The announcement brought with it a long and thoughtful
pause.
“I wisht I could send you on your way with somethin’
worthwhile,” said Hank Rainer at length.
“But I ain’t rich. I’ve lived
plain and worked hard, but I ain’t rich.
So what I can give you, Andy, won’t be much.”
Andrew protested that the hospitality had been more
than a generous gift, but Hank Rainer, looking straight
out the door, continued: “Well, I’m
goin’ down the road to get you my little gift,
Andy. Be back in an hour maybe.”
“I’d rather have you here to keep me from
being lonely,” said Andrew. “I’ve
money enough to buy what I want, but money will never
buy me the talk of an honest man, Hank.”
The other started. “Honest enough, maybe,”
he said bitterly. “But honesty don’t
get you bread or bacon, not in this world!”
And presently he stamped into the shed, saddled his
pony, and after a moment was scattering the pebbles
on the way down the ravine. The dark and silence
gathered over Andrew Lanning. He had little warmth
of feeling for Hank Rainer, to be sure, but the hush
of the cabin he looked forward to many a long evening
and many a long day in a silence like this, with no
man near him. For the man who rides outside the
law rides alone.
He could have embraced the big man, therefore, when
Hank finally came back, and Andrew could hear the
pony panting in the shed, a sure sign that it had
been ridden hard.
“It ain’t much,” said Hank, “but
it’s yours, and I hope you get a chance to use
it in a pinch.” And he dumped down a case
of .45 cartridges.
After all, there could have been no gift more to the
point, but it gave Andrew a little chill of distaste,
this reminder of the life that lay ahead of him.
And in spite of himself he could not break the silence
that began to settle over the cabin again. Finally
Hank announced that it was bedtime for him, and, preparing
himself by the simple expedient of kicking off his
boots and then drawing off his trousers, he slipped
into his blankets, twisted them tightly around his
broad shoulders with a single turn of his body, and
was instantly snoring. Andrew followed that example
more slowly. Not since he left Martindale, however,
had he slept soundly. Take a tame dog into the
wilderness and he learns to sleep like a wolf quickly
enough; and Andrew, with mind and nerve constantly
set for action like a cocked revolver, had learned
to sleep like a wild thing in turn. And accordingly,
when he wakened in the middle of the night, he was
alert on the instant. He had a singular feeling
that someone had been looking at him while he slept.
First of all, naturally, he looked at the door.
It was now a bright rectangle filled with moonlight
and quite empty. There must have been a sound,
and he glanced over to the trapper for an explanation.
But Hank Rainer lay twisted closely in his blankets.
