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Read Ebook: Steve Yeager by Raine William MacLeod
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Ebook has 362 lines and 31032 words, and 8 pages
"I don't know. Something will turn up."
"You're taking a big chance, Steve."
"Not because I want to. But I've got to do what I can for the boys. This ain't just the time for a 'watchful waiting' policy, seems to me. If you've got anything better to offer, I'm agreeable to listen."
"The only thing I can think of is to appeal to Uncle Sam."
"That won't get us much. But there's no harm in trying. Have the old man stir up a big dust at Washington. After plenty of red tape an official representation will be made to Pasquale. He will lie himself black in the face. More correspondence. More explanations. Finally, if the prisoners are still alive, they will start home. Mebbe they'll get here. Mebbe they won't."
"Then you don't think it's worth trying?"
"Sure I do. Every little helps. It might make Pasquale sit steady in the boat till I get a chance to pull off something."
When Daisy Ellington heard of the plan she went straight to Yeager.
"What's this I hear about you committing suicide?" she demanded.
"News to me, compadre," smiled the puncher.
"You're not really going down there to shove your head into that den of wolves, are you?" Without waiting for an answer she pushed on to a prediction. "Because if you do, they'll surely snap it off."
"Wish you'd change your brand of prophecy, ni?a. You see, this is the only head I've got. I'm some partial to it."
"Then you had better keep away from that old Pasquale and Chad Harrison. Don't be foolish, Steve." She caught the lapels of his coat and shook him fondly. "If you don't know when you're well off, your friends do. We're not going to let you go."
"Threewit and Farrar," he reminded her.
"They'll have to take their chance. Besides, Pasquale isn't going to hurt them. There wouldn't be any sense in it. So there's no use us getting panicky."
"I don't reckon I'm exactly panicky, Daisy. But it won't do to forget that Pasquale is one bad hombre. Harrison is another, and he's got it in for the boys. We can't lie down and quit on them, can we? I notice they didn't do that with me."
"What good will it do for you to go and get trapped too? It's different with you. They've got it in for you down there. It's just foolhardiness for you to go back," she told him sharply.
"You're sure some little boss," he laughed. "I'm willing to be reasonable. If I can prove to you that I stand a good chance to pull it off down at Noche Buena, will you feel different about it?"
"Yes, if you can--but you can't," she agreed, flashing at him the provocative little smile that was one of her charms.
"Bet you a box of chocolates against a ham sandwich I can."
"You're on," she nodded airily.
"Better order that ham sandwich," he advised, mocking her lazily with his friendly eyes.
"Oh, I don't know. You're not so much, Cactus Center. I expect to be eating chocolates soon."
Her gay audacity always pleased him. He settled himself for explanations soberly, but back of his gravity lay laughter.
"All right, Steve. Show me. I'm from Joplin, Missouri. When are you going to do all this proving?"
"We won't set a date. Some time before I leave."
Yeager walked from the studio to his rooming-place. Ruth Seymour met him on the porch and stopped him. It was the first time he had seen her since their return.
"Is it true--what Mr. Manderson says--that you are going back to Noche Buena?" she flung at him.
"I'm certainly getting on the society page," he laughed. "Manderson has a pretty good reputation. I shouldn't wonder if what he says is true."
The face beneath the crown of soft black hair was colorless except for the trembling lips.
"Why? Why must you go? You've just escaped from there with your life. Are you mad?"
"Look here, Miss Ruth. I've just had a roundup with Miss Ellington about this. I'm going to take a whirl at rescuing our friends. Pasquale can't put over such a raw deal without getting a run for his money from me. I'm going back there because it's up to me to go. There are some things a man can't do. He can't quit when his friends need him."
She was standing in the doorway, her head leaning against the jamb so that the fine curve of the throat line showed a beating pulse. Something in the pose of the slim, graceful figure told him of repressed emotion.
"That is absurd, Mr. Yeager. You can't do anything for them if you go."
"Everybody sizes me up for a buzzard-head," he complained whimsically.
The gravity did not lift from her young, quick eyes.
"If you go they'll kill you," she said in a voice as dry as a whisper.
"Sho! Nothing to that. I'm going down disguised. I'll be safe enough."
"I suppose ... nothing can keep you from going." A sob choked up in her throat as she spoke.
"No. I've got to go."
"You think you have a right to play at dice with your life! Don't your friends count with you at all?"
"It's because they do that I'm going," he answered gently.
Her troubled eyes rested on his. The protest in her heart was still urgent, but she dared go no further. Some instinct of maidenly reticence curbed the passionate rebellion against his decision. If she said more, she might say too much. With a swift, sinuous turn of the slender body she ran into the house and left him standing there.
Daisy sat at one end of the pergola mending a glove. It was in the pleasant cool of the evening just as dusk was beginning to fall. A light breeze rustled the rose-leaves and played with the tendrils of her soft, wavy hair. The coolness was grateful after the heat of an Arizona day.
The front gate creaked. A man was coming in, a Mexican of the peon class. He moved up the walk toward her with a slight limp. As he drew closer, she observed negligently that he was of early middle age, ragged, and of course dirty. Age and lack of soap had so dyed his serape that the original color was quite gone.
He bowed to her with the native courtesy that belongs to even the peons of his race. A swift patter of Spanish fell from his lips.
Miss Ellington shook her head. "No sabe Espa?ol."
The man gushed into a second eruption of liquid vowels, accompanied this time by gestures which indicated that he wanted food.
The young woman nodded, went into the house, and secured from Mrs. Seymour a plate of broken fragments left over from supper. With this and a cup of coffee she returned to the pergola.
"Gracias, se?orita." The shining black poll of the man bowed over the donation as he accepted it.
He sat cross-legged among the roses and ate what had been given him. Daisy observed critically that his habit of eating was not at all nice. He discarded the fork she had brought, using only the knife and his fingers. The meat he tore apart and devoured ravenously, cramming it wolfishly into his mouth as fast as he could. A few days before she had fallen into an argument with Steve Yeager about the civilization of the Mexicans. She wished he could see this specimen.
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