the Drift Fence (1992) (17 page)

Slinger Dunn whistled long and low, and afterward muttered a deep curse.

His brown hand shot out like the strike of a snake and snapped a dead twig of cedar.

"Molly, you've shore cleared up part of this heah deal," he said, gratefully. "I'll bet a hundred Jocelyn aimed to throw in with the Cibeque."

"That's what he said, Arch," rejoined Molly, and impelled by released emotion, she began at the point when Jocelyn waylaid her on the trail and recalled every word and action of that encounter.

"So much fer Hackamore Jocelyn," muttered Dunn. "I wonder now--I just wonder what cairds Seth holds--or if it is his deal."

"I wouldn't trust Seth Haverly with his grandma's spectacles," said Molly.

"Wal, Molly, mebbe I'd better take your hunch. But I cain't believe Seth would double-cross me, leastways with a puncher from the Diamond. An' thet brings us to real talk."

Molly had only to look up to realize that herself. Dunn fastened a hand in her blouse, so close and tight as to pinch her neck, and with a slow pull he drew her up so that her eyes were scarcely a foot from his.

"What's this I heah aboot Jim Traft insultin' you?"

"I--I don't know what you heahed, Arch--but it's a lie."

"Did you meet him?"

"Yes, at the fair."

"An' went to thet dance with him?"

"Oh, no. I went with Mrs. See... But Jim Traft came--an' I--I danced with him once."

"An' thet's all? You wasn't out in the moonlight with him, on the porch?"

"Yes--we walked out a--a little."

"An' he grabbed you an' hugged you?" demanded Dunn, leaning down.

"Y-yes, Arch--he did," whispered Molly.

"You let him?"

"He's big an' strong... What could I--I do? But at that I slapped him."

"Which was proof you felt insulted. So how's it come you say you wasn't?"

"Listen--Arch--an' don't choke me," she gasped. "I--I wasn't honest with him. The truth is--I took to him--somethin' outrageous. An' he must have guessed it... But when he--he had me in his arms--I hit him. I--I wanted him to believe I was insulted. He'd taken me for a girl far above one from the Cibeque... But I really wasn't insulted--an' when I hit him I wasn't honest. An' an'--"

Molly reached the subtlety of a woman in her instinct to protect Jim Traft. And she seemed to divine that her brother might not know more.

"Took to him somethin' outrageous!" ejaculated Arch, incredulously.

"Molly Dunn!"

"Yes, Molly Dunn," retorted Molly, gaining courage with resentment. "Even if I do belong to the Dunns of the Cibeque I've got a heart."

"I ain't blamin' you, Mol," he returned, as if real zing the inevitableness of the fact, and he let go of her. "You're only a kid. An' he's shore a good-lookin' fellar. An' he can talk. But, Molly, the thing is he's old Jim Traft's kin. He's worth a million. An' he couldn't have no honest intent toward you."

"I'm no fool, Arch, if I am a kid," she rejoined. "I know when a man means bad by me. Lord knows I've had reason to. I shore knew today when Jocelyn grabbed me... But Jim Traft didn't mean bad. I swear it."

"Molly, he must have talked you out of your haid," said Dunn, amazed.

"No. He didn't waste any time talkin'. I'd hardly got out in the moonlight. It was that white dress, Arch."

"What white dress?"

"The one Mrs. See bought for me. It's lovely. He--they--everybody there said I looked--"

"You poor kid! Mebbe they was all to blame. Damn thet See woman, anyway."

"Arch, let me put on the dress for you."

"Molly, I don't need any white dress to know how pretty you are... An' I reckon I hold ag'in' Traft your defendin' him."

"But that's not fair, Arch."

He shook his shaggy head doggedly.

"You cain't tell me honest thet Jim Traft didn't make you feel you was Molly Dunn of the Cibeque."

"No, Arch, I--I can't. He did. He was shore surprised. An' he let out what he thought. Afterwards he tried to--to soften it. But--but then my heart was broke."

Dunn made a swifter and more expressive movement of his hand, passionate and vindictive.

"Hurtin' your feelin's thet way is a wuss insult than huggin' you," he declared, with a note of pathos in his anger.

"It hurt like sixty, Arch. But he didn't mean it. There is a difference between Molly Dunn of the Cibeque an' Jim Traft from the East--rich, educated, with family name."

"Ahuh. You said it, Molly. Family name. You're daughter of old John Dunn.

An' sister to Slinger Dunn!"

"I told him that."

"Before or after?"

"It was after, of course."

"Shore it was. No, Mol, there ain't no overlookin' thet. He was only playin' with you. Shore, in some safer place he'd gone farther. Made a hussy of you!"

"No!" cried Molly, poignantly, as if at the thrust of a blade. "An' you're givin' it away thet you'd let him go as far as he liked."

"Oh, Arch! How can you--talk so!" sobbed Molly. "That's a lie. You're insultin' me."

He shook his head gloomily, and averted his blazing eyes to hide their thought from her. Then he strode away, leaving, her there trembling and stricken.

Chapter
TWELVE

For days Molly lived in a perpetual state of nervous dread of events that had cast their shadows.

Arch remained in one of his brooding moods. He worked in the fields as if to make up for lost time. And he did not go to the village in the evenings. The Haverlys rode over every day or so and engaged him in long talks, which left Arch more taciturn than ever.

Then one morning when Molly came down she saw Arch's horse saddled and carrying a small pack.

"Where are you goin', Arch?" she asked, at breakfast.

"Up on the Diamond, an' I reckon you better stick around home," he replied, gruffly.

"What're you--goin' for?" she dared ask.

"Wal, fer one thing, to see if this outfit is lyin' to me. I didn't tell you thet Seth an' his new pard swear they posted a notice up north of the Diamond. They laid down the law fer thet drift fence. The Cibeque wouldn't stand fer the fence goin' farther than the haid of East Fork.

Thet's in the saddle just under the Diamond. And if it was built farther it'd be laid down pronto."

"What else you goin' for?" added Molly, anxiously.

"Wal, I reckon you ought to know," he replied, with a dark glance on her.

Molly in trepidation followed him out to his horse, where her mother would not hear. She laid a trembling hand on him, as he was about to mount. She did not know what to say. But terror of something possessed her. "Arch, if you really love me you--you won't--"

He stared down at her, arrested by her agitation if not her words.

"Who ever said anythin' aboot me lovin' you?" he asked.

"No one. But you do, don't you?" she implored. "Somebody must love me or--or I cain't live."

"You seem to've been tolerable healthy all along," he drawled.

Nevertheless, he evaded the question.

"I've only you to help me, Arch," she went on swiftly. "I'm tryin' hard not to run true to what they expect of Molly Dunn. An' I can be drove too far. 111 hate you if--if you--"

But he was flint. Molly gathered that her emotion somehow augmented his suspicion of her.

"You have run true to the Dunns, I reckon," he replied, bitterly and rode away.

Molly hid up in the loft, tormented beyond endurance. When she could stand it up there no longer she climbed down and went out to look for her horse. She had not done her errands by horseback for a year or more, for the very good reason that she had no saddle and would not be seen in the village without one. The dignity of sixteen years had been embarrassing in many ways. Molly had ridden bareback since she was big enough to get on a horse.

She found the pony in the unfenced north end of the clearing. He was wild and she did not easily corner him. But finally, when she had him and was patting his neck, she wondered what she had wanted him for. And she seemed struck with the fact that it was not beyond her to ride up on the Diamond to warn Jim Traft his life might be in danger. But worried as Molly was, she did not think that so dire a thing would threaten until the drift fence actually crossed the Diamond. Down in the valley the opinion was general that the barbed wire would never go so far. Moreover, Molly remembered more than once when Slinger Dunn had ridden off with intent to fight, and this morning he had not been like that.

Three days later, while Molly was in the village with her mother, she heard that her brother was there, drunk and quarrelsome. At the store she met Andy Stoneham, who was a clerk for Enoch Summers. While waiting upon Molly, he contrived to whisper: "Heaps goin' on, an' hadn't I better come out tonight?" Molly nodded, and joined her mother, conscious of a sinking sensation in her breast.

Old Enoch was full of talk. "High jinks goin' on around West Fork. Hain't been so busy since last fall round-up."

"What's goin' on?" queried Mrs. Dunn. "Cattle movin'. Riders comin' through."

"This time of year! Well, that's strange."

"So it is, Mrs. Dunn. An' we can lay it to thet drift fence. Did you heah the latest aboot Jim Traft?"

"Where'd I ever hear any news?"

Molly felt the blood tingle in her cheeks.

"Wal, it's shore news," replied the storekeeper. "Young Traft has had notices put up thet he'd make no claim to cattle already drifted down into Sycamore Canyon. His drift fence has crossed the head of Sycamore an' is now out on the Diamond."

"Well, is that all the news?" declared Mrs. Dunn, indifferently. "Wal, most folks is agreed thet Jim Traft was shore more than square to the Cibeque when he done thet," went on Summers. "Mebbe there's more'n a thousand haid of steers, let alone cows an' calves, in the brakes of Sycamore. Seth Haverly an' his outfit sold near two hundred two-year-olds hyar yesterday. Forty-eight dollars a head! An' they've gone back fer another drive. Reckon they'll have most of thet stock, before the other boys get wind of it."

"Forty-eight a head!" ejaculated Mrs. Dunn, who appeared to be conjuring with figures. "Arch was in on that?"

"Wal, it seems not. He's had a fall-out with the Cibeque, or somethin'.

Anyway, he was in town last night. It was Slinger who busted in here with news thet the drift fence had reached Tobe's Well. It shore upset all reckonin's around West Fork. Tobe's Well is way out on the Diamond."

While her mother completed her purchases, Molly waited in the grip of conflicting feelings. She could not help a thrill to hear Jim Traft kindly spoken of, nor a start at the information he had passed Sycamore Canyon with his fence. This was the dead line drawn by the riders of the brakes. Traft had disregarded their notice:

Molly calculated that he was then actually within ten miles of West Fork, and not more than forty to the east end of the Diamond. She had ridden up and down the brakes of Beaver Canyon and knew the trail to Tobe's Well.

She had also been over the Derrick Trail once, but had no confidence that she could remember how to find it.

After supper that evening she waited at the gate for Andy, something she had never before done, and she knew he would make stock of it.

"Shucks!" he ejaculated, when he arrived to beam upon her with his homely face. "It's different when you want suthin' of somebody, ain't it, Molly?"

"I reckon so, Andy. You see what bein' friendly does. I'm doin' a heap of worryin' an' I'm just low-down enough to want your help."

"Wal, you've cause to worry, Molly Dunn," he said. "Let's get out of sight somewhere. I'm plumb scared of thet Hackamore Jocelyn."

Molly led him back of the cabin along the edge of the clearing to the creek and halted beside a huge fallen pine. The amber creek babbled over the rocks below; the squirrels and jays were noisy; the woods were full of the golden glow of sunset.

"Molly. last night I happened on suthin' thet's got me scared stiff," he began. "After work hours I went up the crick to ketch a mess of trout.

An' as I was comin' back along the crick trail I seen Seth Haverly an' some riders. I ducked into the brush an' squatted down. I reckoned they'd pass. But I'm a son-of-a-gun if they didn't stop in a little glade not forty steps from where I hid. With Seth was his brother Sam, an' Hack Jocelyn. The Haverlys stayed in their saddles, but Jocelyn got off. He acted oneasy. An' he walked up an' down the trail. They was waitin' fer someone."

"I'll bet it was Slinger," said Molly, who sometimes in excitement used her brother's sobriquet.

"It shore was. Wal, fust off, Jocelyn swore Slinger wouldn't come, an'

Seth said he would... Molly, they stayed there till dark an' I could repeat every blame word they said. But heah short an' sweet is what it all means... Hack Jocelyn has got in with the Cibeque outfit, an' they're aimin' to double-cross Slinger. They're goin' to cut the drift fence an' lay the blame on to Slinger. They're goin' to kidnap Jim Traft an' squeeze a big ransom out of his uncle. Thet's the stake Jocelyn is playin' fer. But I seen, if Seth couldn't, thet Hack is playin' a deeper game than they savvy. Mebbe Slinger is on to him. 'Cause Slinger wouldn't heah of Jocelyn throwin' in the Cibeque. He wouldn't go in the cattle drive they're plannin'. Thet all came out in their talk before Slinger got there."