"Ain't it lovely, Ora?" and 'Tana danced past Ora Harrison, the doctor's pretty daughter, as if her feet had wings to them. And as Ora's bright face smiled an answer, it was clear that the only two young girls in the settlement were enjoying Lyster's party to the full.
For it was a pronounced success. Every "boy" invited was there in as much of festive outfit as circumstances would allow. All the "family" people were there. And the presence of Doctor Harrison--the only "professional" man in the town--and his wife and daughter gave a stamp of select society to the gathering in Mrs. Huzzard's rooms.
Mrs. Huzzard beamed with pleasure at the great success of it all. She would have liked to dance, too, and refused most unwillingly when Lyster tried to persuade her. But a supercilious glance from the captain made her refusal decided. The doubt as to whether ladies in "sussiety" ever did dance after forty years, and one hundred and sixty-three pounds weight, deterred her. Now, if the captain had asked her to dance, she would have been more assured.
But the captain did not; and, after a while, he was not to be seen. He had vanished into the little back sitting room, and she was confident he was engaged in his innocent pastime of a friendly game of cards with the doctor.
"Go and dance with 'Tana, or that nice little girl of the doctor's," she said to Lyster, when he was trying to inveigle her into a quadrille--"that's the sort of partner for you."
"But 'Tana has disappeared mysteriously; and as Miss Ora is 'bespoke,' I can't dance with her unless I want a duel with her partner."
"'Tana disappeared! Well, now, I haven't seen her for two dances," said Mrs. Huzzard, looking around searchingly, "though I never missed her till this minute."
"Beg pardon, ma'am," said a voice at her elbow; "but is it the--the young lady with the white dress you are looking for?"
"Yes, it is," answered Mrs. Huzzard, and turned around to face the speaker, who was an apologetic-looking stranger with drab-colored chin whiskers, and a checkered shirt, and a slight impediment in his speech.
"Well, ma'am, I saw her go into that room there quite a spell ago," and he nodded toward the back sitting room. "She hasn't passed out again, as I've seen."
Then, as Mrs. Huzzard smiled on him in a friendly way, he ventured further:
"She's a very pretty girl, as any one can see. Might I ask her name?"
"Oh, yes! Her name is Rivers--Miss Tana Rivers," said Mrs. Huzzard. "You must be a stranger in the settlement?"
"Yes, ma'am, I am. My name is Harris--Jim Harris. I come down from the diggings with Mr. Overton this morning. He allowed it would be all right for me to step inside, if I wanted to see the dancing."
"To be sure it is," agreed Mrs. Huzzard, heartily. "His friends are our friends, and civil folks are always right welcome."
"Thank, you, ma'am; you're kind, I'm sure. But we ain't just friends, especial. Only I had business in his line, so we picked up acquaintance and come into camp together; and when I saw the pretty girl in white, I did think I'd like to come in a spell. She looks so uncommon like a boy I knew up in the 'big bend' country. Looks enough like him to be a twin; but he wasn't called Rivers. Has--has this young lady any brothers or cousins up there?"
"Well, now, as for cousins, they are far out, and we hain't ever talked about them; but as for brothers or sisters, father or mother, that she hasn't got, for she told me so. Her pa and Mr. Dan Overton they was partners once; and when the pa died he just left his child to the partner's care; and he couldn't have left her to a squarer man."
"That's what report says of him," conceded the stranger, watching her with guarded attention. "Then Mr. Overton's partner hasn't been dead long?"
"Oh, no--not very long; not long enough for the child to get used to talking of it to strangers, I guess; so we don't ask her many questions about it. But it troubles her yet, I know."
"Of course--of course; such a pretty little girl, too."
Then the two fell into quite a pleasant chat, and it was not until he moved away from beside her, to make room for the doctor's wife, that Mrs. Huzzard observed that one arm hung limply beside him, and that one leg dragged a little as he walked. He was a man who bore paralysis with him.
She thought, while he was talking to her, that he looked like a man who had seen trouble. A weary, drawn look was about his eyes. She had seen dissipated men who looked like that; yet this stranger seemed in no ways a man of that sort. He was so quiet and polite; and when she saw the almost useless limbs, she thought she knew then what that look in his face meant.
But there were too many people about for her to study one very particularly, so she lost sight of the stranger, Harris, and did not observe that he had moved near the door of the sitting room, or that the door was open.
But it was; and just inside of it Lyster stood watching, with a certain vexation, a game of cards played there. The doctor had withdrawn, and was looking with amusement at the two players--'Tana and Captain Leek. The captain was getting the worst of it. His scattered whiskers fairly bristled with perplexity and irritation. Several times he displayed bad judgment in drawing and discarding, because of his nervous annoyance, while she seemed surprisingly skillful or lucky, and was not at all disturbed by her opponent's moods. She looked smilingly straight into his eyes, and when she exhibited the last winning hand, and the captain dashed his hand angrily into the pack, she waited for one civil second and then swept the stakes toward her.
"What! Don't you want to play any more, captain?" she asked, maliciously. "I would really like to have another dance, yet if you want revenge--"
"Go and dance by all means," he said, testily. "When I want another game of poker, I'll let you know, but I must say I do not approve of such pastime for young ladies."
"None of us would, if in your place, captain," laughed the doctor. "And, for my part, I am glad I did not play against her luck."
The captain mumbled something about a difference between luck and skill, while 'Tana swept the money off the table and laughed--not a pleasant laugh, either.
"One--two--three--four!--twenty dollars--that is about a dollar a minute, isn't it?" she asked provokingly. "Well, captain, I guess we are square up to to-night, and if you want to open another account, I'm ready."
She spoke with the dash and recklessness of a boy. Lyster noticed it again, and resented it silently. But when she turned, she read the displeasure in his eyes.
"Oh, it's you, is it?" she inquired airily. "Is it time for our dance? You see, the captain wanted some amusement, and, as the doctor was nearly asleep over the cards, I came in and helped them out."
"Beautifully," agreed the doctor.
But Lyster borrowed no cheeriness from their smiles.
"I think it is our dance," Lyster observed. "And if you will come--"
"Certain," she said, with a nod; but at the door she paused. "Won't you keep this money for me?" she asked. "I've no pocket. And just put a five in a locked pocket 'for keeps,' please; I owe it to you."
"To me? You won that five."
"No, I didn't; I cheated you," she whispered. "Keep it, please do."
She pushed the money into his hand. One piece of it fell and rolled to the feet of the stranger, who leaned carelessly against the doorway, but in such a position that he could easily see into the sitting room.
He stooped and picked up the money.
"Yours, miss?" he said, courteously, and she smilingly reached out her hand for it--the hand on which Overton's gift, the strange ring, glittered.
The paralytic stranger barely repressed an exclamation as he noticed it, and from it his eyes went swiftly, questioningly, to the girl's face.
"Yes, it's mine," she said, with a nod of thanks. Then she smiled a little as she saw where his attention was given. "Are you wondering if the snakes you see are the result of odd drinks? Well, they are not; they are of metal and won't hurt you."
"Beg pardon, miss. Guess I did look at your pretty ring sharp; and it is enough to make a man shake if he's been drinking. But a little drink will do me a long time."
Then Lyster and the girl passed on, the girl smiling at the little exchange of words with the stranger. But Lyster himself was anything but well pleased at the entire affair. He resented the fact that he had found her there gambling, that she had shown such skill, that she had turned to the seedy-looking stranger and exchanged words, as men might do, but as a girl assuredly should not do. All these things disturbed him. Why, he could scarcely have told. Only that morning she had been but a little half-savage child, who amused him by her varying moods and sharp speech. But to-night, in her graceful white gown, she seemed to have grown taller and more womanly and winsome. The glances and homage of the most acceptable youths about revealed to him the fact that she was somewhat more than the strong swimmer or clever canoeist. She was deemed charming by others, in a very different fashion than he had thought of her, and she appeared rather too conscious of the fact. He fancied that she even delighted in letting him see that others showed deference to her, when he had only that day teased her as carelessly as he would have teased a boy into a rage.
Then to stop and jest like that with the insignificant stranger by the door! Mr. Lyster said a bad word in his mind, and decided that the presuming masculinity of the settlement would be allowed few chances for favors the remainder of the evening. He intended to guard her himself--a formidable guard for the purpose, as a man would need a good deal of self-reliance to try for favor if so handsome a personality as Lyster's was an opponent.
But the rather shabby stranger, standing by the inner door, scarcely noticed the noticeable young fellow. All his attention was given to the girl who had spoken to him so frankly. She passed on and did not observe his excessive interest. But his eyes lighted up when he heard her voice speaking to him, and his face flushed with color as he stroked his beard with his well hand and gazed after her.
"So this is where the trail begins, is it?" he whispered to the trembling hand at his lips. "Well, I would have looked for it many another place before commencing with a partner of Mr. Dan Overton--law-and-order man. He must have gulled this whole territory beautifully to have them swear by him as they do. And 'Monte' is his protegee! Well, Miss--or Mr. Monte--whichever it is--your girl's toggery is more becoming than the outfit I saw you wear last; but though your hair is a little darker, I'd swear to you anywhere--yes, and to the ring, too. Well, I think I'll rest my weary body in this 'burgh' for a few weeks to come. If the devil hasn't helped his own, and cheated me, this partner--Mr. 'Rivers'--is yet alive and in the flesh. If so, there is one place he will drift sooner or later, and that is to this young gambler. And then--then death will be no sham for him, for I will be here, too."
To 'Tana--jubilant with her victory over her instinctive antagonist, the captain--all the evening was made for her pleasure, and she floated in the paradise of sixteen years; and the world where people danced was the only world worth knowing.
"I will be good now--I can be as good as an angel since I've got even with the captain."
She whispered those words to Lyster, whose hand was clasping hers, whose arm was about her waist, as they, drifted around the rather small circle, to a waltz played on a concertina and a banjo.
She looked up at him, mutely asking him to believe her. Her desire for revenge satisfied, she could be a very good girl now.
It was just then that Overton, who stood outside the window, glanced in and saw her lovely upturned face--saw the red lips move in some pouting protest, to which Lyster smiled but looked doubtfully down at her. To the man watching them from without, the two seemed always so close--so confidential. At times he even wondered if Lyster had not learned more than himself of her life before that day at Akkomi's camp.
All that evening Dan had not once entered the room where they danced, or added in any way to their merry-making. He had stood outside the door most of the time, or sometimes rested a little way from it on a store box, where he smoked placidly, and inspected the people who gathered to the dance.
All the invited guests came early, and perfect harmony reigned within. A few of the unsavory order of citizens had sauntered by, as though taking note of the pleasures from which they were excluded. But it was not until almost twelve o'clock--just after Overton had turned away from watching the waltz--that a pistol shot rang out in the street, and several dancers halted.
Some of the men silently moved to the door, but just then the door was opened by Overton, who looked in.
"It was only my gun went off by accident," he said, carelessly. "So don't let me stampede the party. Go on with your music."
The stranger, Harris, was nearest the door, and essayed to pass out, but Overton touched him on the arm.
"Not just yet," he said hurriedly. "Don't come out or others will follow, and there'll be trouble. Keep them in some way."
Then the door closed. The concertina sobbed and shrieked out its notes, and drowned a murmur of voices on the outside. One man lay senseless close to the doorstep, and four more men with two women stood a little apart from him.
"If another shot is fired, your houses will be torn down over your heads to-morrow," said Overton, threateningly; "and some of you will not be needing an earthly habitation by that time, either."
"Fury! It is Overton!" muttered one of the men to another. "They told us he wasn't in this thing."
"What for you care?" demanded the angry tones of a Dutch woman. "What difference that make--eh? If so be as we want to dance--well, then, we go in and dance--you make no mistake."
But the men were not so aggressive. The most audacious was the senseless one, who had fired the revolver and whom Overton had promptly and quietly knocked down.
"I don't think you men want any trouble of this sort," he remarked, and ignored the women entirely. "If you've been told that I'm not in this, that's just where some one told you a lie; and if it's a woman, you should know better than to follow her lead. If these women get through that door, it will be when I'm an angel. I'm doing you all a good turn by not letting the boys in there know about this. No religion could save you, if I turned them loose on you; so you had better get away quiet, and quick."
The men seemed to appreciate his words.
"That's so," mumbled one.
And as the other woman attempted a protest, one of the men put his hand over her mouth, and, picking her up bodily, walked down the street with her, she all the time kicking and making remarks of a vigorous nature.
The humor of the situation appealed to the delicate senses of her companions, until they laughed right heartily, and the entire tone of the scene was changed from a threat of battle to an excuse for jollity. The man on the ground reeled upward to his feet with the help of a shake from Overton.
"Where's my gun?" he asked, sulkily.
Blood trickling from a cut brow compelled him to keep one eye shut.
"Overton has it," explained one of his friends. "Come on, and don't try another racket."
"I want my gun--it was him hit me," growled the wounded one, whose spirits had not been enlivened by the spectacle the rest had witnessed.
"You are right--it was him," agreed the other, darkly; "and if it hadn't been for breaking up the dance, I guess he'd a-killed you. Come on. You left a ball in his arm by the looks of things, and all he did was to knock you still. He may want to do more to-morrow. But as you have no gun, you'd better wait till then."
The door had been opened, and the light streamed out. Men talked in a friendly, jovial fashion on and about the doorstep. They saw the forms moving away in the shadows, but no sign of disturbance met them.
Overton stood looking in the window at the dancers. The waltz was not yet finished, and 'Tana and Lyster drifted past within a few feet of him. The serenity of their evening had not been disturbed. Her face held all of joyous content--so it seemed to the watcher. She laughed as she danced; and hearing the music of her high, girlish tones, he forgot for a time the stinging little pain in his arm, until his left hand, thrust into his coat pocket, slowly filled with blood. Then Dan turned to the man nearest him.
"If Doctor Harrison is still in there, would you do me the favor of asking him to come outside for a few minutes?" he asked, and the man addressed stepped closer.
"There is a back way into the house. Hadn't you better just step in that way, and have him fix you up? He's in the back room, alone, smoking."
Overton turned with an impatient exclamation, and a sharp, questioning look. It was the half-paralyzed stranger--Harris.
"Oh, I ain't interfering!" he said, amiably. "But as I slipped out through the back door before your visitors left, I dropped to the fact that you had some damage done to that left arm. Yes, I'll carry any message you like to your doctor, for I like your nerve. But I must say it's thankless work to stand up as a silent target for cold lead, just so some one else may dance undisturbed. Take an old man's advice, sonny, do some of the dancing yourself."
