The Border Legion

It was afternoon before Joan could trust herself sufficiently to go

out again, and when she did she saw that she attracted very little

attention from the bandits.

Kells had a springy step, a bright eye, a lifted head, and he seemed

to be listening. Perhaps he was--to the music of his sordid dreams.

Joan watched him sometimes with wonder. Even a bandit--plotting gold

robberies, with violence and blood merely means to an end--built

castles in the air and lived with joy!

All that afternoon the bandits left camp in twos and threes, each

party with pack burros and horses, packed as Joan had not seen them

before on the border. Shovels and picks and old sieves and pans,

these swinging or tied in prominent places, were evidence that the

bandits meant to assume the characters of miners and prospectors.

They whistled and sang. It was a lark. The excitement had subsided

and the action begun. Only in Kells, under his radiance, could be

felt the dark and sinister plot. He was the heart of the machine.

By sundown Kells, Pearce, Wood, Jim Cleve, and a robust, grizzled

bandit, Jesse Smith, were left in camp. Smith was lame from his

ride, and Joan gathered that Kells would have left camp but for the

fact that Smith needed rest. He and Kells were together all the

time, talking endlessly. Joan heard them argue a disputed point--

would the men abide by Kells's plan and go by twos and threes into

the gold-camp, and hide their relations as a larger band? Kells

contended they would and Smith had his doubts.

"Jack, wait till you see Alder Creek!" ejaculated Smith, wagging his

grizzled head. "Three thousand men, old an' young, of all kinds--

gone gold--crazy! Alder Creek has got California's '49 and' '51

cinched to the last hole!" And the bandit leader rubbed his palms in

great glee.

That evening they all had supper together in Kell's cabin. Bate Wood

grumbled because he had packed most of his outfit. It so chanced

that Joan sat directly opposite Jim Cleve, and while he ate he

pressed her foot with his under the table. The touch thrilled Joan.

Jim did not glance at her, but there was such a change in him that

she feared it might rouse Kells's curiosity. This night, however,

the bandit could not have seen anything except a gleam of yellow. He

talked, he sat at table, but did not eat. After supper he sent Joan

to her cabin, saying they would be on the trail at daylight. Joan

watched them awhile from her covert. They had evidently talked

themselves out, and Kells grew thoughtful. Smith and Pearce went

outside, apparently to roll their beds on the ground under the porch

roof. Wood, who said he was never a good sleeper, smoked his pipe.

And Jim Cleve spread blankets along the wall in the shadow and and

lay down. Joan could see his eyes shining toward the door. Of course

he was thinking of her. But could he see her eyes? Watching her

chance, she slipped a hand from behind the curtain, and she knew

Cleve saw it. What a comfort that was! Joan's heart swelled. All

might yet be well. Jim Cleve would be near her while she slept. She

could sleep now without those dark dreams--without dreading to

awaken to the light. Again she saw Kells pacing the room, silent,

bent, absorbed, hands behind his back, weighted with his burden. It

was impossible not to feel sorry for him. With all his intelligence

and cunning power, his cause was hopeless. Joan knew that as she

knew so many other things without understanding why. She had not yet

sounded Jesse Smith, but not a man of all the others was true to

Kells. They would be of his Border Legion, do his bidding, revel in

their ill-gotten gains, and then, when he needed them most, be false

to him.