The Border Legion

"Bill," called Kells to the man standing there with a grin on his

coarse red face, "you go back and help Halloway pack. Then take my

trail."

Bill nodded, and was walking away when Kells called after him: "And

say, Bill, don't say anything to Roberts. He's easily riled."

"Haw! Haw! Haw!" laughed Bill.

His harsh laughter somehow rang jarringly in Joan's ears. But she

was used to violent men who expressed mirth over mirthless jokes.

"Get up, Miss Randle," said Kells as he mounted. "We've a long ride.

You'll need all your strength. So I advise you to come quietly with

me and not try to get away. It won't be any use trying."

Joan climbed into her saddle and rode after him. Once she looked

back in hope of seeing Roberts, of waving a hand to him. She saw his

horse standing saddled, and she saw Bill struggling under a pack,

but there was no sign of Roberts. Then more cedars intervened and

the camp site was lost to view. When she glanced ahead her first

thought was to take in the points of Kells's horse. She had been

used to horses all her life. Kells rode a big rangy bay--a horse

that appeared to snort speed and endurance. Her pony could never run

away from that big brute. Still Joan had the temper to make an

attempt to escape, if a favorable way presented.

The morning was rosy, clear, cool; there was a sweet, dry tang in

the air; white-tailed deer bounded out of the open spaces; and the

gray-domed, glistening mountains, with their bold, black-fringed

slopes, overshadowed the close foot-hills.

Joan was a victim to swift vagaries of thought and conflicting

emotions. She was riding away with a freebooter, a road-agent, to be

held for ransom. The fact was scarcely credible. She could not shake

the dread of nameless peril. She tried not to recall Roberts's

words, yet they haunted her. If she had not been so handsome, he had

said! Joan knew she possessed good looks, but they had never caused

her any particular concern. That Kells had let that influence him--

as Roberts had imagined--was more than absurd. Kells had scarcely

looked at her. It was gold such men wanted. She wondered what her

ransom would be, where her uncle would get it, and if there really

was a likelihood of that rich strike. Then she remembered her

mother, who had died when she was a little girl, and a strange,

sweet sadness abided with her. It passed. She saw her uncle--that

great, robust, hearty, splendid old man, with his laugh and his

kindness, and his love for her, and his everlasting unquenchable

belief that soon he would make a rich gold-strike. What a roar and a

stampede he would raise at her loss! The village camp might be

divided on that score, she thought, because the few young women in

that little settlement hated her, and the young men would have more

peace without her. Suddenly her thought shifted to Jim Cleve, the

cause of her present misfortune. She had forgotten Jim. In the

interval somehow he had grown. Sweet to remember how he had fought

for her and kept it secret! After all, she had misjudged him. She

had hated him because she liked him. Maybe she did more! That gave

her a shock. She recalled his kisses and then flamed all over. If

she did not hate him she ought to. He had been so useless; he ran

after her so; he was the laughing-stock of the village; his actions

made her other admirers and friends believe she cared for him, was

playing fast-and-loose with him. Still, there was a difference now.

He had terribly transgressed. He had frightened her with threats of

dire ruin to himself. And because of that she had trailed him, to

fall herself upon a hazardous experience. Where was Jim Cleve now?

Like a flash then occurred to her the singular possibility. Jim had

ridden for the border with the avowed and desperate intention of

finding Kells and Gulden and the bad men of that trackless region.

He would do what he had sworn he would. And here she was, the cause

of it all, a captive of this notorious Kells! She was being led into

that wild border country. Somewhere out there Kells and Jim Cleve

would meet. Jim would find her in Kells's hands. Then there would be

hell, Joan thought. The possibility, the certainty, seemed to strike

deep into her, reviving that dread and terror. Yet she thrilled

again; a ripple that was not all cold coursed through her. Something

had a birth in her then, and the part of it she understood was that

she welcomed the adventure with a throbbing heart, yet looked with

awe and shame and distrust at this new, strange side of her nature.