"Larry, we"ll wait and see how much you"ve maybe leaked."
"No we won"t wait fer nuthin"!--not fer nuthin", understand?" corrected Trimmer aggressively. "I ain"t a-trustin" you, Opal, no more! You done me up at every turn, and now, by G.o.d! you"re goin" to come to terms!" He pulled an ugly, rusty gun, and thumped with its muzzle on the table. "You"ll never leave this room alive if I don"t git the money. Ring fer it, Opal, ring the bell, and order it in with the drinks!"
McCoppet would have temporized. It was not so much the money now as the state of affairs in the street. How much was known?--and what was being done? These were the questions in his mind.
"Don"t get excited, friend," he said. "If things are out, and you and I are caught with the aces in our sleeves, we may have to fight back to back." He was edging around to draw his pistol un.o.bserved,
But Trimmer was alert. "Stand still, there, Opal, I"ve got the drop,"
he said. "I"m lookin" out fer number one, this morning, understand?
You ring the----"
A sudden, loud knock at the door broke in upon his speech, and both men started in alarm.
"Opal! Opal!" cried a m.u.f.fled voice in accents of warning just outside the door, "Christler"s on your trail! Come out! Come out and--huh!
Too late! You"ll have to get out the window!"
The roar and excitement of the coming crowd, aroused to a wild indignation, broke even to the den. An army of citizens, leading the way for Christler"s deputies, was storming McCoppet"s saloon.
He heard, and a little understood. He knew too much to attempt to explain, to accuse even Trimmer to a mob in heat. Nothing but flight was possible, and perhaps even that was a risk.
He started for the window. Trimmer leaped before him.
"No you don"t!" he said. "I told you, Opal----"
"Take that!" the gambler cut in sharply. His gun leaped out with flame at its end; and the roar, fire, bullet, and all seemed to bury in the lumberman"s body. A second shot and a third did the same--and Trimmer went down like a log.
His gun had fallen from his hand. With all his brute vitality he crawled to take it up. One of the bullets had pierced his heart, but yet he would not die.
McCoppet had s.n.a.t.c.hed up a chair and with it he beat out the window.
Then Trimmer"s gun crashed tremendously--and Opal sank against the sill.
He faced his man. A ghastly pallor spread upon his countenance. He went down slowly, like a man of melting snow, his cigar still hanging on his lip.
He saw the lumberman shiver. But the fellow crowded his cigar stump in his mouth, with fire and all, and chewed it up as he was dying.
"Good shot," said McCoppet faintly. His head went forward on his breast and he crumpled on the floor.
CHAPTER XLVI
WASTED TIME
Van was conveyed to Mrs. d.i.c.k"s. The fever attacked him in his helplessness and delirium claimed him for its own. He glided from unconsciousness into a wandering state of mind before the hour of noon.
His wound was an ugly, fiery affair, made worse by all that he did.
For having returned from his lethargy, he promptly began to fight anew all his battles with horses, men, and love that had crossed his summer orbit.
Gettysburg, Dave, and Napoleon begged for the brunt of the battle.
They got it. For three long days Van lay upon his bed and flung them all around the room. He hurt them, bruised them, even called them names, but ever like three faithful dogs, whom beatings will never discourage--the beatings at least of a master much beloved--they returned undaunted to the fray, with affection constantly increasing.
There were three other nurses--two women and Algy, the cook. But Beth was the one who slept the least, who glided most often to the sick man"s side, who wetted his lips and renewed the ice and gave him a cooler pillow. And she it was who suffered most when he called upon her name.
"Beth! Beth!" he would call in a wildness of joy, and then pa.s.s his hand across his eyes, repeating: "--this is the man I hate more than anyone else in the world!"
That she finally knew, that the tell-tale portion of her letter had been found when Bostwick was searched--all this availed her nothing now, as she pleaded with Van to understand. He fought his fights, and ran his race, and returned to that line so many times that she feared it would kill him in the end.
At midnight on that final day of struggling he lay quite exhausted and weak. His mind was still adrift upon its sea of dreams, but he fought his fights no more. The fever was still in possession, but its method had been changed. It had pinned him down as a victim at last, for resistance had given it strength.
At evening of the seventh day he had slept away the heat. He was wasted, his face had grown a tawny stubble of beard, but his strength had pulled him through.
The sunlight glory, as the great orb dipped into purple hills afar, streamed goldenly in through the window, on Beth, alone at his side.
It blazoned her beauty, lingering in her hair, laying its roseate tint upon the pale moss-roses of her cheeks. It richened the wondrous l.u.s.ter of her eyes, and deepened their deep brown tenderness of love.
She was gold and brown and creamy white, with tremulous coral lips.
Yet on her face a greater beauty burned--the beauty of her inner-self--the beauty of her womanhood, her nature, shining through.
This was the vision Van looked upon, when his eyes were open at last.
He opened them languidly, as one at peace and restored to control by rest. He looked at her long, and presently a faint smile dawned in his eyes.
She could not speak, as she knelt at his side, to see him thus return.
She could only place her hand upon her cheek and give herself up to his gaze--give all she was, and all her love, and a yearning too vast to be expressed.
The smile from his eyes went creeping down his face as the dawn-glow creeps down a mountain. Perhaps in a dream he had come upon the truth, or perhaps from the light of her soul. For he said with a faint, wan smile upon his lips:
"I don"t believe it, Beth. You meant to write "love" in your letter."
The tears sprang out of her eyes.
"I did! I did! I did!" she sobbed in joy too great to be contained.
"I"ve always loved you, _always_!"
Despite his wound, his weakness--all--she thrust an arm beneath his neck and pillowed her cheek on his breast. He wanted no further explanation, and she had no words to spend.
One of his arms was remarkably efficient. It circled her promptly and drew her up till he kissed her on the lips. Then he presently said:
"How much time have we wasted?"
"Oh, _days_!" she said, warmly blushing. "Ever since that night on the desert."
He shook a smiling negative.
"Wrong. We"ve wasted all our lives."
He kissed her again, then sank into slumber with the dusk.