The Border Legion

Then they started for the door.

Joan clung to Cleve on one side, and on the other, instinctively

with a frightened girl's action, she let go Kells's arm and slipped

her hand in his. He seemed startled. He bent to her ear, for the din

made ordinary talk indistinguishable. That involuntary hand in his

evidently had pleased and touched him, even hurt him, for his

whisper was husky.

"It's all right--you're perfectly safe."

First Joan made out a glare of smoky lamps, a huge place full of

smoke and men and sounds. Kells led the way slowly. He had his own

reason for observance. There was a stench that sickened Joan--a

blended odor of tobacco and rum and wet sawdust and smoking oil.

There was a noise that appeared almost deafening--the loud talk and

vacant laughter of drinking men, and a din of creaky fiddles and

scraping boots and boisterous mirth. This last and dominating sound

came from an adjoining room, which Joan could see through a wide

opening. There was dancing, but Joan could not see the dancers

because of the intervening crowd. Then her gaze came back to the

features nearer at hand. Men and youths were lined up to a long bar

nearly as high as her head. Then there were excited shouting groups

round gambling games. There were men in clusters, sitting on

upturned kegs, round a box for a table, and dirty bags of gold-dust

were in evidence. The gamblers at the cards were silent, in strange

contrast with the others; and in each group was at least one dark-

garbed, hard-eyed gambler who was not a miner. Joan saw boys not yet

of age, flushed and haggard, wild with the frenzy of winning and

cast down in defeat. There were jovial, grizzled, old prospectors to

whom this scene and company were pleasant reminders of bygone days.

There were desperados whose glittering eyes showed they had no gold

with which to gamble.

Joan suddenly felt Kells start and she believed she heard a low,

hissing exclamation. And she looked for the cause. Then she saw

familiar dark faces; they belonged to men of Kells's Legion. And

with his broad back to her there sat the giant Gulden. Already he

and his allies had gotten together in defiance of or indifference to

Kells's orders. Some of them were already under the influence of

drink, but, though they saw Kells, they gave no sign of recognition.

Gulden did not see Joan, and for that she was thankful. And whether

or not his presence caused it, the fact was that she suddenly felt

as much of a captive as she had in Cabin Gulch, and feared that here

escape would be harder because in a community like this Kells would

watch her closely.