The Flaming Jewel

A mile to the north, blocking the other exit from Drowned Valley, Mike Clinch, Harve Chase, Cornelius Blommers, and Dick Berry stood listening to the shooting.

"B'gosh," blurted out Chase, "it sounds like they was goin' through, Mike. B'gosh, it does!"

Clinch's little pale eyes blazed, but he said in his soft, agreeable voice: "Stay right here, boys. Like as not some of 'em will come this way."

The shooting below ceased. Clinch's nostrils expanded and flattened with every breath, as he stood glaring into the woods.

"Have," he said presently, "you an' Corny go down there an' kinda look around. And you signal if I'm wanted. G'wan, both o' you. Git!"

They started, running heavily, but their feet made little noise on the moss.

Berry came over and stood near Clinch. For ten minutes neither man moved. Clinch stared at the woods in front of him. The younger man's nervous glance flickered like a snake's tongue in every direction, and he kept moistening his lips with his tongue.

Presently two shots came from the south. A pause; a rattle of shots from hastily emptied magazines.

"G'wan down there, Dick!" said Clinch.

"You'll be alone, Mike----"

"Au right. You do like I say; git along quick!"

Berry walked southward a little way. He had turned very white under his tan.

"Gol ding ye!" shouted Clinch, "take it on a lope or I'll kick the pants off'n ye!"

Berry began to run, carrying his rifle at a trail.

For half an hour there was not a sound in the forests of Drowned Valley except in the dead timber where unseen woodpeckers hammered fitfully at the ghosts of ancient trees.

Always Clinch's little pale eyes searched the forest twilight in front of him; not a falling leaf escaped him; not a chipmunk.

And all the while Clinch talked to himself; his lips moved a little now and then, but uttered no sound: "All I want God should do," he repeated again and again, "is to just let Quintana come my way. 'Tain't for because he robbed my girlie. 'Tain't for the stuff he carries onto him. ... No, God, 'tain't them things. But it's what that there skunk done to my Evie. ... O God, be you listenin'? He hurt her, Quintana did. That's it. He misused her. ... God, if you had seen my girlie's little bleeding feet!---- That's the reason. ... 'Tain't the stuff. I can work. I can save for to make my Evie a lady same's them high-steppers on Fifth Avenoo. I can moil and toil and slave an' run hootch -- hootch---- They wuz wine 'n' fixin's into the Bible. It ain't you, God, it's them fanatics. ... Nobody in my Dump wanted I should sell 'em more'n a bottle o' beer before this here prohybishun set us all crazy. 'Tain't right. ... O God, don't hold a little hootch agin me when all I want of you is to let Quintana----"