“So Joan died?” he queried.
“Yep, and was buried under them two trees in
front of the house. I don’t think she lived
long after they was married, but about that nobody
knows. They was clear off by themselves and there
isn’t any one can tell about their life after
they was married. All we know is that Drew didn’t
get over her dyin’. He ain’t over
it yet, and goes out to the old place every month
or so to potter around the grave and keep the grass
and the weeds off of it and clean the head-stone.”
The candle guttered wildly on the floor. It had
burnt almost to the wood and now the remnant of the
wick stood in a little sprawling pool of grease white
at the outer edges.
Bard yawned, and patted idly the blanket where it
touched on the shape of the revolver beneath.
In another moment that candle would gutter out and
they would be left in darkness.
He said: “That’s the best yarn I’ve
heard in a good many days; it’s enough to make
any one sleepy—so here goes.”
And he turned deliberately on his side.
Nash, his eyes staring with incredulity, sat up slowly
among his blankets and his hand stole up toward the
noose of the lariat. A light snore reached him,
hardly a snore so much as the heavy intake of breath
of a very weary, sleeping man; yet the hand of Nash
froze on the lariat.
“By God,” he whispered faintly to himself,
“he ain’t asleep!”
And the candle flared wildly, leaped, and shook out.
THE SWIMMING OF THE SAVERACK
Over the face of Nash the darkness passed like a cold
hand and a colder sense of failure touched his heart;
but men who have ridden the range have one great power
surpassing all others—the power of patience.
As soundlessly as he had pushed himself up the moment
before, he now slipped down in the blankets and resigned
himself to sleep.
He knew that he would wake at the first hint of grey
light and trusted that after the long ride of the
day before his companion would still be fast asleep.
That half light would be enough for his work; but when
he roused while the room was still scarcely more visible
than if it were filled with a grey fog, he found Bard
already up and pulling on his boots.
“How’d you sleep?” he growled, following
the example of the tenderfoot.
“Not very well,” said the other cheerily.
“You see, that story of yours was so vivid in
my mind that I stayed awake about all night, I guess,
thinking it over.”
“I knew it,” murmured Nash to himself. “He was awake all the time. And
still-----”
If that thrown noose of the lariat had settled over
the head and shoulders of the sham sleeper it would
have made no difference whether he waked or slept—in
the end he would have sat before William Drew tied
hand and foot. If that noose had not settled?
The picture of the little piece of paper fluttering
to the floor came back with a strange vividness to
the mind of Nash, and he had to shrug his shoulders
to shake the thought away.
