第94章 CHAPTER XX. LASSITER'S WAY(1)

Footprints told the story of little Fay's abduction. In anguish Jane Withersteen turned speechlessly to Lassiter, and, confirming her fears, she saw him gray-faced, aged all in a moment, stricken as if by a mortal blow.

Then all her life seemed to fall about her in wreck and ruin.

"It's all over," she heard her voice whisper. "It's ended. I'm going--I'm going--"

"Where?" demanded Lassiter, suddenly looming darkly over her.

"To--to those cruel men--"

"Speak names!" thundered Lassiter.

"To Bishop Dyer--to Tull," went on Jane, shocked into obedience.

"Well--what for?"

"I want little Fay. I can't live without her. They've stolen her as they stole Milly Erne's child. I must have little Fay. I want only her. I give up. I'll go and tell Bishop Dyer--I'm broken.

I'll tell him I'm ready for the yoke--only give me back Fay--and--and I'll marry Tull!"

"Never!" hissed Lassiter.

His long arm leaped at her. Almost running, he dragged her under the cottonwoods, across the court, into the huge hall of Withersteen House, and he shut the door with a force that jarred the heavy walls. Black Star and Night and Bells, since their return, had been locked in this hall, and now they stamped on the stone floor.

Lassiter released Jane and like a dizzy man swayed from her with a hoarse cry and leaned shaking against a table where he kept his rider's accoutrements. He began to fumble in his saddlebags. His action brought a clinking, metallic sound--the rattling of gun-cartridges. His fingers trembled as he slipped cartridges into an extra belt. But as he buckled it over the one he habitually wore his hands became steady. This second belt contained two guns, smaller than the black ones swinging low, and he slipped them round so that his coat hid them. Then he fell to swift action. Jane Withersteen watched him, fascinated but uncomprehending and she saw him rapidly saddle Black Star and Night. Then he drew her into the light of the huge windows, standing over her, gripping her arm with fingers like cold steel.

"Yes, Jane, it's ended--but you're not goin' to Dyer!...I'm goin' instead!"

Looking at him--he was so terrible of aspect--she could not comprehend his words. Who was this man with the face gray as death, with eyes that would have made her shriek had she the strength, with the strange, ruthlessly bitter lips? Where was the gentle Lassiter? What was this presence in the hall, about him, about her--this cold, invisible presence?

"Yes, it's ended, Jane," he was saying, so awfully quiet and cool and implacable, "an' I'm goin' to make a little call. I'll lock you in here, an' when I get back have the saddle-bags full of meat an bread. An' be ready to ride!"

"Lassiter!" cried Jane.

Desperately she tried to meet his gray eyes, in vain, desperately she tried again, fought herself as feeling and thought resurged in torment, and she succeeded, and then she knew.

"No--no--no!" she wailed. "You said you'd foregone your vengeance. You promised not to kill Bishop Dyer."

"If you want to talk to me about him--leave off the Bishop. I don't understand that name, or its use."

"Oh, hadn't you foregone your vengeance on--on Dyer? But--your actions--your words--your guns--your terrible looks!... They don't seem foregoing vengeance?"

"Jane, now it's justice."

"You'll--kill him?"

"If God lets me live another hour! If not God--then the devil who drives me!"

"You'll kill him--for yourself--for your vengeful hate?"

"No!"

"For Milly Erne's sake?"

"No."

"For little Fay's?"

"No!"

"Oh--for whose?"

"For yours!"

"His blood on my soul!" whispered Jane, and she fell to her knees. This was the long-pending hour of fruition. And the habit of years--the religious passion of her life--leaped from lethargy, and the long months of gradual drifting to doubt were as if they had never been. "If you spill his blood it'll be on my soul--and on my father's. Listen." And she clasped his knees, and clung there as he tried to raise her. "Listen. Am I nothing to you?'

"Woman--don't trifle at words! I love you! An' I'll soon prove it."

"I'll give myself to you--I'll ride away with you--marry you, if only you'll spare him?"

His answer was a cold, ringing, terrible laugh.

"Lassiter--I'll love you. Spare him!"

She sprang up in despairing, breaking spirit, and encircled his neck with her arms, and held him in an embrace that he strove vainly to loosen. "Lassiter, would you kill me? I'm fighting my last fight for the principles of my youth--love of religion, love of father. You don't know--you can't guess the truth, and I can't speak ill. I'm losing all. I'm changing. All I've gone through is nothing to this hour. Pity me-- help me in my weakness. You're strong again--oh, so cruelly, coldly strong! You're killing me. I see you--feel you as some other Lassiter! My master, be merciful--spare him!"

His answer was a ruthless smile.

She clung the closer to him, and leaned her panting breast on him, and lifted her face to his. "Lassiter, I do love you! It's leaped out of my agony. It comes suddenly with a terrible blow of truth. You are a man! I never knew it till now. Some wonderful change came to me when you buckled on these guns and showed that gray, awful face. I loved you then. All my life I've loved, but never as now. No woman can love like a broken woman. If it were not for one thing--just one thing--and yet! I can't speak it--I'd glory in your manhood--the lion in you that means to slay for me.

Believe me--and spare Dyer. Be merciful--great as it's in you to be great....Oh, listen and believe--I have nothing, but I'm a woman--a beautiful woman, Lassiter--a passionate, loving woman--and I love you! Take me--hide me in some wild place--and love me and mend my broken heart. Spare him and take me away."

She lifted her face closer and closer to his, until their lips nearly touched, and she hung upon his neck, and with strength almost spent pressed and still pressed her palpitating body to his.

"Kiss me!" she whispered, blindly.