; things have been quiet lately an' the boys was gettin' restive."
The latter remark sounded like an excuse, but Jim knew it was not so intended ; Rogue was simply giving him all the facts. To Jim, the important point was that this man who had coolly confessed to the crime had not been content to let another suffer for it, and he, Jim, owed his life to him ; he could not condemn, and in his present rebellious attitude to his own kind, had no wish to.
"What made yu think I'd come here?" he asked.
"I saw them bills an' knew Mallick would close the towns to yu," Rogue explained. "Reckoned yu'd make for San Antonio an' sent one o' my men to watch for yu. Didn't he find yu?"
"Shore, but it wasn't him sent me," Jim said, and told of the attempted arrest and chase.
If the outlaw smiled it was behind his beard ; he guessed the part his envoy had played. His comment contained more than a touch of admiration :
"Three fellas, with their guns out, an' then yu busted up the posse! Yu ain't losin' any time justifyin' yore label. Sudden."
"My name's Jim--I'd liefer yu called me that."
"Mine's Roger, but everybody calls me Rogue an' I dunno as I care. Allasame, Jim goes with me. Now, yu better stick around awhile, yo're safe here. Later on, yu can decide 'bout stayin' ; I'm hopin' yu will ; I want a fella I can trust."
"I'm obliged to yu," the visitor said.
"Shucks, it's shore up to me to watch out for yu," Rogue rejoined. "yu can double up with Sandy, an' we all feed together in the big cabin. Now, there's another thing : yore face wouldn't look no worse without hair on it."
He rummaged on a shelf and produced a bottle. "This dye'll wipe out them markin's. I'll show yu yore quarters."
He led the way to a little hut standing rather apart from the others, built of unbarked logs, clinked with clay. As they approached a cheerful but unmelodious voice within announced that it was "his night to howl."
"An' he's shorely doin' it," Rogue said, with a saturnine smile. "Hey, Sandy, I've brung yu a bunkie."
The young man who emerged proved to be the second sentinel of the gorge and his face opened in a wide grin when he saw the new-corner.
"Shucks, it's shorely up to me to watch out for yu," Rogue introduced. "yu can put him wise an' make him known to the boys."
"Pleased to," Sandy said, shaking hands.
When the outlaw leader had gone, with a word that he would see them at supper, Sandy turned to the visitor.
"I'm lucky to get yu," he said. "Last fella I bunked with musta been bit by a mad dawg some time, the sight o' water gave him the fan-tods."
Together they inspected the quarters. Two beds--mere frames with strips of rawhide nailed across them, a couple of up-ended boxes for seats, a cracked mirror, and a few pegs comprised the furniture. The previous sole owner of all this magnificence waited covertly for comment, but when the stranger spoke it was about something entirely different.
"Yu ain't been with this crowd very long," he said.
Sandy stared at him and retorted quizzically, "Tell me somethin' about my future, Mister Medicine Man."
"Shore," Sudden smiled. "I'm sayin' yu won't be with 'em a great while, neither."
Sandy grinned. "Now I'll do a bit o' wizardin'," he said. "Listen, yo're a nifty poker player, an' yu an' me is goin' to he good friends."
They shook hands on that, and then, having brought in his saddle, blankets, and war-bag, the visitor proceeded to shave off his moustache. Sandy watched the operation in silence and then laughed slyly.
"I grow one an' yu get shut o' yores--funny, ain't it?" he emarked, and, inspecting the result critically, "It certainlymakes a difference. What yu goin' to do with the bottle?"
"Rogue thinks my hoss would look better all black, an' I'm inclined to agree with him," Sudden explained, his eyes twinkling.
The removal of the tell-tale marks did not take long and when the horse had been turned loose to graze, Sandy suggested that it was getting near grub-time. On the way, Sudden put a question.
"Rogue ain't a bad of scout but difficult to figure," was the reply. "There's times he's near human an' others when he can be a devil from hell, gotta be, I reckon, with the team he has to handle ; there ain't a tougher crowd between Kansas an' the Rio Grande."
Sudden's own observations during the meal supported this description. Sandy alone seemed to be of a different type ; somehow he did not "belong." Rogue's remark anent a "man he could trust" no longer astonished him.
They fed at a long table in the largest building, which served as a general living-room for the community. Rogue sat at one end, and at the other was a man who immediately attracted the attention of the new-comer. In the thirties, of medium height, slim and supple, he had the face of a demon. The acquiline nose, high cheek-bones, cruel mouth and lank, black hair proclaimed a mixed origin, despite his yellowish-white skin, and Sudden was not surprised to hear him addressed as "Navajo." His dark eyes, flashing from beneath lowered lids, and sinuous movements, were reptilian. He was, Sandy whispered, a sort of second in command of the band. Rogue's presentation was perfunctory:
"Boys, this is Jim," he said. "He's stayin' with us a while."
Nods and a muttered "Howdy" here and there came in response, and the men went on with the business of filling their bellies. The food was good and plentiful. Not until their voracious appetites were appeased and pipes or cigarettes lighted did the company take much notice of the guest. Then he came in for a good deal of furtive scrutiny.
Presently, when most of the men were playing or watching a card game, he slipped away, and from a bench outside, sat gazing over the valley. It was a restful sight : the green expanse, with its verdure-ringed pool and grazing beasts, the rock-rimmed walls where the gathering shadows heralded the approaching night, and to the west, a lingering golden glory in the sky.
"Looks peaceful, don't it?" Sandy said, squatting beside his new chum.
"Shore does."
Sandy did not pursue the subject. He sensed the bitterness n the tone, guessed what the speaker might be thinking, but knew he must not ask. Though they felt a mutual attraction, these two, they had exchanged no confidences.
Chapter IV
ROGUE was absent from the breakfast table on the following morning, but there was a new arrival in the person of the man Sudden had seen in San Antonio. He grinned cheerfully at the cowboy and, when the meal was over, beckoned him outside.
"So yu changed yore mind?" was how he opened the conversation.
"Yu might call it that," was the sardonic reply.
"Aimin' to throw in with Rogue?"
Sudden did not reply at once. Despite the man's apparent friendliness, he did not like him ; there was a lurking malignancy which suggested that he enjoyed the misfortunes of others.
"I ain't decided," he said, adding savagely, "What else is there for me to do?"
"Come a-swimmin'--that's what."
It was Sandy who had answered the question, and he smiled ' as he waved a hand to the pool, glittering in the bright sunshine like a jewel in a green setting. Sligh--so the outlaw was called--shrugged disdainful shoulders.
"yu did oughta remember them critters has to drink that water," he said.
"Which is why yu don't go in, huh?" Sandy retorted.
The water looked cool and inviting and Sandy hurriedly divested himself of his clothing. Sudden followed his example but more leisurely. He watched the boy step lightly towards a jutting bit of bank which afforded a good place for a plungeand then snatched a gun from the belt he had just discarded and fired. Sandy whirled instantly.