A month passed by and the haze above the Sink lifted its shroud and revealed the mountains beyond; the soft blues and pinks crept back into the distance and the shadowy canyons were filled with royal purple. At dawn a silver radiance rose and glowed along the east and the sunsets stained the west with orange and gold; there was wine in the cool air, and when the night wind came up the prospectors crouched over their fires. The first October storm put a crown on Telescope Peak and tipped the lesser Panamints with snow, but still Wilhelmina waited and Wunpost did not return from his mysterious trip “inside.”

The time was not ripe for his notable revenge and he had forgotten Jail Canyon and her. Yet at last she saw his dust, and as she watched him through her glasses something told her that his thoughts were not of her. He was on his way, either seeking after gold or searching out the means of revenge; and if he came that way it was to find his dog and mules and not to make love to her. Their ranch was merely his half-way house, a place to feed his 184animals and leave them when he went away; and she was only a child, to be noticed like a fond dog, but not to be taken seriously. Billy put up her glasses and went back to the house, and when he arrived she was a woman. Her hair was done up gracefully, her nimble limbs were confined in skirts; and she smiled at him demurely, as if her mind was far away and he had recalled her from maidenly dreams.

“Well, well!” exclaimed Wunpost as he limped up to the house and discovered her on the shady front porch; “where’s the trusty bib-overalls and all? What’s the matter–is it Sunday, or did you see my dust? Say, you don’t look right without them curls!”

“We’re thinking of moving away,” she explained quite truthfully, “and I can’t wear overalls then.”

“Moving away!” cried Wunpost; “why, where were you thinking of going to? Has your father given up on his road?”

“Well, no–or that is, he’s working on a trail to pack down the ore he had sacked. And after that’s shipped, if it pays him what it ought, we’re going to move inside.”

“Oh,” observed Wunpost and sat down on the porch, where he rumpled his hair reflectively. “Say,” he said at last, “I’ve got a little roll–what’s the matter if I build the road?”

“Shh!” she hissed, moving over and speaking low; “don’t you know that Mother wouldn’t hear to it? And poor Father, he feels awful bad.”

185“No, but look,” he protested, “you folks have been my friends, and I owe you for taking care of my mules. I’d be glad to advance the money to put in an aerial tramway and you could pay it back out of the ore. That’s the kind of road you want, one that will never wash out, and I know where you can get one cheap. There’s one down by Goler that you can buy for almost nothing–I stopped and looked it over, coming up. And all you have to do, after you once get it installed, is to feed your ore into the buckets and send them down the canyon and the empties will come up with your supplies. It’s automatic–works itself, and can’t get out of order–just a long, double cable, swinging down from point to point and supplying its own power by gravity. Some class to that, and I tell you what I’ll do–I’ll lend the money to you!”

“No!” she said as he reached down into his pocket, and she gazed at him reproachfully.

“What do you mean?” he asked after a minute of puzzled silence, and she shook her head and pointed towards the house. Then she rose up quietly and led off down the path where the hollyhocks were still in full bloom.

“You know what I mean,” she said at the gate; “have you forgotten about the cloudburst?”

“Why, no,” he returned; “you don’t mean to say-”

“Yes, I do,” she replied, “they think your money is accursed. Father says you didn’t come by it honestly.”

186“Oh, he does, eh?” sulked Wunpost; “and what do you think about it?”

“I think the same,” she answered promptly and looked him straight in the eye.

“Well, well,” he began with a sardonic smile, and then he thrust out his lip. “All right, kid,” he said, “excuse me for living, but I wouldn’t be that good if I could. It takes all the roar out of life. Now here I came back with some money in my pocket, to make you a little present, and the first thing you hand me is this: ‘My money ain’t come by honestly.’ Well, that’s the end of the present.”

He shrugged his shoulders and waited, but Billy made no reply.

“I went up into the hills,” he went on at last, “and discovered a vein of gold–nobody had ever owned it before. And I dug it out and showed the ore to Eells and asked him if he thought it was his. No, he said he couldn’t claim it. Well, I took it to Los Angeles and sold it to a jeweler and here’s the money he paid me for it–don’t you think that money is honest?”

He drew out a sheaf of bills and flicked the ends temptingly, but Billy shook her head.

“No,” she said, “because you don’t dare to show the place where you claim you dug up that gold–and you told Mr. Eells you stole it!”

“Heh, heh!” chuckled Wunpost, “you keep right up with me, kid. Don’t reckon I can give you any present. I was just thinking you might like to take a trip to Los Angeles, and see the bright lights and 187all–taking your mother along, and so forth–but it’s Jail Canyon for you, for life. If this thousand dollar bill that you earned by saving my life is nothing but tainted money, all I can do is to tender a vote of thanks. It must be fierce to have a Scotch conscience.”

“You mind your own business,” answered Billy shortly, and brushed away a furtive tear. A trip to Los Angeles–and new clothes and everything–and she really had earned the money! Yes, she had saved his life and enabled him to come back to dig up some more hidden gold. But it was stolen, and there was an end to it–she turned away abruptly, but he caught her by the hand.

“Say, listen, kid,” he said; “I may not be an angel, but I never go back on a friend. Now you tell me what you want and, no matter what it is, I’ll go out and get it for you–honestly. You’re the best friend I’ve got–and you sure look swell, dressed up in them women’s clothes–but I want you to have a good time. I want you to go inside and see the world, and go to the theaters and all, but how’m I going to slip you the money?”

Billy laughed, rather hysterically, and then she turned grave and her eyes looked far away.

“All I want,” she said at last, “is a road up Father’s canyon–and I know he won’t accept it from you. So let’s talk about something else. Are you going back to your mine?”

He sighed, then glanced up at the ridge and nodded his head mysteriously.

188“There’s somebody after me,” he said at last. “They follow me up now, every place. In town it’s detectives, and out here on the desert it’s Pisen-face Lynch and his gang. But I don’t mind them–I’m looking for that feller that shot me in the leg last month. It wasn’t Lynch–I’ve had him traced–and it wasn’t none of those Shooshonnies; but there’s some feller in these hills that’s out after my scalp and I’ve come back to get him. And when I find him, kid, I’ll light a fire under him that’ll burn ’im off the face of the earth. I’m going to kill him, by grab, the same as I would a rattlesnake; I’m going to-”

“Oh, please don’t talk that way!” broke in Wilhelmina impatiently, “it gives people a bad impression. There isn’t a man in Blackwater that isn’t firmly convinced that you’re nothing but a bag of hot air. Well, I don’t care–that’s just what they said!”

“Ahhr!” scoffed Wunpost, “them Blackwater stiffs. They’re jealous, that’s what’s the matter.”

“No, but don’t talk that way,” she pleaded. “It turns folks against you. Even Father and Mother have noticed it. You’re always telling of the big things you’re going to do-”

“Well, don’t I do’em?” he demanded. “What did I ever say I’d do that I didn’t make good, in the end? Don’t you think I’m going to get this bad hombre–this feller that’s following me through the hills? Well, I’ll tell you what I’ll do. If I don’t bring you his hair inside of a month–you 189 can have my mine and everything. But I’m going to git him, see? I’m going to toll him across the Valley, where he’ll have to come out into the open, and when I ketch him I’m going to scalp him. He’s nothing but a low-down, murdering assassin that old Eells or somebody has hired-”

“Oh, please!” she protested and his eyes opened big before they closed down in a sudden scowl.

“Well, I’ll show you,” he said and packed and rode off in silence.