The Border Legion

Joan felt herself weakening. Kells was so powerful in spirit and

passion that she seemed unable to fight him. She strove to withhold

her reply, but it burst forth, involuntarily.

"Yes--often."

That roused more than anger and passion. Jealousy flamed from him

and it transformed him into a devil.

"You held hands out of that window--and kissed--in the dark?" he

cried, with working lips.

Joan had thought of this so fearfully and intensely--she had battled

so to fortify herself to keep it secret--that he had divined it, had

read her mind. She could not control herself. The murder of Pearce

had almost overwhelmed her. She had not the strength to bite her

tongue. Suggestion alone would have drawn her then--and Kells's

passionate force was hypnotic.

"Yes," she whispered.

He appeared to control a developing paroxysm of rage.

"That settles you," he declared darkly. "But I'll do one more decent

thing by you. I'll marry you." Then he wheeled to his men. "Blicky,

there's a parson down in camp. Go on the run. Fetch him back if you

have to push him with a gun."

Blicky darted through the door and his footsteps thudded out of

hearing.

"You can't force me to marry you," said Joan. "I--I won't open my

lips."

"That's your affair. I've no mind to coax you," he replied,

bitterly. "But if you don't I'll try Gulden's way with a woman. ...

You remember. Gulden's way! A cave and a rope!"

Joan's legs gave out under her and she sank upon a pile of blankets.

Then beyond Kells she saw Jim Cleve. With all that was left of her

spirit she flashed him a warning--a meaning--a prayer not to do the

deed she divined was his deadly intent. He caught it and obeyed. And

he flashed back a glance which meant that, desperate as her case

was, it could never be what Kells threatened.

"Men, see me through this," said Kells to the silent group. "Then

any deal you want--I'm on. Stay here or--sack the camp! Hold up the

stage express with gold for Bannack! Anything for a big stake! Then

the trail and the border."

He began pacing the floor. Budd and Smith strolled outside. Bate

Wood fumbled in his pockets for pipe and tobacco. Cleve sat down at

the table and leaned on his hands. No one took notice of the dead

Pearce. Here was somber and terrible sign of the wildness of the

border clan--that Kells could send out for a parson to marry him to

a woman he hopelessly loved, there in the presence of murder and

death, with Pearce's distorted face upturned in stark and ghastly

significance.