TWISTED TRAILS ifornia >nal TWISTED TRAILS HENRY OYEN BT HENRY OYEN AUTHOR OF "THE PLUNDERER," "BIG ,FLAT," "GASTON OLAF," ETC. NEW YORK GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY COPYRIGHT, 1921, BY GEOEGE H. DORAN COMPANY; COPYRIGHT, 1920, 1921, BY THE CURTIS PUBLISHING COMPANY PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA TWISTED TRAILS 2137553 ' TWISTED TRAILS CHAPTER I OOK, m'sieu! Them is a girl* 1 "Where?" "On the point look!" Stephen Warren leisurely raised his head from the bottom of the becalmed pirogue and peered beneath the boom of the red sail in the direction which the excited guide indicated. A lazy, sun-drenched day in November was drawing to a close over the southern Louisiana swamp. High above in the heavens a long-legged crane wag moving majestically toward the west where the sunset was painting the horizon with flaming colors. On the bayou the wild hyacinths and water lilies were closing their petals against the coming of night; and in the eve- ning calm the lifeless sail of the pirogue was reflected like a splotch of blood upon the sun-gilded waters. Ambrose LaFonte, the red-shirted Barataria guide, was staring at a girl who, half-hidden in the rushes and deepening shadows, was watching them from a point where the two bayous forked. "We are lost, m'sieu," said he, "and the night conies on. We must ask that girl yonder where we are." 7 8 TWISTED TRAILS Warren nodded lazily . He was experiencing that state of pleasant mental haziness which comes from being drugged with the enervating rays of Southern sun; for though it was November the springlike air of the swamps was of a sort to cause a young man on a vacation to doze and dream indolently. "Suit yourself, Ambrose," he muttered comfortably. "We can't be badly lost in a country where Cajun girls are running round." Ambrose swung his paddle and drove the pirogue over the mirrorlike water toward the point. "M'sieu I" he whispered suddenly. "That is no Ca^un girl." "Cajun or not, it's all the same to a Yankee like me." "It is a grand lady, m'sieu." Lazily Warren pulled back the sail to get a better view. He sat up. The nose of the pirogue had slid into the thick lily bank guarding the point, and Stephen saw that Ambrose was right. Although the girl was in conceal- ment from the rushes and the shadows of a blue-gum tree, it was obvious that the face which peered out from the reeds, and the sun helmet, the middy-blouse and skirt of white flannel, and the great black and yellow boar hound which she held by the collar, were not those of a native of the bayous. The dog growled. "Herod!" said the girl sharply, and at the sound of her voice Stephen suddenly became conscious that a week in the swamps does not make for a prepossessing appear- ance. He wished lazily that he had shaved. TWISTED TRAILS 9 "I beg your pardon for frightening the dog," said he, "but I assure you we are quite harmless, appearances to the contrary notwithstanding. You see, we are lost. There's really nothing wrong with us outside of that. The red shirt which makes Ambrose here look like a pirate indicates vanity, not viciousness. This," he rue- fully rubbed the growth of beard on his jaw?:, "represents nothing worse than sheer laziness. I don't blame the dog but we are lost, that's all." The faintest of chuckles came floating out from the shadows. "It doesn't seem to worry you much," said the girl. "Ambrose does the worrying. You see he's the guide ; it hurts his prestige to admit that he's lost." "Where do you wish to go?" Warren wrinkled his sunburned brows in an apparent effort at deep thought, and presently looked up with the swiftly breaking smile of one who has solved a weighty problem. "I don't know," said he. "What?" "Strange but true. I know we're lost, because Ambrose says so; but what we're lost from or where we're going I don't know." "You must be badly lost indeed if you don't know where you are going," she retorted. "On the contrary, how can one be lost if one isn't going any place in particular?" "Isn't a person lost who is just drifting about without any destination?" 10 TWISTED TRAILS "I suppose so." Warren looked about. "Well, where would that bayou lead us?" he asked, pointing to the bayou which came down from the north. "That? Oh, that's Lily Bayou," she replied. The shadows from the gum tree had deepened now and she was barely visible. "That would take you out of the swamps into the Cajun country." "Evangeline's country ?" he asked eagerly. "Yes, but you won't find much of Evangeline about it now, I fear. Lily Bayou would take you back to civiliza- tion" even in the half dusk he could see the gleam of her teeth as she flashed a smile at his beard "and all its re- sponsibilities. If you paddle it for a day you will come to Lily City, and to the great Hartland sawmills, and such things. But it's a hard bayou to paddle, upstream and full of lily drift, as you see." "And the other bayou?" he inquired, pointing to the stream that ran eastward. "Where will that take us?" "Oh, that's an easy bayou to travel ; with the current, as you see. That will take you into the heart of Deep Swamp, and to the great Black Woods where no one goes, into what is almost forest primeval." " 'This is the forest primeval,' " quoted Stephen, look- ing down the brown current. "And a fellow has only to put the pirogue in and let her drift, and be happy. And the other way it[s upstream, to houses, people, towns, Hartland's sawmill and," he rubbed his beard thought- fully, "the responsibilities of civilization. What shall I do? Shall I drift and be happy? Or shall I paddle up- stream, back to civilization, and be useful, maybe?" TWISTED TRAILS 11 "Don't you know which you wish to do ?" "In the face of this pleasant sunshine, I confess I do not." "Do you dread the struggle upstream?" "This climate isn't conducive to a desire for struggling, is it?" "Then, don't you want to be useful?" she laughed. "Does any one in such sunshine?" She laughed again and drew farther back into the shadows, pulling the dog with her. "Estella!" called a man's voice from round the bend. "Coming!" she replied. "Choose for me!" said Warren, rising to his knees in the cranky craft. "Suppose I should choose the wrong way ! Can you accept the responsibility ?" "I deny the responsibility," was her instant response. "Don't you want to be useful?" he demanded. "Does any one in such sunshine?" she retorted, and laughing, she disappeared round the point. Stephen rose and stepped out of the boat onto the knees of an old cypress stump. From this elevation he could, by rising to tiptoes and craning his neck, look over the rushes and see the girl as she stepped aboard a racy little motor boat which had been waiting for her. An old man, dignified and aristocratic of bearing, with snow- white hair and Vandyke beard, was seated in one of the cane chairs in the aft, and a tall young man, the image of what ^he older one must have been thirty years before, was waiting to help the girl in. "What did Herod bark at?" he asked. 12 TWISTED TRAILS "Oh, just a couple of hunters in a pirogue/' Stephen heard her reply. As she stepped nimbly over the side the young man was behind her for a moment, and in that moment Stephen Warren saw that which left him sick and cold with shock and anger. The young man bent low over the girl's neck. His hands were poised above her like claws, his under jaw protruding, his whole attitude that of a beast of prey about to strike. As if warned by some subtle instinct the girl turned swiftly round, but more swiftly than her movement the man had effaced the mark of the beast upon himself, and was again the smiling courtier. The older man solicitously slipped a cloak about her shoulders and she seated herself beside him while the young man stepped forward to the engine. The boat glided away with the purring of a powerful motor, and in a moment had swept smoothly round a bend, and there was left only the diminishing roar of its engine to tell of its existence. Presently, for the boat was a flyer, that was gone too ; and upon the waters the tristness and silence of eventide came wholly into their own. "And what shall we do now, m'sieu?" muttered Am- brose. "Camp for the night," came the quick command. "And in the morning?" "That way," Warren pointed to the brown waters of the bayou which ran eastward. "Into the swamp and the wilderness where no one goes." CHAPTER H "1VJ"ORNING came like the lifting of a million gossamer r -* veils from the face of the bayou country. At the call of the sun's first rays the night vanished into the heavens, and upon its dark heels rose the shreds of its pall, the vapor mists, by night dank layers of fog, now dainty filaments of emerald and amethyst rising upward at the beck of the dawn. Stephen Warren, Steppy as he was more generally known among lumbermen looked about him and found the world good to be in. He had in his pocket a letter from Mr. Hartland, of the Hartland Lumber Company, offering him the position of superintendent of the Lily City mill, but he was in no hurry to see Mr. Hartland. He had deposited with a banker in New Orleans drafts for a good lump sum representing the proceeds of his logging ventures in the North, and for a week he had drifted about in the sun-warmed swamps in company with the red-shirted Ambrose LaFonte, lazily falling in love with the lovable, lazy country, but nevertheless keeping an eye open for a good piece of timber. He looked at present like a prosperous, contented tramp, but it was obvious that a shave would have revealed a firm and busi- nesslike jaw. ** "Into the wilderness where no one goes !" he laughed as they thrust the pirogue into the bayou which ran into 13 14 TWISTED TRAILS Deep Swamp. "Ambrose, why do men bother about fight- ing each other to make money? Why don't they just drift round in the sun and live?" "Me I do," said LaFontc, as he steered the little craft into the swamp. "Wise man, Ambrose !" "But this I do not like this drifting to the Black Woods," said the guide with a nervous look round. In Deep Swamp the darkness of night still held sway. The gentle morning sun which had dispersed the darkness overhead had as yet been unable to penetrate the swamp's roof of moss-draped cypress branches and reach the water beneath. The tops of the gaunt trees were purple in the sunlight, but the festoons of gray moss, hanging low from the lower branches, were as yet in darkness, and through their arches and loops the morning mists were oozing upward in uncannily writhing wisps and streamers. "You don't like it, Ambrose?" "This? Yes, this is all right. But not where we are going Black Woods. There are bad stories about that, m'sieu. That is why no one goes there." "Fine!" laughed Warren. "Tell me the stories, Am- brose." "Not me, m'sieu !" "All right. Want to turn back?" "No, m'sieu." "All right. Paddle on." It was near evening when they reached their destination, and upon the broad lakelike stretch of open water between cypress jungle and the high ground of the pine, lay the TWISTED TRAILS 15 long cool shadows of sunset, scarcely disturbed by the infinitesimal drift of the placid current. Between the shadows the sun was rosy upon the water, tinting the masses of purple wild hyacinths, the tiny white water lilies and green lily-masses in their patient, incessant drift toward the sea. Warren halted the canoe at the edge of the cypress swamp and trained his glasses upon the high ground be- yond the open water. The timbered land lay like a great island, an oasis of solid ground rising up in the heart of the submerged swamp. Round its shore stretched a lily bank and a belt of rushes so dense and uniform that it seemed as if no craft ever had, or could push through it to the shore. Beyond, on higher ground, the lordly long- leaf pines reared their crowned heads royally, serried rank after rank of them as far as the eye could reach, a veri- table sea of green tree crowns, their size and density domi- nating the scene as a mountain dominates the foothills at its base. "That comes about as near being the forest primeval as I've ever seen," mused Warren with the glasses to his eyes. "It's beautiful and there's a fortune in it. Why isn't it being logged, Ambrose? Who owns it?" "Who owns it ?" repeated Ambrose in the shocked whis- per of one who had heard sacrilege uttered. "Who knows? The devil perhaps." "Yes?" said Warren. "Then the old boy has got a nice little fortune waiting to be saw-logged." "As for cutting it you could get men to log hell, m'sieu, as soon as log the Black Woods." 16 TWISTED TRAILS "As bad as that, eh? All right, Ambrose, what say if you raise your sail?" Ambrose reluctantly thrust the craft out upon the open water and stepped his mast and ran up the red lateen sail. A light breeze was blowing out of the swamp upon the lake and the little sailing pirogue lifted its bow from the water at the pull of the canvas and with its red sail re- flecting upon the water, went dancing out over the sun- tinted lake toward the dark woods. Warren sat in the stern with the tiller under his left arm and his glasses to his eyes. He could see but little. The darkness within the woods was apparently like the gloom of night in which no spear of sunlight was to be seen. Stephen had the impression that he was looking into the mouth of a sepulchral cavern rather than into a forest. From the forest exuded a silence that was de- pressing. As they approached it the lapping wavelets be- neath the bow of the gliding pirogue seemed to grow hushed ; a zone of chilly air seemed to ooze out from the gloom, and in the bow by the mast Ambrose shivered dis- tressingly. And then the silence was rent by the curt note of a rifle in the pines. One shot. Then all was silent again. The evening breeze played upon the sun-tinted waters and upon the smiling, unruffled face of nature with no hint that anything of significance had occurred ; but War- ren and Ambrose knew better. In the red lateen sail, a foot or so above where LaFonte's head had been, there appeared a tiny and eloquently sinister round hole. Warren held to the tiller as if nothing had happened, TWISTED TRAILS 17 but his thick dark brows were in a thundercloud, and his face was hard, as he peered beneath the boom toward the pines whence the bullet had come. Not a word was spoken for several seconds. Ambrose, hearing the whistle of the lead after it had passed, had dropped like one stricken to the bottom of the pirogue. There he lay, open-mouthed, his face greenish white beneath the clay-colored skin, staring now at Stephen, now at the hole in the sail. He put his hand to an ear. "M'sieu!" he gasped. Stephen gave him only a quick glance 1 . "You re not hit only ripped your ear on the nail in the rnast." The tiller in his hand did not move. Low-crouched to peer beneath the sail, he stared straight ahead, and from his tightened lips came half -whispered the inevitable American term for the concealed bushwhacker. The course of the pirogue had been set straight for the pines, and the shot had merely stiffened Warren at the tiller. The wind had not altered or* shifted at all to adjust itself to the situation. Steadily it held taut this red sail ; stead- ily the pirogue tore on toward the pines. "Ah Dieu!" The return of speech to Ambrose's lips came with a note of prayer. As if in response the rifle in the black woods spat again and a second hole appeared in the sail within a hand's breadth of the first. Even now, though they were within a hundred and fifty yards of the high ground, there was no one in sight. There was no sign of smoke or of a rifle barrel. The marksman apparently was far inside the forest line and well hidden in the shad- 18 TWISTED TRAILS ows and brush of the woods. It was as if the dark, for- bidding forest itself in deadly fashion was warning them to keep off. "Steer off, steer off!" Ambrose hurled himself upon the tiller, throwing the rudder hard to port. The pirogue veered and canted, shuddering as it came round, and flew away on a port tack, broadside to the pines, its starboard canted high above the water. A third shot came from the woods, the bullet whipping through the thin bows of the craft close to the water line. Ambrose rose up in terror, his empty hands held aloft in supplication toward the pines. "We go ! We go !" he bawled Stephen kicked him suddenly behind the knees and he tumbled in the bottom of the boat; and as the little pirogue, trembling from pull of sail and rudder, fled like a frightened bird from the danger spot, Warren glow- ered back over the stern, and at the top of his lungs repeated his rough respects to the bushwhacker. "M'sieu!" pleaded Ambrose, "you are not thinking of going back?" "Not now." "Merci, m'sieu, merci! Steer straight away. Ah, my pirogue is gone. See the holes!" Warren debated for a moment. "Where's the first place to find out who owns these woods ?" he demanded. "M'sieu, I am not of this parish; I do not know." "All right. We'll go to Hartland's mill at Lily City. They will know there." TWISTED TRAILS 19 "That girl said no one goes to Black Woods," said Ambrose ruefully, "but the devil is " "Wake up!" said Warren, pointing to the bullet holes in sail and hull. "Those holes were made by bullets from a rifle about .30 caliber, fired by a regular human man who is a first-class shot." "We do not know we saw no one." "But we do see the holes," said Stephen grimly. "Am- brose, it's the same game all over, here as elsewhere. Fight! Play the tiger! Grab and hold. I'm going back there some day. I want to talk with the fellow who fired those shots. Just now we'll travel along to Lily City and get your ear fixed up and learn who owns that timber." CHAPTER HI T ILY CITY was old, as Cajun villages are inclined to *-^ be, but its age was like the age of one of the magnolia trees or rambler rosebushes which adorned it and which, with the passing of years, steadily acquire new facets of charm to conceal or nullify any hint of decrepitude. It lay in a crescent along a single shell-paved street curving gently along the lily-banked shores of a bay in the bayou, a tiny place, mellowing placidly beneath the spreading branches of vast and ancient live oak and magnolia trees ; and it was as contented as it was proud. The cause for pride was not obvious at first glance. There were, as a first impression, two squares of low rambling stores, each with its wooden awning stretching over the stone sidewalk and each apparently striving to excel its neighbor in maintaining the leisurely atmosphere which prevailed. Along the water front lay a careless clutter of docks and boat-houses, and from this point of view the town seemed to consist mainly of tiny frame houses conspicuously covered with the omnipresent white- wash. But this unfavorable first impression was because most of Lily City was so hidden beneath its spreading arbor, with only the gray church steeple piercing and sur- mounting the dense branches, that but little of it was visible at first glance. Back from the street, mellowed 20 TWISTED TRAILS 21 by many unchanging decades in their parklike grounds, stood mansions of a cool, white-pillared dignity calculated to make architect or artist or mere lover of beauty pause and stare with delight the seignioral homes of the old Cajun aristocrats of the district. The single oppressively modern touch here was to be found in the big Hartland sawmill with the yellow-painted company town round it on the east side of the bayou, across the bay. But this was a physical phenomenon. Lily City had accepted it and such other modern touches as a brick railway station, and a trig white building on its bayou front bearing the legend: Hartland Lumber Company, without permitting them to disturb or affect in any way its spirit of permanent contentment and leisure. Normally it dozed genially in its white sunshine or deep shade, the mingled odors of lily growth and magnolias diffused over it like a faint, pleasant drug, subduing even the businesslike "whan-ng-ng !" of Hartland's saws across the bayou to a pleasantly droning hum. As the spirit of the place, so the spirit of its people. At times one might hear turbaned old negro servants on the water front bar- gaining with the fishermen in Cajun French for lack of practice in a strange tongue called English. On the afternoon that Stephen Warren and Ambrose LaFonte came paddling their patched pirogue up the bay toward the water front, however, Lily City was not a-doze. An air of unnatural alertness and tension pre- vailed among the group of Cajun citizens who were gath- ered upon the wharf to greet the newcomers. Normally such a group would have lounged at ease and would have 22 TWISTED TRAILS greeted the boat's occupants, neighbors or strangers as they might be, with a genial smile and wave of the hand. This group on this day did not lounge. Nor did it greet the approaching pirogue at all. It bunched closely together behind two men who stood well to the forefront. One of these men, sallow, hawk-nosed and heavily mus- tached, with a star on his shirt and a gun on his hip, was Pete Mattel, sheriff of the parish. Beside him stood Lejeune, his deputy, a preternaturally tall and hollow youth who casually nestled a double-barreled shotgun in the hollow of his left arm. As Stephen steered the pirogue alongside the dock and stepped out he had the sensation of having stepped into a trap. The sallow sheriff stood with his arms akimbo, appraising the pair of strangers with the grim gaze of the man catcher, a gaze which critically condemned them from first glance. The hungry deputy held the shotgun so carelessly poised that a single flip of the arm would have flung its muzzles to cover either of the new arrivals. It was an old-fashioned gun, and the youth's large, brown hand rested casually upon the hammers. "Well!" Stephen met the sheriff's hostile gaze and checked the friendly greeting which rose to his lips. "What's the idea? You look mean enough to want to bite us, friend." "Leave that gun in the pirogue," snapped the sheriff. "Oh, ho! So that's it? You think we've been break- ing the game laws ?" "You just leave that gun where it is." TWISTED TRAILS 23 "I was going to. Anything to be agreeable. But you're dead wrong, sir. Ambrose " "Stop that !" The sheriff's hand glided toward his hip. "Stand apart! Stick up your hands!" A silence, complete and sinister, fell suddenly upon the scene. The group froze, each man motionless in the at- titude in which the movement had caught him. For the newcomer did not put up his hands. He turned slowly from Ambrose and faced the sheriff. His hands were hooked in his belt and he left them there. "I won't put up my hands," said he. "I won't do it." The sheriff's big mustache twitched. The shock of this unexpected turn of events left him at sea. "If you would be kind enough to explain your business with us we might get somewhere," suggested Stephen. "I'll explain!" growled the sheriff, slipping his fingers round the butt of his gun. "You stick up them hands!" "You tell me what all this is about." The sheriff hesitated for one fatal moment.. If he drew his gun and this stranger still refused to elevate his hands which, by the cold gleam in his gray eyes, was un- doubtedly what he would do, the sheriff would have to fire or back down, and as he relished neither idea just then, he let the gun remain in its holster tentatively. "You're just about the height and build of a certain party I'm looking for," said he with the man catcher's portentous threat in his tone. "My name is Warren," said Stephen. "Is that the name of the man you are looking for ?" "Warren, eh?" said the sheriff suspiciously. "I ain't 24 TWISTED TRAILS so sure it is. I ain't sure you ain't the party known round ; here as the Snake, and who did a little robbing over in the oil fields last night." "Last night," said Stephen, "we were sleeping in that pirogue .down at the edge of Deep Swamp." "You say you were, you mean. Bastien!" A half- grown Cajun boy stepped forth from the group. "You've seen the Snake. Does this man look like him?" "Naw," said the boy after a long vacant stare. "That Snake is a hunchback. Got a big hump." "Look at his face, you fool! Does he look like him?" "Couldn't see the Snake's face," was the reply after another stare. "Snake had a mask all over his head." "How about his size?" The boy nodded. "About the same size, I reckon." "That's what I allowed," said the sheriff shrewdly. "That hump could be put on same as the mask. Young fellow, we don't know you; if you can't explain yourself I reckon you'd better come along." "I can explain myself fully," said Stephen. "I have letters which identify me, one of them from Mr. Hart- land who owns the mill over there." Warren had no time to produce the letters, however. A motor car which had slipped out of the grounds of one of the stately old mansions which were Lily City's pride had rolled up the street on the way to the bridge across the bayou and was now slowly passing the dock. Warren saw that the driver was the tall young man of the speed boat who had been guilty of that gesture behind the girl's TWISTED TRAILS 25 back down on the bayou two days before. The aristo- cratic old man of the boat was in the rear seat of the machine, and the girl sat beside him. She was arrayed for motoring now, but even beneath her green veil Stephen saw that her clear, rosy complexion was not that of the bayou country; he saw also the flash of her eyes as she recognized him and Ambrose. "Why, it's the two men who were lost in the pirogue down the bayou !" she exclaimed. The car stopped. "What's up, Pete?" asked the driver languidly. "Well, I ain't overlooking any suspects," replied the sheriff, almost slavishly. "This stranger is about the Snake's height and build." The girl laughed and leaned forward. "I see you took the way back to civilization after all !" she called to Stephen. "Yes," he replied. "And I knew I was back in civiliza- tion because the moment I arrived I was greeted with the invitation to hold up my hands and be arrested." "Estella," said the old man beside her, fingering his white Vandyke, "do you know these men?" "Do you vouch for them?" supplemented the driver, laughingly. The girl rose up slightly and looked closely at Stephen. "Of course," she said, sitting back. "Let them go, Pete !" laughed the young man, and the car went on. Stephen followed it with his eyes while it swooped along the crescent of the street, while it left the 26 TWISTED TRAILS street and swung onto the bridge at the head of the bay, and while it disappeared behind a clump of live oaks guarding the road on the eastern shore. He felt well re- warded for his trouble, for as the car crossed the bridge the girl turned and looked down on the two scarecrows from the swamps for whom she had vouched so reck- lessly. He fancied that she laughed. "Well, sheriff?" said Warren, turning back, but the sheriff had gone. Followed by his deputy, who now was carrying his shotgun by the barrel over his shoulder, the officer of the law was moving slowly away. He halted, however, when the car from which he had received such positive instructions, was well out of sight and hearing. "I ain't satisfied," he called back. "I'm keeping an eye on you long as you stay round here." "Do you want to see my letters, sheriff?" called Stephen. The sheriff only glared at him and went on his way. The crowd followed. Only one member of it remained, and this one now cried out : "Kill me while I'm dreaming! Don't let me wake. Bo, do I hear you talking honest-to-goodness United States, or am I asleep?" Stephen looked at the speaker and was forced to smile. He was a strange figure to be found on the water front of a Cajun bayou town. His body was that of a boy of sixteen, but his freckled face, beneath a thatch of fiery red hair, was hard and lined with the experiences of a man. In addition he was arrayed in a worn suit of loud TWISTED TRAILS 27 checks, cut so tightly that every line of his hard, wiry body was definitely revealed. "Bo," he said, in a voice trembling with emotion, "Caruso never spilled anything easier on the ears than your talk is to me right now. Mitt me, bo, mitt me. Me moniker's Terry McGurk and just now I'm timekeeper over at the mill here." Warren introduced himself briefly. "Go on, keep talking; talk some more!" pleaded the timekeeper. "Who were those people in the car?" asked Stephen. "Miss Reid and Georges Mattel and his old man," was the reply. "Does this Mr. Martel give the sheriff orders here?" The youth shot a swift look at his questioner. "The Martels? Say, bo, they're to this neck of the woods what the boss of Tammany Hall is to New York, and then some. Pete Martel, that's the sheriff, is one of their poor relations. They tell 'em all where to head in round here, the Martels do." "You don't belong down here yourself?" asked Stephen. "Belong down here? Me belong down here? Say, bo, if I ever get back to me old stamping ground round Bel- mont Park it'll take all the coppers in New York to drive me away. Soit'nly not, I don't belong down here ! Can't you hear I'm talking straight United States? I'm up against it, bo, that's why I'm here. I'm a horseman, that's what I am. I land in New Orleans with a sick horse and a bank roll so flat you could run your hand over it and 28 TWISTED TRAILS never feel a bump. I know that Bomb Carkey's foreman for the Hartland Company so I run over and brace him, and he puts me on as timekeeper so I can pull down enough jack to pay me horse's board over at the track. Talk about hard luck! If that Nailer of mine was in shape I'd be living at the St. Charles and going out to the track in a limousine. Oh, well ; cheer up, Terry ; some day they got to run for you." Warren asked for Mr. Hartland. "Who the Main Squeeze? Say, what would he be doing here this P.M.? Don't you know it's opening 1 day over at Jefferson Park to-morrow? That's where every- body's gone who can get away. I'm going myself on the limited to-night. Carkey's over there already. Mr. Hart- land spends most of his time round the office in New Orleans anyhow. If you want to see him you'd better breeze over there." "Is there a doctor here?" asked Stephen. "Ambrose had a little accident to his ear." "But it is nothing, m'sieu!" protested Ambrose. "A scratch what is that?" "I know," replied his employer, "but I wouldn't feel right letting you start for home without having it tended to." "But to spend good money for a scratch!" muttered the canny Cajun. "They soit'nly do hate to let go of money, these birds down here," volunteered young McGurk. "They ain't strong for hustling round to get it, but if they've got it TWISTED TRAILS 29 wow! Old Doc Thibodeaux's got 'em educated though. If they try to stall him there's something doing." - "Then there is a doctor here?" "Is there a doctor here?" repeated McGurk. "Bo, there's one of the doctorest doctors here you ever saw dish out a pill. And a card, believe me ! Been a soldier and a pill shark all over the world, and now he's down here sewing up the dinges when they get cut in the mill and dishing out dope for the Cajuns. And there with the conversation! Who, me? Well, mebbe I am, bo, mebbe I am. But can you blame me, bo, when I get a chance to talk to some one who uses the same language ? Come on, let's hike up to Doc Thibodeaux's and grab an earful of real talk while your Cajun gets his ear sewed up. The doc lives in the old place under those big trees. He's Miss Reid's uncle." CHAPTER IV ' | S HE house toward which Terry energetically led the way was a small cottagelike affair so smothered be- neath the branches of live oak and magnolia trees as to be barely visible from the road. A path led through the picket fence between two rows of oaks to a screened gallery running along the front of the house, and as they turned in Stephen paused in amazement. The garden about the house was a solid, odorous sea of rosebushes. They grew in a profusion that would have been incredible in any other soil and climate. They crowded about the walls of the house, about the stables in the rear. The mosquito screen of the gallery was fairly covered with vines of the rambler varieties, and there was such an abundance of kinds that in spite of .the season flowers were plentiful. "What do you know about it, eh?" whispered Terry, with the proprietary pride of a guide who displays a scene that makes an impression. "Can you imagine it in No- vember? Come on." The screen door of the gallery was open and he led the way in on tiptoe. "Dr. Armand Thibodeaux, Office," read the sign on another door opening into the house and Terry whispered : "Take a peek inside." 30 TWISTED TRAILS 31 Stephen looked into the room and saw first of all the white top of the large, closely cropped head of a man reclining comfortably in a canvas deck chair. The man's back was toward the door, and his gaze was apparently riveted on a hideous gargoyle which leered down from its lofty pedestal on the opposite wall. But for the presence of the white head in the deck chair Stephen realized that he would have been attracted by the gar- goyle first of all. It was horribly vivid, two feet or more high, and carved out of some dense black wood by a master craftsman. Its position, on a tall white pedestal, was strategic. From there its hideous leer greeted one the moment the threshold was passed. From its pedestal the Thing looked down on everything in the room looked down upon and sneered contemptuously opon every one and everything with a sneer that seemed to make it offensively alive. Terry grinned impudently back at the gargoyle; Am- brose shuddered and crossed himself surreptitiously; Stephen turned his attention to the large white-cropped head. The owner of the head was mostly hidden in the chair, but it was apparent that he was small of body and almost mahogany colored of complexion from ex- posure to the elements. A precise military mustache and tiny goatee, both as snow white as the closely cropped hair, adorned the dark countenance. Apparently he was so deeply in communion with the ugly figure on the wall that he was unconscious of the arrival of the visitors. Between his teeth he held a long bamboo cigarette holder containing a phenomenally long brown cigarette, 82 TWISTED TRAILS but he did not smoke in the accepted fashion ; he blew deli- cately through the holder to keep the tobacco burning, and the faint, snaky streams of pungent smoke rose lan- guidly upward, like incense burned to the leering figure that sneered down upon it all. By no word or sign had the man indicated that he heard his callers arrive. Yet suddenly he burst forth without moving* "No, no ! I am occupied. Do you not see I am occu- pied?" Steppy looked carefully at the little man, fearing that some detail of the doctor's occupation had escaped him, but as far as he could see he had not moved. He lay stretched out at leisure in the long chair, presently blowing another thin stream of smoke into the air, en- tirely idle if ever a man was idle. "Because I am not doing something with my hands you think I am not occupied," said he quietly. Warren started. The doctor's back was turned toward him so the latter could not see hirn, yet that was just what Steppy had been thinking at the moment. "What an ass is man!" continued the doctor confiden- tially to the gargoyle. "He finds a virtue in skittering about, doing things with his hands. The water bug skitters, and the monkey has hands. Cannot you see I am busy ? I am consulting my honest friend, Solomon, about the Snake. Go away." "There's a guy here got his ear ripped open, doc," sug- gested Terry. "Who is he?" asked the doctor without moving. TWISTED TRAILS 33 "What's your moniker your name? Tell him who you are," whispered Terry. "Ambrose LaFonte, m'sieu," said the Cajun timidly. "LaFonte? LaFonte? There are no LaFonte's in this parish." "I come from Barataria Bay." "You should have stayed there and netted shrimps," was the instant response. "They are very good, Bara- taria shrimps a la Creole. So are gumbo de crevisse and fricassee champignon. What are you doing over here, LaFonte?" "I come with M'sieu' Warren " "Yankee. Bunker Hill. Goon." "He want to make the big pirogue trip through the swamp. I come with him. Do not be 'fraid, m'sieu'; he pay you " The deck chair was suddenly convulsed. A rift ap- peared in the cloud of smoke. The small, trig, military figure of Doctor Armand Thibodeaux landed in one bound before the three visitors, his stubby white hair seeming to bristle with anger. 1 'Do not be afraid, he will pay you !' Is that what you said, LaFonte ?" he thundered with a pyrotechnical display of Gallic gestures. He came close to the big Cajun, his eyes flashing behind their thick glasses, and shook a long brown finger beneath his nose. "Say that again " He stopped abruptly. Above the head of the Cajun he saw Warren and he got no further. Steppy tried to smother the grin on his face, failed completely, and re- 34 TWISTED TRAILS turned the doctor's stare frankly, grinning his widest the while. The doctor's belligerent expression seemed to van- ish and gave way to the expression of the student inter- ested in the scrutiny of a rare specimen. He thrust Ambrose to one side without moving his gaze and came close up to Steppy and looked straight into his eyes. "My name's Warren," said Steppy. The doctor continued his scrutiny a moment longer, toying slowly with the tiny, white goatee on his square, brown chin. "That has nothing to do with it," he snapped and turned to his patient. "What did this ?" he asked, when he had examined the torn ear. "A nail ? Were you trying to drive a nail into your thick head, LaFonte? It bent, did it not? Terry, what are you laughing at?" "Bent the nail bent the nail!" chortled Terry. "You're there, doc, you're there! That's better'n 'solid ivory'!" "Out !" cried Doctor Thibodeaux. . "Oh, you were not trying to drive a nail into your head, LaFonte? Then perhaps you were trying to hang yourself upon a nail? A nail in the ear; it is a strange place for a nail, you must admit. Sit down." "It was in the bottom of the mast of my pirogue, doc- tor," said Ambrose. "Then how did it get into your ear, my poor LaFonte?" "I I put the ear against it, m'sieu." "So still, still! It burns? Of course. So you put your ear against the nail in the bottom of the mast in TWISTED TRAILS 35 your pirogue? A strange place for an ear, LaFonte. Come, my son," he continued with a change of manner, laying his hand on the guide's shoulder in paternal fash- ion, "you must not mind if I jest a little. You are a good Cajun, and so am I. If I have hurt your pride, I beg a thousand pardons. You must forgive an old man his fun." "It is I who should beg pardon for troubling you, m'sieu doctor," replied LaFonte. "A cut in the ear, what is that? But, M'sieu Warren insisted we must see a doctor. He will see, he says, that he send me home as good as he found me." "It is the Yankee way, LaFonte, the Anglo-Saxon way," chuckled the doctor, busy at his work. "Knock a man down, kick in his ribs, call the Red Cross." "Pardon, doctor, not M'sieu Warren " "All alike. Every one of them. Do not contradict. They love to help after they have whipped. Sit still!" "It was an accident, m'sieu," protested Ambrose. "I threw myself down blindly the bullet was so close." Doctor Thibodeaux paused with the swab of iodine held daintily between thumb and forefinger. "Bullet?" said he, his eyes questing Warren. "We were sailing past Black Woods, doctor, down there in Deep Swamp," explained Steppy, "and somebody took a couple of shots at the pirogue." "Oh ! A couple shots. Casually. It is a common ex- perience to you, then?" "No, I wouldn't say common," replied Warren. "Fact is, I wanted to stick round and see how about it, but 36 TWISTED TRAILS Ambrose is prejudiced and superstitious against having anything at all to do with Black Woods." "And you, my young Yankee, you have no such preju- dices or superstitions yourself?" "I haven't about Black Woods, at least. It's one of the most beautiful pine forests I've ever seen." "Ah! Beautiful, is it?" "Yes, sir," concluded Warren practically, "and whoever logs it ought to clean up a nice piece of money if he knows the game. I'm down here in that line, doctor," he added. "Do you know who owns it?" "Pierre Martel," said the doctor, turning to his work. "Do you happen to know if he would sell?" "The Martels? For ready money they would sell their souls if they had any. Now that is all I have to say about that." He turned all his attention to the task of bandaging Ambrose's ears, his manner indicating plainly, and yet in a way at which no one could take offense, that the con- versation was over. His thin, skillful hands flew about with the swiftness and precision of long practice, and presently he fastened the end of the bandage in position, slapped Ambrose on the back and said: "Go home, LaFonte; your wife will be lonesome. I know the ways of good Cajun wives ; they are very af- fectionate. Get out out, out !" "Merci " "Out out out!" The doctor flung himself into his deck chair, his back to the door, and resumed his com- munion with the black monkeylike figure on the wall. "I TWISTED TRAILS 3T am occupied. By all the devils of civilization! Cannot you see I am occupied? The fee is three dollars." "Ain't he a card, bo, ain't he?" demanded young McGurk, as they walked back toward the office. "What d'you know about a bird like that, eh?" Stephen replied carelessly, his mind busy with a quite different matter. The tract of pine locally known as Black Woods had not been gobbled up by the Hartland Company or by any other corporation, but was still in the hands of private ownership. This meant that it could be bought. He considered the fact that it was strange that no lumber company had purchased the tract, but he did not let this deter him in the least. The tract was well down in the Deep Swamp and he had seen enough of the Cajun country to know how effective might be a barrier of fear and superstition such as had been thrown round Black Woods. Outside timber cruisers had probably seen the woods, but he wondered if they, too, had been greeted by some first-class shooting by a hidden marks- man? If so, the reason for the tract remaining untouched was easily explained. The fact that he and Ambrose had been so effectively warned away from the timber did not trouble him now. That was an incident. Black Woods was in private hands that was the all-important fact. In the trees of Black Woods he saw the way to a fortune. "You say that Mr. Pierre Martel has gone over to the races?" he asked as he followed Terry toward the mill office. "Do you know when he will be back?" "No," replied Terry, haughtily flicking an imaginary 38 TWISTED TRAILS speck of dust from an imaginary glove, "Mr. Pierre Martel didn't stop and wise me up about that, but I'll see him over't the track to-morrow and ask him. But there's Octo Landry, the bookkeeper, quitting work, and Octo's sort of nephew to the old man and he may know. Hey, Octo," he shouted to a slightly built Cajun youth who was leaving the office, "how long is Old Man Martel going to stay over at New Orleans?" The clerk glanced contemptuously at Terry, but paused as he saw Stephen. "Have you business with Mr. Martel, Senior, Mr. McGurk?" he asked. "Aw, can it, Octo, can it!" cried Terry. "You needn't pull that up-stage stuff on me. I got your number; I know when it comes down to cases you're one good- old scout. How 'bout it? When does the Old Duke of Lily City expect to be back?" "I am not familiar with Mr. Martel, Senior's expec- tations, McGurk," was the dignified reply. "That's a little better. Don't mister me again, Octo, old scout, unless you want to see some fireworks." "I wanted to see Mr. Martel on business," interrupted Stephen. "He has gone to the races," replied the bookkeeper cour- teously. "It is uncertain when he will return. If there is anything I could do " "Thank you very much, but it's something I have to see Mr. Martel personally about." "It is too bad he is not here. I could telephone over to-morrow morning. He stops at the St. Charles." TWISTED TRAILS 89 "Thanks. That will do," replied Stephen. "Thank you very much." Landry bowed; Stephen bowed; Terry bowed. "Can you beat 'em ?" demanded the latter as he watched the bookkeeper walk proudly away. "I suspect I'll have to pin one on that bird's chin some day just to make him human. Well, I wouldn't care much for his job, handling the money here, with the Snake floating round and pulling his stunts. Say, bo, I'm going to beat it to New Orleans on the next train to-night. How 'bout you? You know the old saying when in rum do as the rummies, do. Come on, bo, better follow the crowd and go to the CHAPTER V TT was opening day of the racing season at New Orleans, the day to which thousands looked forward for the thrill of the stirring cry: "They're off!" Apparently Nature approved of the sport, for the day was in complete accorji with the occasion. The sun shone like June. A breeze which had been born in Yucatan and nurtured by the Gulf, lazied its way over the city. It was a soothing breeze, a lulling one. It whispered a fib, but the fib was easy to hear. It whispered that winter and care did not exist, that there was only spring and pleasure ; that there never would be any season but spring. The breeze moved languorously over and through the moist, devious ways of the Old French Quarter, seeping dreamily into old courtyards long since abandoned to mold and the odor of mold, to ancient, indigent mammies, to the ghosts of tender, dead loves. It crossed Canal Street swiftly, rather offended at the Yankeelike bustle and modernity of that great business thoroughfare, and went a-search for congenial scenes and plaisance. It left the city behind and reached the race track as the first early railbirds were passing through the turn- stiles, and there it found a congenial atmosphere, so it lingered and stayed for the races. It swept the manes of the thoroughbreds and made them whinny, touched 40 TWISTED TRAILS 41 the nostrils of gaunt old timber toppers loosening up for the long, rough steeplechase, stroked the sleek coats of the rollicking two-year-olds prancing about with stable boys on their backs, and it seeped into the clubhouse pa- vilion, danced vagabondishly down a row of seats next to the rail and rustled the program in Stephen Warren's sun-browned hands. Stephen had accompanied Terry McGurk to New Orleans and had tried in vain to find Pierre Mattel. He had met Mr. Hartland, a stocky, good-humored man of fifty, who had immediately offered Stephen a job. Stephen had requested two days for a decision. In those two days he expected to learn if he had a chance to get hold of the timber of Black Woods. He was at the race track for that purpose, as he had been informed that Mr. Martel, Senior, would appear there that afternoon without fail. Warren knew horses and therefore he loved horses for their own sake. Mainly he knew working horses, the great clumsy patient i6oo-pound animals of the logging woods, and the smaller work beasts of farms. But the thoroughbred is king; he is to work breed what a prince of the blood is to his strong peasant subjects. Warren was out early to feast his eyes on the perfection of horse flesh, the dainty, fiery-eyed gallopers, which, playing with the stable boys on their backs, came cavorting, dancing, stepping sidewise, past the stand. A long-legged young bay colt, a baby racer by his lines, was fox-trotting leisurely toward the paddock and Warren tried to pick him out on the program. 42 TWISTED TRAILS "That's Nailer," said some one near by. "Number 7 in the third race. Don't play him. It's a full mile, and that baby ain't in shape to go a furlong. Martel is play- ing his horse, The Hammer, to win. The tip is he ain't quite ready either. Here's The Hammer now the big black." A pair of racers, one remarkable for his size and the blackness of his coat and the redness of his fiercely dis- tended nostrils, swept past on their way to the paddock. As if in answer to a challenge the bay called Nailer reared, tossed his head, and in spite of his rider, danced away in vain pursuit. A curt snatch of laughter from the gangway leading toward the betting ring attracted War- ren's attention. It attracted the attention of others, women as well as men. "Georges Martel, the big plunger/' whispered a woman behind Steppy. "Owns The Hammer, you know." "Some man!" whispered her companion. Warren had risen to go to the paddock to watch the horses at closer range and presently he found himself following in Mattel's wake. The latter apparently was well known. As he leisurely made his way toward the betting pavilion behind the grand stand his passage drew an occasional greeting, an occasional look and question. Women in particular looked at him, his tall figure and handsome features attracting their attention even in the hurly-burly of the moment. At times he paused and bowed, spoke a word, shook hands, passed on. Steppy found no difficulty in keeping him in view. In the betting pavilion Mattel's reception was peculiar. TWISTED TRAILS 43 Several bookmakers turned their back when they saw him coming; all seemed to know him. He wrote a ticket and presented it to the leading bookmaker at the meet, and passed on toward the paddock without troubling to note how the layer received the bet. "Here, Mr. Martel!" called the bookmaker excitedly as he read the figures on the ticket. "Well, Levy ?" Martel paused but did not turn round. "That's a whale of a big bet, Martel if you lose. I ain't taking markers this year." Martel carelessly drew a wallet from an inner pocket and displayed a wad of yellow bank notes. "Oh! All right." The bookmaker fell back respect- fully and Martel passed on without having looked at him. In the jam of the paddock Steppy lost sight of his man. The crowd was shifting and milling about the horses that were being led in, and Steppy, caught in the confusion, drifted carelessly with the excited throng down the length of the stalls. A shift in interest, a new horse being led out into the paddock, and the crowd flowed back like quicksilver. Stephen was about to drift with it, but from one of the stalls near by came a muffled curse and the sound of a blow. In the paddock at the end of the stalls Terry McGurk was gripping Nailer's bridle with his left hand while in his right he brandished the whip with which he had just dealt a stinging blow. "Don't you kick my horse out of the way, you big stiff!" he cried. "Don't you go trying that!" The large, thick-set man whom he had struck, drew 44 TWISTED TRAILS the back of his hand across his cut lip, leaped forward, caught the boy off the ground and pinned him like a puppet against a pillar. "I'm Bomb Carkey, kid," he snarled drunkenly. "I don't care " The big man's hand knocked the helpless boy's head to one side. "Stop it, Bomb, for God's sake!" cried bystanders. "Let him go." McGurk's jockey furiously hurled a hammer at the big man's head and missed. The big man did not notice. "You hit me, kid," said he slowly, and slowly lifted a fist like a sledge. "You hit me Bomb Carkey !" "Carkey ! For the love of Mike, don't hit him !" The men were too far away to prevent the blow. Steppy had clenched his fist and suddenly found it resting upon the top of a half -filled sack of grain. It was done in a flash. As Carkey's fist tautened the heavy sack flew through the air and struck him full in the back. Sixty pounds of solid Western oats is no mean missile and, large and rugged as he was, Carkey coughed, released his grip and fell forward on hands and knees. "Beat it sudden now, son," warned a grizzled horse- man. "Beat it before he gets up; that's Bomb Carkey, ex-heavyweight." "He a fighter?" said Steppy. "He's just a fine speci- men of a bully, that's what he is!" "Not on your life!" "Hitting a kid like that!" "He's got booze in him, Carkey has. Started last night. TWISTED TRAILS 45 Always makes him ugly. The nag there was in his way and he took a kick at him. He'd a kicked a tiger just the same. Beat it hell, it's too late!" Carkey had suddenly sprung to his feet, whirling round in the air, throwing his coat one way, his hat the other. "Who did it?" he bellowed. "Who's looking for it?" His eye fell upon Steppy, the only one of the crowd who did not give back before his menacing glare. His eyes widened and closed shrewdly, his lips straightened, grew thin, and he sucked his breath in so noisily that it whistled. "Here, kid," he whistled, tossing a twenty-dollar bill to the boy he had manhandled. "Pay the damage. Worth it. Got me into a real fight at last." "Beat it, son, beat it!" pleaded the old horseman, trying to thrust Steppy away. "It's Bomb Carkey fought the champion, you know. Beat it !" "Naw, you don't !" whistled the drunken giant. "Stand away from him there, you. He knocked Bomb Carkey down from behind and he's got to explain. Don't be- devil him, you fools. He understands; he's got the eye of a fighting man. Throw your coat, young feller, or I'll knock you kicking right where you stand." "No, you won't, Bomb!" screamed Terry, picking up the hammer, and aiming it at the back of Carkey's head. "I'll cave in your dome for you !" "Put that down, son," laughed Steppy. "It's all right; put it down." "Do you see, do you hear?" growled Carkey. "Didn't I tell you he had the eye of a fighting man? Up with 46 TWISTED TRAILS your dukes, young fellow, and leave your address where you want your body sent." "Carkey, have some sense," pleaded onlookers. "Beat it, young feller ! Beat it ; we'll hold him while you make a getaway." "Ah! You will?" cried Carkey. He crouched like a bear for a spring, his eyes glaring, huge fists swinging. "You will, eh? Then look out, I'm " "Carkey!" The ex-pugilist froze in the very instant he was about to leap. For a few seconds he stood with his fists tensed ready to strike, his legs bent for the spring. Then he subsided; his eyes went to the ground. "All right," he said sullenly, then hesitated a moment, picked up hat and coat and turned away. In amazement Warren turned to see who had spoken. The crowd, with a quicksilver change of interest, was shifting back toward the paddock, and the broad, well- groomed back of Georges Mattel was disappearing round a corner. CHAPTER VI XJLTARREN found himself alone with Terry who, as- sisted by his jockey, had caught the bay and was soothing him as one might soothe a terrified child. "So, Nailer! Poor old Nailer! Steady, steady, old boy. Ain't nobody going to put anything over on you while Terry's round. Easy, old boy, easy. I'm with you." The horse, which during the excitement had been vainly trying to climb a ten-foot fence, was in a bad way. The soothing tones of the boy stopped his jumping, but the muscles under his black hide played nervously, and his fiery thoroughbred eyes roved about in wild alarm. "So, boy," said Warren, and at the strange voice the horse went into the air, dragging the boy off his feet. "So, boy," repeated Steppy and came forward and laid a hand on the slender neck. The racer started, looked at him, blew a great blast from his distended nostrils and grew still. "Well, I'll be darned!" said Terry. "That's the foist stranger he's let touch him since he got sick." Nailer was a splendid young animal; the rampant life of the two-year-old thoroughbred was in his eyes. The lines of him showed that his breeding was of the finest, but his bearing did not live up to his lines. His coat was 47 48 TWISTED TRAILS a dead, dusty bay in color and his dainty feet shuffled un- certainly as he moved them. Only his eye remained true, fiery, dynamic the warrior eye of the thoroughbred race horse. "What's the matter with him?" said Warren. "He looks as if his grain wasn't doing him much good." "You think he's a mutt?" retorted Terry belligerently. "I don't know anything about race horses," replied Warren. "He looks to me like a pretty good animal in very bad rig." "Pretty good ! Pretty good! I suppose Salvator would have looked pretty good to you, eh? Or Roamer or Colin or Say, bo, Sassin was this baby's granddaddy. Does that mean anything to you?" "Not a thing," replied Stephen, rubbing the horse's nose. "Don't hit me; I'm not kicking him, you know." McGurk grinned until his freckled countenance was split in twain. "Gee, bo ! That was some bouquet you handed Carkey. I I guess you saved me a beatin' all right. Say, did you make the bird who called him to time ? That was Georges Martel. Every time I see him I wonder how does he ever escape the movies. All that guy'd have to do'd be to vamp some Jane through six reels and they'd have to call out the reserves to keep the skoits from crashing through the box office." "Why in the world did Carkey stop at a single word from him?" asked Warren. "Bo, if I had a buck for everything over there I don't know or understand I'd have John D. Rockefeller bitin' TWISTED TRAILS 49 his nails and waiting- for me to come down and lend him jack enough to keep his oil carts going. Mattel must have something tough on Bomb Carkey, all right, to stop him cold like that. I know Bomb Carkey ; used to know him when me stamping ground was between Belmont Park and Thoid Avenue and Fourteenth, up in New Yawk. He ain't no piker any way, for nerve or anything. In half an hour he'll be back here making it all right with me, see'f he don't. So, Nailer, poor old feller! Nothing but hard luck since we started south. First we get into a train wreck that wrenches his neck and drives him crazy, and then he gets the flu. And here he is entered for the thoid race and he ain't fit to go a furlong." "Do you own him?" "Who owns you, Nailer? Listen to him, old boy! Who raised you from a baby up there at Jamaica, when they were going to shoot you because they thought you'd put your shoulder out crashing through that fence ? Who slept in the stall with you, and worked as stable boy to get jack enough to feed you? He's mine, sir; and he's every one and everything I've got in the world. But but he's a race horse, bo, he's a stake horse, not an over- night purse chaser. And some day, when I get him into condition and have a little luck, he's going to prove it. I got him nominated for the Mardi Gras Handicap next February. Gimme two months with him at a decent training place and I'll beat 'em all. Say, bo, you done me a favor, and I'll slip you the only thing I can in return. Lay off this baby to-day. He can't go the distance, and 50 TWISTED TRAILS I just got him in there on the ghost of a chance of getting a piece of money to train him on." "We'll give that big black Hammer a chase though, Terry," said the jockey, slapping his boots with his whip. "I'll make the bird upon him ride." "For about half the distance, Monk," said Terry. "Then we'll fade and drop back poor old Nailer. The favorite will beat about three horses. But cheer up, Terry, cheer up; some day they got to run for you." Warren made his way slowly back toward the club house. The park was rapidly filling. The mellow sun- shine lay over clubhouse, grand stand, track, infield and paddock. Trains, street cars and motors were pouring a crowd through the welcoming gates. It was like a sum- mer crowd, for though the month was November the unusual warmth had brought out a throng in summer array, summer manners and gayety. As Warren passed through the betting ring the band in the grand stand poured forth The Star Spangled Banner; then a pause, and to the accompaniment of laughter, cheers and con- tagious animation, Auld Lang Syne. A variegated throng was crowding the clubhouse pa- vilion, an animated talking throng, the talk exclusively of King Horse. There were horsemen and gambling men : Kentuckians to whom horse racing was meat, wine, bread, tobacco and religion ; and the inevitable contingent of gamblers to whom a race horse was merely a counter on a sublimated roulette wheel. Northern tourists rubbed shoulders with Spanish-speaking South Americans, courtly dignified horse breeders and horse lovers were TWISTED TRAILS 51 jostled by hard-jawed, curt-spoken bookmakers and graft- ers. The drawl of the South, soft, lingering, friendly, was in the air, and through it might be heard French and Spanish and Portuguese. Dark-skinned Latin ladies, grand dames from old plan- tations, graceful, olive-skinned Creoles, and the more ro- bust ladies of tourist parties from the North made up a gayly dressed feminine element, with here and there one of the flashily dressed, over-bediamonded and effulgent ladies of the tracks. In that crowd, charged with a vitality as keen as that of the horses about to race, a man or woman must be exceptional to attract attention, to make the crowd pause its buzzing and observe for even a mo- ment, yet at the moment that Steppy reached the head of the stairs leading into the pavilion the portion of the crowd nearest the clubhouse was in that momentary state of suspense and silence which even at race tracks occa- sionally stills the babble and chatter. Estella Reid had come out of the clubhouse escorted by Pierre Martel. Stephen, looking closely, SO.VST a tall, white- haired man whose dark skin, snow-white imperial and courtly bearing marked him apart as of aristocratic lineage. Alone, the old man would have been the focus of many eyes in any crowd, yet now he was merely an appendage, a foil to the girl he was escorting. Romantic Latin blood had joined with blood of a Northern race in creating in her a woman who to one ob- server might appear all fire and languor, to another ice and strength, so intricately and so subtly did two natures seem to be mingled in Estella Reid. Physically she was 52 TWISTED TRAILS taller and more strongly built than the Creole type, and more animated and gay than the woman of the North. Spiritually she seemed at the moment a lambent flame of carefree youth, a carefree apotheosis of the scene about her. She walked slowly beside her distinguished escort. Her high-held head was surmounted by a girlish mass of brown hair upon which shimmered an impression of red; her blue eyes were girlishly eager under the stimulus of the crowd. Yet she was not of the crowd. She was different. Some time later, when she was not present, Warren heard two women discussing her : "How was she dressed, do you remember?" "No ! I never noticed a thing." It was her usual effect, exercising itself even upon the fading, sophisticated women who in their hearts hated her for her beauty and youth. It was expressed by the soft, tense whisper of a Brazilian : "La Louisiane !" The pair passed to the front of the pavilion to a corner box at the rail, and as Warren's eyes followed he saw that Georges Martel and Mr. Hartland were seated in the box. Georges Martel, as he greeted her, bent playfully over her hand and laughed with a flash of white teeth. Warren was too far away to hear what was said but the girl looked up suddenly, a flush and a troubled smile came upon her face, and she looked away. The silvery notes of a bugle down by the judge's stand suddenly stilled the crowd and swerved its attention to- ward the track. Warren did not take his eyes from the box, for in the instant that bugle had blown, when every- TWISTED TRAILS 53 body's eyes went to the track, he had seen Georges Mar- tel bend over the girl's neck as she leaned over the rail to see the horses, as he had bent over her down on the bayou. Martel's face was congested with blood, his eyes protruded, his lips worked nervously, and his large white hands moved like a pair of claws. It was only for an instant. Then he straightened his tall figure, his face calm, indolently assured and composed, his fingers toying playfully with the thin watch chain across his vest, as he joined in the scrutiny of the parade for the first race of the season and laughingly made some comment on the horses. CHAPTER VII A TEN-THOUSAND-TONGUED roar shook the pavilion and echoed up to the blue sky as the crowd, coming to its feet, announced that the racing season at Jefferson Park was opened. And then Warren had his second shock within a few seconds. With the interest of her companions suddenly transferred from her and concentrated on the race, the girl looked round, and he saw that though she could not have seen Mattel's gesture behind her back some fine sense of intuition had troubled her. Her blue eyes were calm, but the light of pleasure had gone from them. They were wide and questing, with the hint of loneliness in them, a hint of tragedy. Instinctively Steppy found himself leaning toward her, and in that instant her eyes found his. He had forgotten himself so completely that he was staring at her frankly, and at the sight of this she looked away. It was an instinctive movement; Warren would have been surprised if she had done anything else. But she looked back, and she smiled a little as she recognized him as the lost one on the bayou and saw that he recog- nized her. For the moment it seemed that in spite of the great crowd, or because of it, the two of them were quite alone. Out upon the track a well-matched field was swinging 54 TWISTED TRAILS 55 round the turn; in pavilion, grand stand and on the rail thousands were tense with the thrill of racing; and Stephen and the girl looked only at one another ; and then she smiled again and turned to watch the race. Warren's countenance promptly took upon itself the noncommittal mask of complete indifference with which his breed mask the tale of excitement, and though his heart leaped distractedly he turned his attention to the track and watched the finish of the first race with apparent interest. Cheers greeted the finish ; the favorite had won. The crowd, in relief from the tension, began milling round, laughing, chattering; and presently Mr. Hartland rose, looked round and saw Stephen. "Hello, Warren!" he called. "Come down here; got a chair for you." In a daze and confusion, though his countenance was calm and composed, Stephen found himself being intro- duced. The older Martel greeted him courteously, studied his face and saw nothing but a good-natured athletic boy, and grew cordial at once, while Georges Martel smiled indolently, the brown eyes under his thick lashes keenly interested but inscrutable. "Miss Reid, Mr. Warren." Warren stammered a formal acknowledgment of the introduction but Miss Reid nodded and smiled mischiev- ously. "You're not lost to-day, Mr. Warren, are you?" "Well, no, Miss Reid, not exactly not as badly as I was lost the other day." 56 TWISTED TRAILS "Ah! You are acquainted with Mr. Warren, Estella?" said Georges Martel. "Oh, dear, yes! Haven't I spoken of him? Mr. War- ren of of Deep Swamp. He he gets lost there, don't you, Mr. Warren?" "He does," agreed Stephen. "Think of it !" she said solemnly. "He was lost in -the wilds of our own bayou!" "Ah! Then it was you the sheriff had, Mr. Warren?" interrupted Georges. "I am glad you didn't turn out to be the Snake." "Thank you," replied Warren, pleasantly, "but it was Miss Reid who helped me, you remember." "H'm, h'm!" said Mr. Hartland promptly. "Talking about that, have you made up your mind about that job?" "Not yet, Mr. Hartland. I'm afraid that when it conies to making decisions I'm rather slow." "That's all right; you said to-morrow. Stick to it; that's business. You're a business man. That's why I feel sure you won't turn my job down! Johnson, my old superintendent, succumbed to the climate. Threw up a fine job to be a bum." "Oh !" Miss Reid interrupted with a petulant stamp of the foot. "How can you say that, Mr. Hartland? Mr. Johnson fell in love, really, truly in love." "He went crazy about a little Cajun girl, if that's what you mean, Miss Reid." "Me, too Ah am poah lil Cajun gal, M'sieu," she said, and Hartland bowed his gray head contritely. "I stand corrected. Will you forgive me?" TWISTED TRAILS 57 "Let me see will I ?" she put a finger thoughtfully to her brow. "Yes, Cajun gals are generous. I forgive you if you'll not use the word 'bum' in describing John- son's romance." "All right," laughed Hartland. "Well, Warren, Johnson went fell in love with a little bayou beauty and let the job go smash." "Quite proper, too," said the girl. "He couldn't let his business interfere with his romance, could he?" "Well, he didn't at all events. So the job is open. Lily City Mill means a good thing, Warren." "But, Mr. Hartland, perhaps Mr. Warren would fall in love, too," persisted Estella. "Ha ha!" said Georges Martel mirthlessly. "Estella, you do not understand the modern business man, in spite of your Northern education. Johnson would not permit business to interfere with his romance. A good business man a strong business man such as Mr. Warren will not allow his romance if he is weak enough to have one to interfere with his business." "Is that true, Mr. Hartland?" "I should hope so! If I thought it wasn't, I wouldn't offer him the job. Lily City Mill is too big a plant to fool with. It's really a fine thing, Warren. You ought to jump at it." "Is that what Yankee hustlers do?" asked Estella sol- emnly. "What's that, Miss Reid?" "Jump. Jump at it whatever it is. It must be fun to see them do it, isn't it? I've never seen a Yankee 58 TWISTED TRAILS hustler jump. Do they do the standing high jump or the running broad? It would be very thrilling, I think." She flashed a swift, mischievous glance at Stephen and saw by his smile that he was enjoying it all to the fullest, and she made an attempt to continue solemnly, but his smile was too much for her, and she gave vent to a peal of hearty laughter. "I'm rude," she said uncontritely. "Are you thinking over the job at the Lily City Mill, Mr. Warren?" "Yes." "Won't that be nice!" "He is only thinking it over, Estella," said Georgts Martel softly. "Until to-morrow," rejoined Stephen, smiling upon Georges. "I perish with anxiety," said the girl calmly, and turned her attention to the track. "There's the field for the third race coming out," said Mr. Hartland. "There's The Hammer, black and red. Betting on him, Georges ?" "Of course. He has only to beat Venus Delight, the chestnut, yellow and purple." "And the nice bay horse in the lead, with the pretty green and gold colors?" asked Estella. The men, except Warren, laughed. "Nailer. Owner, Mr. Terrence McGurk." "Little Terry over at the mill?" "The same." "Oh!" she cried, "I'll root for him." "To beat The Hammer, Estella?" purred Georgei TWISTED TRAILS 69 "I know it's too bad, Georges," she replied, "but I do so love green and gold colors 1" "Warren," said Georges, turning with false deference to Stephen, "what is your opinion?" "No !" Steppy laughingly refused to be drawn in. "The Hammer'll beat Nailer, but he'll finish behind the favorite. He isn't in shape; that's the consensus," inter- posed Hartland. "That's my idea, too." "Ah!" said Georges seriously, with a lifting of the brows. "But," he added after a moment's pause, "it is highly important that the consensus on this race is wrong." "Important to you, you mean, eh?" laughed Hartland; but Warren had seen the look that Georges bestowed upon the back of Estella's head and knew that was not what he had meant at alL CHAPTER VHI >T*HEY'RE off!" " The crowd rose again at the ringing shout, but almost instantly there followed a groan of dismay. "The favorite's left! The favorite's left!" Down at the starting line a perfectly aligned field had leaped forward at the drop of the flag except one horse. The chestnut filly bearing Number One, the favorite, Venus Delight, had been caught flat-footed. Six horses flashed into view in a closely crowded bunch, while two lengths behind the outwitted jockey upon the favorite, to the tune of imprecations from the stands, was striving with whip and heel to make up the distance he had lost. "The Hammer leads ! The Hammer leads !" Georges Martel flecked the ashes from his cigarette as the race swept past the pavilion, but did not rise. "There he goes The Hammer! He's got a length on 'em!" A sudden hush. Then a bellow of surprise and dis- may rose from the crowd as the bunch struck the first turn. "Number Seven! Number Seven!" "Who is it?" "Nailer!" Stephen leaped to his feet. 60 TWISTED TRAILS 61 "Nailer!" cried the girl. "Oh, good!" Out in the lead by a good length The Hammer had leaped at the turn, and as if at a signal Nailer had leaped after him, eating up the daylight between them in a won- derful spurt, crowding the black horse's flanks with his clean, bay head, moving up from flank to shoulder, run- ning neck to neck for a stride or two, and suddenly show- ing his nose ahead of the big black. "Nailer! Wat d'you know! Watch him run!" Nailer was running with a long easy stride that was the perfection of thoroughbred running, running at top speed as easily and naturally as an eagle swoops at its fastest. The boy on his back sat immobile, crouched and guiding only, knowing the splendid animal beneath was running with every ounce of speed in his sturdy heart. So perfect was the running form of the bay horse that though the speed with which he swung round the turn caused the wise ones on the rail to look at one another, there was no appearance of effort or hurry in his move- ments. Beneath his bay hide the long muscles moved with the smoothness of swift slipping water, each muscle well- ing and relaying in accord with the whole, the whole tes- tifying eloquently that here was an animal bred to race, to run its best at highest speed though the effort dropped it dead on the track. The spirit of the race seemed to have transformed the sluggish animal that Steppy had seen in the paddock. The flaming spirit of him seemed to flare out and shine through the dull color of his coat. As if his racing heart had surmounted the weakness of the flesh and bone his 62 TWISTED TRAILS dainty feet, which had moved uncertainly in the paddock, now seemed to spurn the earth, gripping it only with a toe hold for the drive forward. "Nailer! Nailer!" A half length of the bay showed ahead of the out- stretched black nose of The Hammer as they whirled into the straightaway of the back stretch and between them and the rest of the field a full two lengths of daylight was visible. The favorite was forgotten. All interest cen- tered upon the terrific struggle between the two leaders. With the long straightaway before his eyes Nailer seemed to let out another link in his speed. The boy upon The Hammer was using his whip right and left. Georges Martel rose leisurely to his feet and placed his glasses to his eyes. "Yes, he runs very prettily, Nailer, and should," he said calmly. "He is bred in the same blood as The Ham- mer. But no condition. There he goes." A half-smothered groan had escaped the lips of the girl in the front of the box. And many an old horseman groaned with her, in sympathy for the gallant Nailer and what had happened out on the back stretch. For at the half-mile post Nailer had faltered and lost his stride. His pace shortened. The great, flashing stride which had carried him over the half mile at close to a record for the track was gone in an instant. He had given the best that was in him, had run his best as he had to do to keep The Hammer from distancing him, and now he was through. The indomitable spirit was there, striving to drag the TWISTED TRAILS 63 lagging body on, his effort diminished not in the least, but the legs would not, could not, respond. "The Hammer creeping up!" "Yes. It is the time," murmured Georges. The black horse had crept along the bay's flank in a few strides. Neck and neck they raced, Nailer, a beaten horse, fighting like mad to keep even; then the black's nose showed in front. "Nailer's finished," said Martel, and turned his glasses elsewhere. But Nailer though he was beaten was not quite finished. A silk-clad green and gold arm glimmered in the sunlight as his jockey flashed the whip in the air and brought it down with a vicious cut. With a leap that was only a thing of will and nerve the indomitable horse responded, gained a foot or two, raced neck and neck for a few strides, then began to fall back. "The Hammer! The Hammer!" The r :~owd was hailing the leader vociferously, but Georges Martel had his glasses trained elsewhere, and a rush of blood suffused his face, thickened his neck, while his lips drew into a thin, straight line of rage, defeat and hate unspeakable. "Damn it !" he muttered. "He wasn't ready, after all !" Out on the far side of the closely bunched trailers two lengths behind The Hammer, a low-running, lean chestnut filly had struck her stride, and, swinging far toward the farther fence, went wide to be dear of her field. The race of Nailer was over : the pace had told and was telling harder upon The Hammer ; and the chestnut filly, though 64 TWISTED TRAILS outclassed by two horses in the field, was demonstrating the invincibility of perfect condition. Trained to the minute, just right for this hour, she had just begun to run her race. Running like a machine she cleared the ruck, still going wide; at the curve she cut across the track and reached Nailer's heaving flanks. She swung to the rail, her nose at The Hammer's rump, her tail before Nailer's nose. Like three machines they were outlined against the rail in this order as they swung round the curve for the finish then it happened. A space of daylight showed between the side of the hard-driven Hammer and the white-painted rail. The whip of the boy on the filly flashed in the air. Like a bullet the chestnut flew into the gap, filled it, and with whips flying The Hammer and Venus Delight swung in for the finish on even terms, with Nailer a bad third. "The favorite! The favorite!" The fickle crowd had changed its tune. "Venus Delight! Come on Venus!" Nailer was through. He dropped back and a rangy bay nosed him out of the money before the finish began to be ridden. Out in front the filly and The Hammer were fighting like the true racers they were. For a space the big black held his own through the power of the breed in him. Then the chestnut showed her nose ahead. There was only the semblance of a struggle on The Hammer's part. For a stride he responded to the spur of the whip, but as the filly crept ahead the fight went out of him. "Venus Delight! Come on!" The Hammer quit. The boy flogged him to the TWISTED TRAILS 65 finish line, but he had quit too soon to have a chance. Like a flash Venus Delight went forward and made the race safe. A length in the lead she flashed by the judges. The Hammer second, the rangy bay third. Somewhere back in the ruck was Nailer, overlooked, forgotten no, not quite. "Poor old Nailer!" murmured Estella. "What a shame !" "Venus Delight wins!" "Venus always wins," murmured Georges MarteL "Even over The Hammer." "Lose much?" asked Hartland. Georges looked at him curiously a moment. "Oh, so-so," he said with a shrug of his shoulders. "Nevertheless, it was quite important that I should win." He smiled easily ; but the face of his father, the aristo- cratic Pierre Martel, had become drawn and sunken; the old eyes were blazing and his cheeks were the color of cold ashes. CHAPTER IX QTEPHEN excused himself and hurried from the ^ pavilion the moment the race was over. He shoul- dered his way through the excited throng in the betting ring, through the crowd in paddock, down the long line of stalls and finally came upon Terry and his beaten horse. "Gee, Terry," the disconsolate jockey was saying, "I tell you I thought I had 'em all beat. He had more in him for that first half than any nag I ever had between my knees. He " "Aw, can that chatter, Monk," muttered Terry. "Ain't you told me that thoity times? Don't I know it? Didn't I give you the dope on it before the start? Well, cheer up, Terry ! Some day they got to run for you." "How much money do you need to get him in shape to do himself justice?" asked Warren abruptly. "What?" The question was repeated. Terry McGurk shook his red head, rubbed it, staring meanwhile at Steppy as if he doubted his ears. "That's funny," he said at last. "That listens like a dream." "I mean it," said Warren. "Here comes Bomb Carkey a minute ago and says: 66 TWISTED TRAILS 67 'Terry, you up against it?' *Up against it hard, Bomb,' I says. 'I was drunk, you know,' he says, 'when I pulled that rough stuff.' 'That's all right, Bomb,' says I. 'I shot my wad on the wheel last night,' says Bomb, 'or I'd stake you.' And here I'm wondering why it couldn't be some guy who hadn't shot his wad who was willing to stake me and you come along, and say, why do you want to kid me, bo?" "I'll stake you if it won't cost too much," replied War- ren. "I don't know anything about the game; that's up to you. But I'll stake you to training expenses so you can get him in shape." "But what's the game?" stammered Terry. "No game. I feel he ought to have his chance. If you can get him in shape to run a full race the way he ran the first half mile it seems to me you'd win some money." "You don't know anything about the game, eh?" said Terry shrewdly after a pause. "Well, you made a pretty good guess then. If I get him in shape to go a full race at that speed he'll be right; and if he's right that's the day the ponies soit'nly will run for little Terry Mc- Gurk. How strong is your bank roll, bo? Can you scare; up five hundred berries? Fine! "Now, get me straight, bo, I can't see myself letting you stake me to training expenses for Nailer. You took a chance with Carkey for me, and and that went a long ways with me. If you want to back Terry McGurk's stable now when it's in the hole you get in on it when it pulls up to where we cash in. I've got Nailer, and I 68 TWISTED TRAILS couldn't borrow ten dollars on him from any of these wise birds round here; you've got five hundred iron men, and you you believe in the horse, don't you? All right. Fifty-fifty. What d'you say? Fine! We'll have him right for the Mardi Gras Handicap in February ! "The Hammer '11 be in it, and we'll beat him and we'll clean up. Can you slip me a hundred now, so I can square up here and ship him over to Lily City ? Oh, boy, real money! Pretty yellow strangers, you soit'nly feel good! Say, Mr. Warren say Oh, cheer up, Terry; now they got to run for you some day sure." In the betting ring beneath the grand stand Stephen passed Georges Martel and the big bookmaker. The packet of new, yellow bills was reposing in the hands of the bookmaker's cashier and Georges was returning an empty wallet to his pocket with an air of a man who has parted with nothing of the slightest significance to him- self. Georges could do that; he could carry off a desperate loss with a laugh, but with his father it was a different matter. If ever desperation had shown in the expression of a man it had shown in the drawn, ash-colored counte- nance of the aristocratic Pierre Martel when he saw The Hammer drop back to defeat. "That money must have come close to meaning life or death to the old man," thought Stephen, "and he's the man who owns the timber of Black Woods." He left the track at once, bribed a taxi driver with a heavy fee to drive back to the city as fast as he could, and in a tall building overlooking Canal Street, he went TWISTED TRAILS 69 straight to the office of his lawyer. It was after bank- ing hours, but at Stephen's behest the lawyer succeeded in converting the young man's draft for five thousand dollars into fifty new one-hundred dollar bills. With this in the inside pocket of his coat Stephen, in company with the lawyer, took his post in the St. Charles Hotel to wait for the return of the older Martel from the track. "If you're going to do any business with the Martels keep your eyes open, Warren," warned the lawyer. "They're a fine old family in name, but they've ruined themselves by gambling and other things, and there are some bad stories round about them." "All right, Gambier," replied Stephen. "I'm taking you along to see that everything's all right. There they come now. Georges goes into the bar to have a drink, and his father goes alone to his room. Fine! Come along, Gambier ; I want to talk to the old man by himself and I want to begin the talk with a good, big quotation from the works of Uncle Sam's treasury department." He wasted no time after they had been admitted to the old man's room and the greetings were over. "I am told you are the owner of the Black Woods, Mr. Martel," he said. "I want to buy the pine on it if it's for sale. I'll give you a better deal than the Hartland Company. They probably will tell you it's just an ordi- nary piece of swamp. I admit frankly it's a wonderful piece of timber. There's a lot of it. I'll cruise it care- fully with your own cruiser, and then we can agree on a just price. In the meantime I'll deposit five thousand dollars of the purchase price with you for the option, 70 TWISTED TRAILS and," he concluded, swiftly producing the proceeds of the certified check, "I'll do it right now." Mr. Martel glanced casually at the little package which Stephen had placed on the table before him, saw that it contained fifty one-hundred dollar bills and assumed an air of tolerant indifference. "They are very impetuous, these Yankees, when it is a matter o business, eh, Gambier?" said he lightly. "What makes you think I wish to sell the pine, Mr. Warren ?" "Five thousand dollars," repeated Stephen absently, riffling the crisp contents of the package. He did not look at Mattel's face, but he watched the old man's long, brown hands and the fingers were trembling. "If you want to do business, give me an option and take the money. If not I'll take it away." He riffled the yellow bills again. Mr. Martel's fingers worked nervously as Stephen made a gesture as if to return the money to his pocket. "This is not a thing to be decided so abruptly," he said with affected lightness. "I am not in the habit of selling tracts of timber so suddenly." "And I'm not asking you to close the deal right now. I'm offering you that five thousand dollars for an option, in case you want to sell. If I'm wrong, and you don't want to sell I'll take the five thousand away." "I have not said that I wish to sell it," said the old man in a faint voice, while his eyes ran desperately round the room but returned as if fascinated to the pile of ready money on the table. "I have not said I wish to sell." "Then I'm sorry to have troubled you, Mr. Martel," TWISTED TRAILS 71 Stephen swept the money into his pocket and out of sight for an instant, then drew it forth and replaced it on the table while he apparently arranged some papers in the pocket. "I have to apologize to Mr. Gambier, too, be- cause I dragged him over to draw up a memorandum in case you wished to make a deal and keep the five thou- sand. I'll have to pay him for his time, while you, Mr. Martel, will just have to forgive me for troubling you." The old man's eyes were on the money and as Stephen's hand stretched forth to sweep it out of sight again, he spoke swiftly: "It has been no trouble," said he. Stephen paused, his hand near the money. "Perhaps after all," continued Martel nervously, "I might consider selling. I I am not sure." He stretched his hand toward the money and withdrew it sharply. "An option, you say, Mr. Warren?" "Yes," said Stephen, "but if you don't want to sell there's no use talking further. If you want to sell want to give me an option right now there's the money ; but since you're not sure I suppose I'd better take it away and put it in some safe. It's too much money to lie round loose five thousand dollars." "I will sell!" Mr. Martel had risen suddenly in his chair, his long hand reaching like a claw for the money. The packet of bills crinkled and crumpled in his grasp. "Yes! I will sell!" he snapped recklessly. "Gambier, draw up the paper !" His face was flushed and swollen, and he swayed like 72 JWISTED TRAILS a drunken man. Suddenly he seemed to shrink and, as If from some invisible menace, he cowered and sank slowly back in his chair, his eyes livid with fear of something that no one save himself could see. He '.hitched the packet of bills as a drowning man clutches a rope. The struggle shook him like a dead tree in a storm, but at last he dropped the money with a sharp groan. "No! No, I cannot sell I mean, I will not sell!" He stammered. "Take your money away take it out of my sight !" he almost screamed. "You " "Martel !" said Gambier softly. Jhe old aristocrat drew himself together proudly and rose and bowed with courtly dignity. "I thank you for your offer, Mr. Warren," he said formally, bowing them from the room. "It was a privi- lege to receive it but Black Woods is not for sale." CHAPTER X OTEPHEN took the defeat of his venture with philosophic calm, as a business deal that did not go through, but Gambier knew old Martel and the latter's conduct had astounded him. "It is beyond me," said the lawyer as he and Stephen parted. "He was ready to sell his soul for ready money, but he was afraid to sell that timber. If it was any one else I would say there was something illegal about it but Martel has no respect for traditions. He has dis- graced himself long ago by flouting the law." "He looked as if he'd seen a ghost" "Yes, that was my impression too." "Do folks see ghosts down here?" "Not as a regular thing," said Gambier, "but there are some ugly stories about the Martels very ugly. Take my advice," he concluded; "have as little to do with them as possible." Warren nodded and turned toward the desk, and as he did so he saw Georges Martel emerging from the bar. In a wish to avoid him Stephen sought to slip away but Martel had seen him and it was too late. "Ah, Mr. Warren!" With no apparent movement on his part Martel somehow seemed to project himself into Steppy's path. 73 74 TWISTED TRAILS He proffered cigarettes from a gold case, produced a tiny golden lighter, laughed and chatted with such easy good fellowship that Warren at once found himself laughing and chatting in response. That the defeat of The Hammer had cost young Martel a sum large enough to hurt was the last thing that any one would have sus- pected from his manner. On the contrary one might well have supposed it was a field day for him, by the lightness of his spirits. With the effortless ease of the polished man of the world he controlled the conversa- tion, leading it playfully to the races, to the incidents of the day, including the affair with Carkey, all as if he had not a care or aim in the world. "That was skillfully done, Warren I refer to that little incident with Carkey," he said carelessly at last. "On the spur of the moment no delicate means at hand, no instinct for selection, therefore no waste of time made the best use of what you had even a sack of grain ! I have been thinking of it as a typically Yankee feat." "Well, it served," said Stephen. "Ah ! Again typically Yankee. It served. What more is to be said ? What of possible consequences ?" Steppy refused to respond with the obvious question. "There are always consequences potential conse- quences, you know, Warren. In this case for instance, your target practice with a sack of oats what lamentable consequences might it not have had." Still Steppy remained silent. "If you should enter Hartland's employ, for instance," murmured Martel softly, and waited. TWISTED TRAILS 75 Warren's countenance slowly took upon itself the non- committal expression natural to him when instinct whis- pered the approach of a crisis. He waited; already he knew that he was a better waiter than Martel. "You see, Warren, our thick-necked friend, Mr. Carkey, is a foreman over at Hartland's at Haute Isle Camp." "Really?" drawled Steppy, without a change in his tone of expression. Martel hid his irritation with a smile. "Really. As I say, Mr. Carkey a foreman at Haute Isle. A remarkable personality, Mr. Carkey. He and the position of foreman over there seem almost created for one another. As a position, frankly it is not a nice one. Hartland cannot choose the men who are willing to work in the swamps over there. Whites he must have some whites, of course do not go to work in those swamps unless there is some other compensation besides that of pay. Isolation security, for instance. It is quite out of the way over there almost out of the world one might say. Troublesome people seldom come that way sheriffs, detectives, for instance. No, they do not like to come over there, and so a white man any white man in those swamps is usually quite safe as long as he remains in them. We will not be crude; we will not say they are bad, rough boys hiding out, but you comprehend, I am sure. Well, such free, original spirits are, of course, not angels. They do not lose their peculiar characteristics simply because they are there. Control for there must be control control over them 76 TWISTED TRAILS is a problem which requires a peculiar personality for its solution. "Then there are the blacks. Children restless chil- dren with no sense of responsibility, and with the child's delight in frequent change. Quite innocent, of course, but Hartland cannot afford to have his labor force sud- denly depleted by the foolish whim of these children cannot have men quitting when they please, and going off and and bearing tales perhaps. To keep enough labor at work over there is not so easy. You see, it must be a peculiar man to control these conditions. I will say that Mr. Carkey is peculiar. "You know, of course, why he lost his chance for the heavyweight championship. No? Well, because he was too tough. Delicious, isn't it? Barred from the prize ring for being too tough. Where should such a man go? Where on earth find a place for him? Warren, there is a niche in this world for every peculiar personality in existence. There he is, Carkey, a perfect flower of his type, blooming in the soil for .which he is adapted. A little embittered, perhaps, because of a noble ambition thwarted, but perfect for his present job. You under- stand, Warren? The job the man." "Why, yes," said Steppy slowly, "but what's all that got to do with me?" Mattel expressed a volume with a smile and a shrug. "The sack of grain the peculiar Mr. Carkey his pride was touched he does not forget if you should meet over there " Another smile and a shrug. TWISTED TRAILS 77 "It gives you something to think of, I see, Warren." "Yes, it does," said Steppy. "I was wondering why you could control him and curl him up as you did with one word. I wonder if he isn't a big four-flusher." There was a moment of tense silence, though so calm were both men that none of the throng about them noticed that anything unusual was taking place. Martel laughed carelessly. "No, he is not a four-flusher; I assure you of that, Warren," said he. "See here, Martel," said Stephen suddenly, "let's be frank with one another. Have you any objection to hav- ing me as a neighbor over at Lily City ?" "My dear fellow! How could you imagine such a thing?" "All right. Then let's drop Carkey. I just had a talk with your father." "Indeed?" "I came within a shade of getting an option on Black Woods from him." Martel sobered so suddenly that he swayed forward from the shock. "But you did not get it?" he asked slowly. "No ! Your father seemed to want to sell, too. Tell me, Martel, what's wrong with Black Woods?" Martel was cold sober now. The flush had gone from his handsome face and for a moment his expression was one of suspicion and alarm. "Do you think there is something wrong about Black Woods, Warren?" he asked, his tone and manner such 78 TWISTED TRAILS that in substance he was asking: "Dare you, a Yankee outsider, question anything which concerns the Martel family?" Stephen replied deliberately: "I hadn't thought so until now," and by the uncom- fortable silence which followed he knew he had scored a hit. Martel puffed his cigarette appreciatively, his head thrown far back, his eyes staring at the ceiling. When at last he spoke it was with the manner of one who speaks the final word of discussion. "Black Woods in all confidence, Warren Black Woods is an excellent spot for you to forget." "In all confidence," retorted Stephen, "what is wrong with that tract? What is the mystery ?" "Forget it absolutely," repeated Martel, turning away. "Especially forget that you fancy there is some- thing wrong about it." CHAPTER XI ^THOROUGHLY nettled by Martel's manner Stephen set out at once to find Mr. Hartland. His mind was made up. Hitherto Black Woods had interested him as a business proposition, but Georges Martel, by his words and attitude, had removed the matter from that category and had made it a personal affair. There was enough of the boy left in Warren t be lured by the ad- venture which Black Woods promised; and there was enough of the fighter in him to be roused by Martel's command, disguised as advice, to forget about the tract. He considered the strange conduct of Martel, Senior. There was something wrong with the tract, that was sure. Gambier had given the Martels a black reputa- tion and had hinted at certain ugly stories. It was all interesting, all alluring, and in the midst of all came the white-hot memory of Georges Martel and his bestial gesture behind Estella Reid's back, and the look in her eyes which hinted tragedy. Stephen recalled the three rifle shots which had driven him from the Woods two days before and smiled. It was rather obvious that visitors to Black Woods were not desired; and the conduct of Georges and his father implied that there were serious reasons for this desire for exclusiveness. And Estella Reid had smiled at Stephen when she recognized him at the track. 79 80 TWISTED TRAILS Warren went to Mr. Hartland's room determined to tell him that he was not ready to accept the position at Lily City until he had investigated Black Woods ; but to his surprise Hartland called out: "You're a fine one! I was just starting on the war- path for you." "And I was looking for you, Mr. Hartland. I " "Whoa!" Hartland held up a broad solid hand. "Hold up a minute. This is a serious matter, a mighty serious matter. Don't you know it is?" "I don't know what you mean." "Mighty mighty serious," continued Hartland, wagging his iron-gray head ominously. "Why, I was beginning to get acclimated, Warren; getting into step with the climate ; and here you come along and give me a prod by reminding me of how things ought to be done. Haven't you got any mercy on a fat old man who's quit hustling? Yes, sir, it's serious so darn serious that you and I have got to hunt up a nice quiet place and have a nice big dinner before discussing the matter any further." "But we haven't discussed it at all," protested Stephen. "I looked you up to tell you " "Stop! Business is business, but dinner at La Creole is an art. I've been severely shocked by your conduct, young feller, and I won't be fit to discuss it until we've seen what little Charley Benoit can do for what ails us." Little Charley Benoit could and did do much for them. La Creole Restaurant was known for its food rather than for its jazz, and the tiny proprietor led the pair to TWISTED TRAILS 81 a quiet table, appraised their tastes and capacities ex- pertly, and thereupon proceeded to give his art full sway. Through the smoke of a Corona following the thick black coffee at the end of the meal Hartland at last turned a twinkling scrutiny upon Stephen and chuckled : "Young feller, what were you trying to do to old Martel? Trying to steal a march on me, eh? Ha! You've got your nerve! Yes, sir, you've got a lot of brass. It it's just what I would have tried to do when I was your age." Between leisurely puffs at his cigar Stephen responded : "Well! The old gentleman must have made rather quick time bringing the news to you." "He didn't. Not a word have I heard from him. Haven't even see him." "You've seen Georges then?" "Nope." "Gambier?" "Nope." "I've had three guesses; I give up," laughed Stephen, "How did you hear about it?" Hartland chuckled with relish. "Old Martel's pretty ward, Miss Reid, told me," said he. "Lord, what a girl she is. If she wasn't a lady she would be a regular spit-fire when her temper is up. She certainly did rake you over the coals, Warren." Stephen blessed the size and quality of his cigar which made it possible for him to instantly mask his counte- nance behind a dense cloud of smoke. "Did she?" he asked casually. 83 TWISTED TRAILS "She did. She was disappointed in you. She had been foolish enough to fancy you were a little different from the ordinary money-grabber. Of course, she had been a fool for ever permitting such a notion to enter her head. One has only to look at your jaw, and your clothes, to know you're a typical sample of that abomina- tion known as a snappy business man." Hartland suddenly gave vent to the explosive laughter which had been welling up in him. "Man, Oh, boy! She certainly did tell me what she thought of you. She was disappointed; no question about that. She wanted to know if I was thinking of bringing that sort of a man meaning you to Lily City ?" "What did you reply ?" asked Stephen. "I said, 'You bet your pretty little boots I am if he'll come,' " was the emphatic answer. "And then she sailed into me. That was just what was to be expected of my kind. She had known it all the time the first time she laid eyes on me. And you, too. We are a couple of low money-grabbers. It shows all over us. Please don't ever speak to her again. The idea of your rushing into old Martel's room when he was ill in bed and trying to bully him into selling Black Woods." "What!" Stephen sat up so violently that the pink candle-shades on the table danced dangerously. "The very idea !" continued Hartland. "A brute. A low, sneaking brute, that's what you are. Well, what are you staring at. It's so, isn't it?" "No!" TWISTED TRAILS 8& "Hell!" laughed Hartland. "I'm disappointed." "Mr. Martel was not ill when Gambier and I saw him in his room." "He wasn't?" "No, sir. He was well enough to grab my option money and throw it back at me and show us out of the room." "Tell me about it!" cried Hartland; and Stephen re- lated the story of what had taken place in the elder Mattel's room. He said nothing of his meeting with Georges, regarding that as purely a personal matter. "I see," chuckled Hartland behind his cigar. "It was your strongarm tactics that put him in bed. He switched the story a little to Miss Reid ; said you found him in bed. He's sort of slippery, Martel is." "I don't see why he should trouble to lie about a straight business proposition like that." "No," said Hartland slowly, "unless it wasn't all straight on his part. There's something a little funny about that piece of timber. If you had come to me first I could have told you it wouldn't work, even though your psychology was right on the ready cash proposition." "How could you know ?" demanded Stephen. "Well, you see, Warren," Hartland paused to grin, "I've been trying to buy that timber myself for the last two years." "Ouch!" exclaimed Stephen. "Cheer up! I haven't succeeded. You did better than I did ; you kept your money. The old rip got three thou- sand out of me for an option." 84. TWISTED TRAILS "The more I hear of Mr. Martel," said Stephen, "the worse he gets. He had sold you an option on Black Woods and yet he was going to sell one to me. He's good ! How long does your option hold ?" "That's the funny part of it," responded Hartland. "There's a hitch in the deal. Did he make any stipula- tion to you? No? Well, it's very unbusinesslike. I started in to get the piece two years ago, feeling him out to get his lowest price. A year ago I offered him a hun- dred thousand dollars flat. That's almost half as much as the thing's worth. And still he wouldn't sell. A while back he began to be more willing to listen to reason. I suppose he was hard up for money. At all events, a couple of months ago, about the time his ward, Miss Reid, came back from school he offered me an option for five thousand dollars which is what I'd offered him right along. He got three thousand ; I made him come down. But heaven knows when I'll be able to exercise the blamed thing." "Why won't he sell outright? What's the hitch?" "It's that darned stipulation on the option. I shouldn't have agreed to it ; it isn't business. I've been rooting and praying for it to come off. Pray with me, will you, Warren? Then we can log Black Woods. Are you rooting?" "Certainly," laughed Stephen. "What's the stipula- tion?" "Martel will sell Black Woods to me as soon as his son Georges they're engaged marries Miss Reid." Stephen was conscious that he was mechanically go- TWISTED TRAILS 85 ing through the motions of dropping the ashes of his cigar upon the ash tray, of lifting the cigar to his lips and sending forth a cloud of smoke, but the movements were those of an automaton, subconscious, instinctive movements to conceal his true state of mind. His mind was a complete blank. Hartland's words had numbed him for the moment, mentally as well as physically. Es- tella Reid marry Georges Martel! He listened to Mr. Hartland's further remarks with apparent interest, but this, too, was only a phase of intuitive pretense, for all he heard, all that he could assimilate just then was the news that Estella was to marry Georges. "They've got it all arranged old families joining you know they never marry outside don't know when it's coming off Help me root for their making it soon." "Sure," said Stephen. He had so far recovered from his numbness that he was conscious of a chill spreading over his body. It seemed to creep along his spine and to spread from there to the tips of his fingers. He felt empty. He felt terribly alone; and like a sudden rush he was warm again, and flooded with confusion. Why had he permitted this to affect him so? The trouble was that he had not permitted it, or been consciously concerned in it at all. It had been bigger than that ; bigger, stronger than himself. It had been to him as a wild flood is to a wisp of straw, and he had been caught and swept out of himself by the sudden, irre- 86 TWISTED TRAILS sistible upheaval of his deepest emotions. Estella to marry Georges Martel ! In the lightninglike vision which comes once or twice in a lifetime, in great crises, he saw them as lovers, as a newly-wedded pair. He wondered if Hartland had observed the shudder that passed over liim. Then he began to fight back to sanity and common- sense. What of it? Why should it concern him? He had barely spoke to her and she to him. And she had believed that he had forced his way to old Martel's sick- bed with a business deal; she had told Hartland it was just what she had expected of him. She "What are you laughing at?" demanded Hartland. "What what a hell of a stipulation in a business deal !" exploded Warren. "I know, not businesslike, but it was that or no option." "You ought to pay them to hasten the happy day!" Stephen was laughing uproariously. "Why, it's as good as a book, Hartland! You've got to get them married to get that timber. It it's the funniest thing I ever heard of in my life!" "Well it isn't so funny to me. Old Martel has got three thousand from me," said Hartland grimly. "Play match-maker, get them married." "All right. Maybe it is a joke." "Maybe? Why, it's immense, Hartland!" "All right," said Hartland. "Now let's talk business. You've got to come with me. I'll give you a good deal I'll give you a crack at the Black Woods deal. Then you can try your hand at hastening the happy event. I need a new superintendent. I need a man at Lily City I can TWISTED TRAILS 87 depend on up to the hilt and I need him right away. The payroll money is getting too big for young Landry to handle alone. Good boy, you know, but well, Pete Martel, the sheriff over there, doesn't seem to have any luck keeping the Snake from making a haul every so often, and if I were a robber of course, my competitors say I am, but that's all right if I were robbing with a gun for a living and you were taking care of some money, I believe I'd size you up and leave that money alone. That's one reason. "Now, there's Camp Haute Isle, too. Bomb Carkey's foreman down there. A good man, you know, but," Hartland lapped h-is head, "a whole lot of bone up there. It means I need a walking boss between the two places. You take it, Warren ; and when Georges gets married or anything else happens so Martel will sell Black Woods you get first crack at the deal. I'll turn my option over to you. How does it sound to you ?" Stephen had smothered the impulse to vent his mood in bitter laughter, and was as hard and cold as steel. In the few minutes that Hartland had rattled on about his need for a new superintendent his listener had fought and won a battle. A man couldn't mix anything else with business ; that much was certain. A girl who could look at a man the way she had done in the grand stand, and a few hours later talk about him as she had done to Hartland Oh, hell! They were all that way. What was the use of letting it bother a fellow? Accept them as they were;, don't take them seriously; put them entirely out of mind. 88 TWISTED TRAILS "Will you draw up an agreement to that effect, Hart- land?" he asked. "That's the boy that's business !" said Hartland. "I will, gladly." "All right. You've hired some one." "Fine! 'When can you take hold over there?" "When is the next train?" "That's the way to talk, Warren! And let me tell you, my boy, I sincerely hope you'll soon have the chance to get at Black Woods. Warren, here's hoping Miss Reid will soon be Mrs. Georges Mattel !" Stephen raised his glass in response. His hand trem- bled in spite of himself. At last he fairly roared : "Here's hoping!" CHAPTER XH TT was perhaps at night, preferably a night of light shifting clouds and a pale autumn moon, when the bayou's water was sprinkled with black and silver, when the tops of the great trees were alight with the moon and the spaces beneath them were great caverns of mystery and gloom relieved only by rays of moonlight filtering through the foliage, that Lily City was to be seen at its best. The flitting moonlight, suggested rather than re- vealed; it fascinated and lured with promise rather than with broad fulfillment. A corner of a stately mansion, a drifting pirogue with a pair of deeply engrossed young folk in it, a bower of roses, a deep, bosomed negress crooning laughingly to her child, and everywhere the inevitable evening promenade which the coming of eve- ning coolness brings forth in all warm climes. There were snatches of song and soft laughter; and the atmos- phere was like the ineffably contented sigh of a woman happy in her love. Stephen Warren stood on the pier of the Hartland Mill and looked across the light-streaked bayou toward the lights of Lily City. It was the evening after his first day in charge of the plant. In the saw-mill behind him tiny electric lights gleamed in the darkness and the clang of a saw told of a gang working overtime. To and fro 89 90 TWISTED TRAILS past an open window shot a log carriage bearing a log against the saws. The huge black sawyer rode the car- riage with the grip of a gorilla, his long arms handling the levers with uncanny ease. A ripping sound as the saws whipped through the log, a whist of steam as the carriage came shooting back, reset the log, and flashed back to the saws. The carriage came to a standstill, empty, and the big black leaned easily on the levers. "That's all," came a white man's voice. "Shut 'er off." The whirr of the saws and the throb of an engine ceased. The long low building grew silent. Silent men came forth, white with saw-dust, tamping tobacco into their pipes or rolling cigarettes, not to be lighted till they had passed through the gate of the mill-yard with its one- armed old watchman. Then burning tobacco perfumed the night air, and said the night watchman: "How does work feel for a change, eh? He'll make you like it. Good-night, boys." There was plenty to do at the mill. There was plenty to keep a man who had accepted the doctrine that girls were fickle jades, so occupied as to preclude his thinking about anything but the task in hand, if he so desired. Lily City Mill was a large, modern plant in need of a Man, without which even the largest and most modern plants are elaborately inefficient. As Stephen had en- tered the yard that morning under the escort of the head sawyer who was temporarily in charge he sensed at once the haphazard fashion in which the mill was operating, TWISTED TRAILS 91 and set his jaw with grim satisfaction over the man-sized job that was before him. As he rolled up his sleeves, both figuratively and literally, he experienced the sense of satisfaction which conies to the expert putting his hand to the wheel, and for the time being he was quite sure that the emotional disturbance of the day before was a thing of the past, an inconsequential incident, done for, forgotten. But, he also thought with an inward chuckle, there would be a surprise for the Martels and Estella when they grew tired of the races and returned to find him boss of the Lily City mill. As Mr. Hartland had said, Johnson, the manager who had preceded Stephen at Lily City, had succumbed to the climate. It had "got him." A tall, blonde Scandi- navian by race, he had required the bracing air of his native North to keep stirred the wells of energy latent in his large frame. Under the caressing sun of Lazy Land he had softened, slowed up and succumbed to the lure and languor of the bayous. He had married a Cajun girl as small and dark as he was large and fair, had built himself a shallow-draft lugger and said to Hartland: "Take your old job; I've found something better." With his tiny wife as crew, he had manned the lugger and drifted down the bayou, down through swamps and lakes and bays to a lazy, contented fisherman's existence in the sun of the Gulf of Mexico. The mill, which was a comparatively new plant, had sagged badly and Stephen saw a world of labor awaiting him in the task of bringing equipment and personnel up to a proper pitch of efficiency. 92 TWISTED TRAILS "Smoke up," chuckled the sawyer to his men. "Things have changed in this mill, niggers. We got a lumber man here now." From the log pond, where the towboats emerged from the swamps to turn their long tow of logs over to the endless chains which gripped them and hauled them up the chutes to the carriers which passed them on to the whirling saws, to the loading yards where the finished lumber went forth in trainloads, Stephen went over the plant that day, seeking to speed it up to full capacity production. The plant was good, all it needed was a man to run it. Up to this time the supply of logs had been more than adequate to the capacity of the mill. Time and again the towboats had been forced to wait for space in the log pond to deposit their tows. But before the day was over this was changed. By nightfall the pond was empty, and the great saws whirred aim- lessly, waiting for the boats to bring up more logs. The supply of saw logs must be increased. And the logs came from Camp Haute Isle, where Carkey, the ex- bruiser, was foreman. "I'll go down there and jack them up," said Stephen as he stood in the moonlight and looked at the empty log pond. He had worked hard enough during the day to send him to bed with the sense of a day well spent, but to retire was the last thought in his mind. He had accomplished enough to give him the sense of satisfaction which comes to the expert at his craft, and his mind was busy with new ideas and plans for the morrow ; and yet it all did not satisfy. TWISTED TRAILS 93 Perhaps it was his loneliness, perhaps the cavernous darkness of the mill buildings, tomb-like now in their silence, and emptiness; but at all events Stephen turned from the mill and stared across the placid bayou toward where the lights of Lily City were reflected upon the water. He was thinking of Black Woods and the Mar- tels. That was business. Hei had an interest in the future of that timber. He steeled himself and refused to let his thoughts stray from his business. Black Woods might mean a lot to him. He owed it to himself to find out all he could about the tract, why the Martels were so mysterious about it; if possible when he might expect to profit by Mr. Hartland's option. Doc- tor Thibodeaux he smiled as he thought of him. Doctor Thibodeaux would know. Stephen stepped into a pirogue and paddled across the bayou to the mirrored lights of Lily City and turned his steps toward the house of Dr. Armand Thibodeaux. It was a moonlight night, and the water of the bayou was like a silver mirror, occasionally ruffled by a bit of floating lily drift. The shell road about the bay gleamed in a white crescent; and within the grounds of the mansions of Lily City the black shadows of trees lay like islands upon a sea of silver light. Stephen entered the doctor's gallery and knocked lightly at the door marked Office. Through the screen door he could see the little doctor as he had first beheld him, stretched out in the deck chair, the inevitable holder and cigarette in his mouth, and his attention apparently concentrated upon the hideous gargoyle Solomon, which 94 TWISTED TRAILS leered down from the wall. By no sign did the doctor indicate that he had heard. So Stephen said : "Pardon me, doctor, are you busy?" "As you see," came the instant response. "I don't wish to intrude." "But you do, nevertheless, being a Yankee." "Yes," said Stephen, a little nettled, "I do being a Yankee. And you, being a physician, ought to turn round and ask what's the matter when a potential patient presents himself." "You are not a potential patient/* "How do you know ? You haven't seen me." "Do you think I am a child, that I must see with the eyes?" demanded the doctor impatiently. "I have ears. I can hear. I heard your step upon the gallery and your knock. I hear your voice now. You do not need or desire medical assistance." "Guilty !" laughed Warren. "I want to talk with you about Black Woods." "I am not interested. Speak to the Martels." "I did," said Stephen; and he told of how he had bargained for Black Woods and of Pierre Martel's weird refusal at the end. He had meant to speak of the strange clause in the option, but the words stuck. After all, he would not bring her into his business. Doctor Thibodeaux waited until the tale was ended before moving. Then he twisted himself round and stared at his visitor for a moment. The deck chair flew into a corner, the doctor lit on his feet before Stephen. "Come !" said he, grasping the young man's arm. "We TWISTED TRAILS 95 can speak better outdoors. You have asked, and I will tell you something about the Martels. At night, that is the time to talk of them, and in the dark. It comports itself with the dark, unhappy Martel soul." Doctor Thibodeaux led the way through the house and through a rear door into a garden thickly planted with rosebushes. In the heart of the garden was a tiny pa- goda, and from it, through a vista in the bushes, was to be seen a streak of moonlight on the bayou and its float- ing lilies. As they seated themselves the doctor again laid his hand on Stephen's arm, after the manner of a scientist carelessly interested in the appraisal of mildly interesting material. "Yes, yes, a very fine male specimen of the two-legged animal of the alleged civilized type," said he. "Among my old friends, the Marquesas Islanders, the young women would scarcely look at you. My young friend, I wonder if you know anything worth knowing? At first sight of you I seemed to see comprehension in your eyes. I wonder if I am right? What have you in that head of yours? Is there in it any true comprehension of life? Any real intelligence? Or merely the usual dreary storehouse of alleged facts with which the white man drugs his immortal soul down to the sad levels of civilization, and which he calls education? Listen, Yan- kee, I have seen a Kanaka pilot, to whom you would be a plaything, kicked out of a whaleboat for being a weak- ling; and a sacred llama, at whose feet I sat respect- fully, scourged from a Tibetan monastery for a fool. Shall I tell you the great difference between the civilized 96 TWISTED TRAILS white man and the alleged savage? It is that the sav- age is not a hypocrite. And the most savage animal on the face of the earth ? It is the educated, civilized white man on the trail of money." Doctor Thibodeaux placed a new cigarette in the long holder, and blew out a fresh puff of smoke. "What an ass is man!" he broke out enthusiastically. "He makes a virtue of movement, of travel. He pur- sues the thing which does not exist, the reward which his instincts promise him. He is so self-important that he considers it important that he must move about on the earth and see with his own eyes." "Referring to me, doctor?" chuckled Warren. "Referring to myself, Yankee. See what comes of it. If I had remained here on the bayou, keeping slug- gish Cajun livers properly agitated with proper doses of calomel, I would naturally have assumed my proper re- sponsibilities, and I, instead of Pierre Martel, would have been the guardian of my niece, my sister's daugh- ter, Estella Reid. But, no. I am one of those who must see the great world. I must go here and there, must live in the tents of all sorts of people black, red, yellow must see them at peace and at war, at work and at love. I must adventure. So I do just that. It has been my life, until I have satisfied my colossal curiosity and acquired common sense. Then I come home and cultivate my roses. I assure you they are much more worth while than man. But then it is too late." CHAPTER XIII HAT is too late ?" asked Stephen to break the long pause that followed; but Doctor Thibodeaux waited until the mood moved him before continuing. "While I am busily poking my nose into the tents of far-away tribes the call of duty to my own my sister and her flesh and blood sounded, and I was not here to answer it. While I am away my sister is married to a Northerner named Thomas Reid. He dies, and my sis- ter also; there is left alone the daughter, my niece Estella. Pierre Martel, the grand seigneur of the par- ish, is appointed her guardian; and all because a fool, named Armand Thibodeaux, in his young days had the restless feet. "Of course, it is not to be said that I would have been a more businesslike manager than old Martel. On the other hand, I do not gamble not since I have discovered the thrill of growing roses. Pierre Martel all the Mar- tels gamble as you breathe. They have been masters so long it is natural for them to feel all things should obey their whims, the whirl of a little ball on a wheel, a horse on a track, a card in a box or pack. But these things have whims of their own." He flipped the cigarette out of the holder with an im- patient twist of his wrist. 97 98 TWISTED TRAILS "Five years ago," he broke out suddenly. "Estella was fifteen then. That was when I came back to the bayou. She was bare-footed, she was bare-legged, and it was morning. She was sitting on a log down there by the lily bed fishing for catfish in the bay. Wild? The eagles in the swamp are no wilder. That was how they had let her grow up the Martels. Can one have money to waste on one's ward when the little ball on the roulette wheel or the horses on the track or the card in the faro box refuse to obey one's imperious will? First the elder Martel, then young Georges, the son. It has been a heavy load for the property to carry. First the Martel property went; it is mortgaged as far as it will go. Then Estella's the child's. "Fifteen she was, a child, but beautiful. Her skirt reached only to her knees, and her long round legs were sunburned and scratched by briars. It was summer then, but in the autumn she was to have a long dress, and stockings and shoes. Yes, yes, yes ; in the autumn. For then they were going to send her to the convent. She was to have one year of it before becoming the bride of Georges Martel. "You see, my young friend, when one has done queer little tricks with a property it is prudent and convenient to have the ward become a member of the family. So they were going to put her in the convent for one year, and then, having grown old enough, she would have been marched to the altar and" his thin brown hand flashed up, tore a rose from its stem and crushed it ruthlessly "like that. But you see, I did come back. Just in time. TWISTED TRAILS 99 Had I been the proper type I would have come back with money. Having no money I made use of what I had. That was a complete disregard for the life of an enemy, and not a too high regard for my own. It is the latter, young man, I assure you, that is the sword. The Martels possess the first of these qualities but not the latter. So I took Estella from them." "Bully!" cried Steppy. The doctor turned upon him with a quizzical smile. "You find something to admire in that, my young friend?" "Great! Go on." "I am a good raconteur, then?" dallied the doctor. "Oh, come on!" said Warren impatiently. "What did they do?" "They did nothing. It had come to that point where men who appraised their own lives a little too highly could do nothing. I had looked into the eyes of Es- tella, and I had said that the flame in them should not be snuffed out by the walls of the convent and the arms of Georges Martel. Not at least until the mind was grown, and the girl could understand and choose for her- self. "Thus I had something to make money for, so I began to practice again. It is the one thing in my life I have done as it should be done. The sick Cajuns of the parish did not know why I made them pay so promptly. Other doctors did not know why I worked so hard. Five years in a Northern school. It costs money. Gowns could I have her poorly dressed ? She 100 TWISTED TRAILS had displayed her scratched, brown legs long enough. And now she is home, and the Martels are after her again. It seems that it is very important that Georges marries her. If he does, I presume they will patch up something by throwing both properties into one, sacri- ficing Estella's perhaps to save their own." He paused abruptly, pulled down a small rose, sniffed it, and let it fly back while he lay in his chair, staring straight up at the dark sky. "Was her father a good business man?" asked Stephen after a pause. The doctor sat up. "Why in the name of all the devils of civilization did you ask that?" he demanded. "That is what has been puzzling me. Thomas Reid was a good business man. He turned the old plantation here into a gold mine. He was method itself. And yet he left things as he did entirely in Martel's charge. Is it comprehensible to you?" "Of course, he left papers if he was a business man," said Stephen. "That is what I have told myself," rejoined the doc- tor, "but he did not nothing. I cannot understand it that Reid should not have left my sister and the child properly provided for. It was not in keeping with his character. Something has been lost or hidden or stolen. Yankee, what did old Martel look like when he gave back your money and said no?" "He looked as if he had seen a ghost," said Stephen. "Perhaps he did, who knows? A guilty conscience may produce the effect of hallucinations, and the con- TWISTED TRAILS 101 science of Pierre Mart el must be black, if he has one. Let us sum up: There is my niece's ruined property, which should be worth a fortune; there is Pierre Martel as her guardian, and Pierre Martel is in the clutches of Felix Dautrive, the money lender. And now we have the Snake and a ghost. What a pretty little devil's brew it is, to be sure!" * "The Snake? You mean this outlaw? What in the world has he to do with this, doctor?" Doctor Thibodeaux turned to Stephen as if he had just become conscious of his presence. "You are going to remain in Lily City, Mr. Warren ?" he asked formally. "Yes." Doctor Thibodeaux was suddenly up on his feet. "Good night, Yankee," said he. "Go home and pon- der upon the wicked greediness of man. I return to my communion with my honest friend Solomon. Solo- mon has no illusions, therefore I can endure his com- pany with pleasure." "By the way, doctor," interposed Stephen, "I've been wondering why you have spoken to me, a stranger, like this?" "Why did you come to me and ask you a stranger to me?" "Business. I am interested in Black Woods in a business way." "You man," said Dr. Thibodeaux emphatically, "your education has failed you. It has not taught you how to lie. Good night." CHAPTER XIV HTERRY McGURK had not been idle. Neither had he gone to the bookmakers with the hundred dol- lars given him by Stephen, as might have been sup- posed. Temptation had whispered seductively, as it al- ways whispered when he felt money crinkling in his pocket, but he had resisted with an effort. Terry had worked at a regular occupation as time-keeper at Lily City Mill for several weeks and to his sporting spirit, accustomed to the irregular, if precarious, existence of the race-track follower, the regular hours, the steady task, the responsibility were as the walls and bars of a prison. For no one else in the world but Nailer would he have submitted himself to the trying ordeal of steady work ; for no one else would he have resisted the tempta- tion to begin at once the problematical but thrilling ven- ture of running a hundred dollars up to a bank roll. But all men have a fetish before which they serve, and to hard, weazened, little Terry McGurk the unproved bay colt served as this symbol. He had said that he owned Nailer, but he would have been more accurate had he admitted that Nailer owned him. The colt represented the only ideal the boy had ever known, a perfect race- horse. The world might scoff at Nailer, and did; at least such small part of it as was aware of his existence. 102 TWISTED TRAILS 103 Horses which were no better than rank second raters might race him off his feet and show him the way to the wire ; it made no difference to Terry. His faith was too deep, too instinctive to be ruffled even. In the presence of the horse he renewed his faith after each discourage- ment; with each set-back the determination to prove the quality of the colt grew a little firmer. Nor was it selfishness which prompted and confirmed Terry in this resolution. None knew better than he the wealth and fame which would accrue to him as the owner if, rather when, Nailer should race according to his expectations. But though Terry appreciated to the ultimate the pleas- ures of life which money may purchase, it was not for the sake of himself but Nailer that he resolved to bring the horse into his own ; and only he who has loved a race- horse will understand why. Therefore, the book makers saw none of the hundred dollars in Terry's pocket. He paid the board bill of Nailer, bought an extra blanket from a trainer, and turned his back upon the track and New Orleans. On the morning after Stephen's visit to Dr. Thibo- deaux the way- freight shunted a box car down the sid- ing to the white-washed cattle chute at Lily City and a grimy, weary little figure emerged from the side door leading a weary, beaten looking horse. Truly it was no impressive appearance that Terry and Nailer made upon their arrival at Lily City. A day and a night in a box-car had not tended to improve Nailer's health and spirits, and as for Terry he had not closed his eyes the night through. The colt stood with uncertain legs on 104 TWISTED TRAILS ,the soft black ground beside the tracks and hung his 'head with weariness. The clean sun and air, the thick green grass at his feet, and the quiet and peace of his new surroundings failed to arouse in him one discernible trace of interest. He turned a soft, mournful eye on Terry, and Terry, smitten to the heart, looked away. "Hey! There ain't any glue factory here." Terry jumped as if some one had struck him foully from behind. The descent of the horse at the cattle chute had attracted a trickling of loafers from the sta- tion with Sheriff Pete Martel and his attenuated deputy, Lejeune, in the lead. " "Mebbe you figure on starting a glue factory over at the Mill?" continued the Sheriff, in the character of a wit before his toadies. "No," snapped Terry, "I brought him out here to catch The Snake." The Sheriff was taken aback, but he countered : "Going to turn detective, kid?" "Not me," said Terry. "Jackasses haven't made good, so I thought something with horse sense might be a help." "Don't get smart, kid," growled Pete : "whatever you do, don't try to get smart with me." "And don't you get to talking 'glue' about my horse!" flared Terry. "Nobody's going to knock that horse, don't care who he is?" "You allow that it is a horse, do you, Terry?" drawled Lejeune good-humoredly. "Oh, hello, Lejeune; that you?" greeted Terry. TWISTED TRAILS 105 "Thought it was a fishpole somebody had stuck in the ground." "You shore'll have to stuff a right smart of feed into that bone-bag to make it look like an animal, Terry." "Oh, I don't know. Not any more than it would take to make you look human." "You better get him out of here if he can move," said the Sheriff. "If he dies here I'll run you in and it will cost you to have him hauled away." A terrible, bleak smile spread across Terry's hard mouth as he sought for words strong enough to reply and failed. Nailer, hearing the harsh voice and sensing the sheriff's threatening presence, laid back his small shapely ears and raised a hind hoof suggestively. "Hey, Nailer, Nailer!" cried Terry, pulling him for- ward. "Come away from there! Want to go spoil- ing your feet?" Heartened a little by the conviction that he had not come off second best in this chaste and elegant exchange of repartee Terry turned his back upon the sheriff and set forth, leading Nailer, to find Warren. He was sorely disappointed. Warren was only mildly interested in the advent of Nailer. "That's so," he recalled, "you said you were going to train him over here. If it interferes with your job you'll have to make room for a new time-keeper." Terry puzzled desperately for some time over the al- tered attitude of his benefactor before the light of under- standing flashed over him. The Big Fellow was on the job; that was the difference. All right; he would get 106 TWISTED TRAILS on the job, too. Nailer went into the livery stable for the day and Terry went back to the slavery of work. When evening came he sped for the barn and to his re- lief found Nailer beginning to evince an interest in his oats. The peace and quiet of his new surroundings had proved so beneficial to the bay that, colt like, he pranced about at Terry's appearance, impatient at being impris- oned in the stall all day. Terry never tired of feasting his eyes upon Nailer, of following the lines of his perfect conformation, from the delicacy of the nostrils to the hang of the tail, or of noting the fire in the racer's eye. The horse was to him a dream nay, a thousand dreams! come true. And this specimen of perfection was his, Terry Mc- Gurk's, to care for, to nurse and to bring into his own, and to profit by. The reflection always made him feel humble. Reverently he saddled the colt, mounted, and rode forth. The evening shadows were lengthening, and the heat of the day had given way to a suggestion of coolness. A pair of saddle fillies stood tied before a store, and the colt, catching the scented air in his nostrils, threw up his head and gave vent to a trumpeted whinny which shattered the evening peace with the imperious message that a young thoroughbred stallion was among those present. Terry turned the colt's head away from the little street by the bayou and rode beneath the arched magnolia on the way toward the open country. Nailer was content to go at a walk, and by this Terry knew how poor was his condition. But there was a whole winter, in which TWISTED TRAILS 107 Nailer would have nothing to do but browse in the favor- able climate of Lily City, and grow strong for the Mardi Gras Handicap. He would not be ready for training for several weeks to come. Then Terry would start him off with light work-outs to harden him for the serious conditioning to come, and two weeks before the Mardi Gras he would go to New Orleans into the expert hands of Pop Daly for a final polishing off for the great con- test. Terry thrilled at the thought and sat up with a jerk. He was passing the gloomy grounds of the Martel place and in the stately white house hidden behind a great hedge lights were gleaming. Terry pulled up. He had not realized that it was growing so late. As he pre- pared to turn about a dog bayed savagely on the lawn. It was Herod, the great boar-hound which Terry knew was kept locked in the house when Georges was away. "That you, Pete?" came Georges' voice from the gloom near the veranda. "No," said Terry, a little shaken. He swung round and sent Nailer back toward town at the trot. At the stable he was greeted by Lejeune who from a comfortable rest on an upturned bucket grinned up in friendly fashion. "I believe he is a horse, after all, Terry," said the deputy as Terry dismounted. "He shore looks a lot better'n he did this morning." "Does he?" demanded Terry eagerly. "Shore does. He's picked up fast. Do you own him, or does that new mill-boss. Warren, own him?" 108 TWISTED TRAILS "I do." Lejeune scratched his head. "Shore seems to me somebody did say Warren was a horseman." "Nope," said Terry, "he ain't." "Know him well, do you, Terry?" "Who Mr. Warren? Oh, so so." "I mean do you know anything about where he come from and how come he's over here?" Terry was in the act of hanging Nailer's bridle on the peg beside the stall and for the first time he sensed that there was something unusual about Lejeune's speech and conduct. There was a directness and an air of pur- pose about Lejeune which sat uncomfortably upon him, and Terry debated his answer while hanging up the bridle. "Oh, I know a few things about him," said he cas- ually. "Know what he was doing before he came here?" Again Terry debated. "Lumbering." "Know how he happened to come here?" "Hartland sent for him." "Got any idea what he was doing down there in the swamp the other day?" "Cruising timber." Lejeune uncrossed and recrossed his long legs. "You'n me are friends, you know, Terry," said he. "I just got sort of curious. Do you reckon he's a de- tective?" TWISTED TRAILS 109 "Him the Big Fellow a dick?" exploded Terry. "How do you get that way ? No ! He's mill-boss ; ain't that good enough for you. He's the works. Think any dick living has got brains enough to run a saw-mill like Hartland's? I should say not!! If he did he wouldn't be a dick." "Reckon that's right, too, mebbe," chuckled Lejeune rising. "Shore sounds like sense." "Wait a minute, Lejeune." Terry's mind was work- ing rapidly. There was something behind this and if it concerned the Big Fellow it was his duty to try to find out. Therefore he wickedly took advantage of the lanky deputy's known weakness. "I was just going down to Bicou's and get a bite to eat." Lejeune paused. He looked at Terry sadly. "Why do you want to go tell me that and make me feel bad?" he said mournfully. "You look sort of empty yourself, Lejeune." "Shore am." "You look as if you could put away a little bite your- self." "Shore could." "Well, come along and keep me company," said Terry artfully. "I got a piece of coin and I hate to eat alone." The restaurant of Lafayette Bicou, Fish a Specialty, was an old house-boat moored on the bayou front, and here Terry McGurk guilefully, with the aid of Bicou's crisp brown catfish, proceeded to lay snares for the heart and confidences of the impressionable Lejeune. When he was hungry, and he was always so, food was to 110 TWISTED TRAILS young Lejeune something akin to what whiskey is to the drunkard. He could not resist it when put before him; he would never refuse it when offered; and its con- sumption seemed to create in him only an insatiable yearning for more. At the sight of him stooping to enter the low door of the house-boat the pudgy face of Lafayette Bicou, the proprietor, grew morose and truc- ulent. "Lejeune, you owe me eight bits," said he ominously. "That's all right, Lafe," said Terry easily. "Le- Jeune's going to have a bite with me." "You going to pay?" "Sure." "For him?" "Yes." "Let me see your money!" Satisfied of Terry's solvency Bicou retired to his skil- lets and began to fry fish, saying with a glance at Le- jeune: "Tell me when to stop." "Needn't stop on my account, Lafe," chuckled Le- jeune. "Just keep right on frying." "When did the Martels get back?" asked Terry cas- ually when the meal was before them. "This afternoon," replied the deputy. "What happened to 'em? They came back all of a sudden, didn't they?" Lejeune was too busily engaged with serious matters to reply. "They had intended to stay over till the Mississippi Stakes and that isn't till day after to-morrow." TWISTED TRAILS 111 It would have been physically impossible for Lejeune to have spoken without danger of choking and he was in no mind to expose himself to such a risk. "How did they come to suspect that Warren is a de- tective?" demanded Terry sharply. "Didn't know they did, Terry." "Who told you to feel me out about him?" "Pete Pete Martel." Terry pondered a moment. "Was Pete up to Martel's since they came back ?" A nod answered the question in the affirmative. "And then Pete came to you and sent you fishing round me?" Another nod. Lejeune was too blissfully occupied to be conscious that he was telling secrets. Further than this, however, he could not -go for the simple reason that the sheriff had volunteered no information beyond his simple instructions. Terry sought in vain to discover why the sheriff or the Martels might be interested in the possibility of Warren being a detective but though Le- jeune under the soothing influence of a vast meal was pathetically eager to make such returns as might be in his power he could tell no more. "What would an outside detective be doing down here?" persisted Terry. "What's there going on down here He sat bolt upright as a thought leaped into his mind. "The Snake!" Deputy Lejeune grinned lazily. "There's several detectives been looking for him," said TWISTED TRAILS he, "but we've managed to keep 'em away from Lily City so far." "Keep them away? What for?" "I donno. Sheriff does it. Wants his chance at the reward, I reckon." "I see," said Terry. "And if the Big Fellow was but he ain't. But if he was, say Pete Martel would look purty trying to make him move on!" "Yes, v he muttered to himself as he paid the bill, "and any time you catch me feeding you again you'll know it, you you big ostrich in pants!" CHAPTER XV unseasonable period of summerlike weather continued. Though the calendar reprovingly called attention to the fact that Autumn was passing and win- ter drawing near, the Sayou country refused to acknowl- edge that a year was drawing to its close. It played that it was still Spring and that Spring always would remain. In more sober lands the stern season was enforcing its might, as the incoming flight of wild-fowl testified, but on the shores of Lily Bayou the humming birds still throbbed musically above the hearts of the roses. Stephen sat at a desk in the office of the Hartland Lumber Company and worked with Octave Landry in the preparation of company pay-roll. It was pay day for the mill hands, and the money was due on the morning train. Stephen's desk faced the window which looked directly out upon the lily sprinkled waters of the bayou. A bland, springlike sun flooded the scene with warmth, Not a breath of breeze was stirring, and the lilies and shrubs and trees along the shore were mirrored perfectly in the motionless waters of the bay. From the mill on the other side of the bayou came the musical drone and whine of the flashing saws, and in the middle of the bay a green-painted sailing pirogue, its green sail hanging idle, was lying becalmed. Warren was too deeply DC- US 114. TWISTED TRAILS cupied with his task to pay any attention to the scene; for while Octave Landry was a good fellow and a per- fect little gentleman, his capacity as a bookkeeper indi- cated room for improvement "Hark!" said Octave suddenly, blissfully ignorant of the thoughts in his superior's mind. Some one was singing out on the bayou, and the song drifted faintly through the screened door and windows of the office. "Zephine, the world grows old; never again this hour; Never again this moon sludl gleam for us as now. Zephine, my heart is faint; calls to your heart for hope. Zephine, the world grows old; Come, let our hearts be young!" It was Estella Reid. She was sitting at the rudder of her pirogue patiently waiting a breeze and apparently not in the least concerned whether it came or not. A great mass of wild hyacinths was drifting down the bayou. It moved slowly, its tiny blue flowers erect in the dense tangle of foliage, but it moved irresistibly, and its course carried it straight toward the becalmed pirogue. "She came back last night," said Octave. "I tell you what, Mr. Warren; I shore wouldn't be surprised if we soon have a wedding round here. That Georges Martel is shore one lucky fellow." "Better foot that column again, Octave," said Stephen, tossing a sheet of figures across the desk. He turned TWISTED TRAILS 115 back to his task. Presently he lifted his eyes and looked out upon the bayou. "Zephine the world grows '' The song broke off abruptly. The oncoming mass of lily drift had intruded itself upon the singer's vision and she sat up suddenly and bent forward. Stephen watched, expecting to see the flash of a paddle and the pirogue shooting forward out of the course of the float- ing foliage. Instead the girl straightened up with a gesture of irritation. For a moment she looked round as if seeking something, then with a glance at the ap- proaching lily drift she began to paddle with her bare hands. The effort came a trifle too late. An outspread- ing lily root under water caught and held the bow of the pirogue. She attempted to back water, but another concealed root was at the stern. For a moment she struggled vig- orously with her hands to free the craft, but the move- ment of the floating mass of foliage was insistent. It pressed on, nestling about the little craft and holding it broadside to the current. Presently she gave up the struggle and with a laugh settled herself comfortably in the stern while the blue-flowered lily drift carried her slowly away downstream. "Octave," said Stephen, "you'd better hop into a pirogue and go out and give her a hand." "Me in a pirogue, Mr. Warren ? I ain't no pirogue- runner. I'd tip over." 116 TWISTED TRAILS Warren watched the helpless craft for awhile as it was dragged downstream by the drift and laid down his work. His pirogue lay tied to the tiny dock before the of- fice building, and soon the light dugout was leaping be- neath the drive of his paddle. Seeing him come, she called crisply : "There's no hurry. I'm quite comfortable, I assure you." The coldness of her tone kept him silent. "I merely forgot my paddle," she said. He nodded. "The breeze died down as I was beating back to the dock. I thought I might float in but along came this floating island of wild hyacinths and got affectionate and insisted that I go with them downstream. I pro- tested as well as I could with my bare hands, but the lilies wouldn't have it. They just wrapped themselves all round and here I am, helpless but contented. Really, I hoped it would be longer before any one saw me and came to my rescue." "Perhaps I'd better turn back then?" he said at last. "Oh, no; not so long as you're here," she said indif- ferently. "I reckon I might as well be rescued now as later on." "You're in no hurry about it?" "Certainly not. Why should I be?" "What's the second verse of that song?" he asked, as he came alongside. "What ! Were you listening ?" TWISTED TRAILS 117 "I plead guilty. I was hoping there'd be more of it, and then the lily drift came along and spoiled it." "There isn't any more of it," she said stiffly. "If s one of Uncle Armand's!" "Doctor Thibodeaux?" "Yes. Does that surprise you so?" "It does. Of course I've only met the doctor a couple of times, but he is the last man in the world I would sus- pect of writing songs." "Then you don't appreciate Uncle Armand. I could suspect him of everything fine in the world." "I agree with you." "But you wouldn't suspect him of writing songs?" she said, looking at him critically as he briskly drew aer pirogue free of the lily drift. "I suppose you hare no time for such foolishness yourself?" "Foolishness? I didn't call it foolishness." "But you must think it so a brisk Yankee business man must think so." Stephen looked round as he towed her boat toward shore. "Why do you say that?" "I heard about your enterprise in trying to purchase Black Woods," she said swiftly. "Is that the way Yan- kees always do business?" "Why, Miss Reid !" he laughed harshly, "you're more than half Yankee yourself." "Am I? Perhaps. But I may have certain preju- dices nevertheless." 118 TWISTED TRAILS "But was there anything wrong in my trying to buy Black Woods?" "I suppose not, from your point of view. It's a chance to make money. What else matters?" "A whole lot of course," he replied. "But you must admit, that matters, too." "Oh, don't be so modest, Mr. Warren," she said with a short laugh. "Don't place the making of money sec- ond to anything else in the world." He paddled in silence for a moment. "Very well, I won't, if you insist/' "That's right," she said, with a subtle hint of mocking in the words of approval. "You came down here to make money. Be true to your colors." Warren looked up, caught the flash of her eyes and the curl of her lip, and looked away. "Very well," he said, "I did come down here to make money." "What else would you or your kind be anywhere for?" "My kind?" "Yes; grasping business men." The pirogues were now slightly above the landing place and with his paddle idle he allowed them to drift slowly in toward the dock. "Guilty," he said finally. "And unashamed," she added. "Yes. Unashamed." The bow of his pirogue struck the shore, he leaped out, drew her craft in and helped her out upon the dock. "Guilty, as charged," he continued, "but still I don't TWISTED TRAILS 119 understand what heinous crime I'm guilty of in offering to buy Mr. Mattel's timber?" She looked at him with an expression of pained skep- ticism. "Just out of curiosity," she said coldly, "don't you really see anything reprehensible in your conduct? Or is that the way you pushing business men always trans- act business?" "No," said Stephen, "I think they are usually more successful." She rewarded the remark with an indignant toss of her head. For a moment she seemed to be seeking a prop- erly barbed retort. "Perhaps old Mr. Martel wasn't sufficiently ill to serve your purpose?" she suggested. "Mr. Martel was not ill when I called on him," said Stephen. "Oh, excellent, splendid!" she cried mockingly. "Really, your acting is convincing almost." "Is Mr. Martel ill, now?" he persisted. "No, not now. Fortunately he is quite recovered from his attack in spite of your pushing business meth- ods of rushing into his room, you and your lawyer, while he was helpless, and trying to bully him into sell- ing his property." Stephen was silent. He looked at her and saw by her expression that her opinion was fixed. Nothing that he, an outsider, a Yankee, could say on this matter would be accepted as anything but an attempt at an excuse. Why should he make any explanation? He looked at 120 TWISTED TRAILS her and laughed, and he was glad at the sight of the flash of anger in her eyes. With one of those lightning changes which were so startling in her she dropped com- pletely into the Cajun character: "Poah lil Cajun gal am glad she mek fun foh grand Yankee biznais man." Warren laughed again. "You're angry," he said, "and you can't hide it." "No; poah lil Cajun gal not so angry as grand Mistoh Warren." "I angry?" "Shore! Man, what yoh angry 'bout? Yoh laugh sounds lak somebody stole yoh precious money. Poah Mistoh Warren! Lil Cajun gal feel sorry for man what got nothing left if folks steal his money." He stared at her dumbfounded. Which was the real girl: Miss Reid, or this pattering Cajun? Now he smiled. "It's too bad, really/' he said. "I'm sorry I said anything Miss Reid I " "Pardon me," interrupted Miss Reid coldly. "I really fear I've kept you from your business too long, Mr. Warren," she said. "I am obliged to you for tak- ing the time and trouble to help me out. Of course, I expect to reimburse you for the time you have lost." "Where shall I send the bill?" he flashed out. She looked back for one swift instant, the smile upon her lips and eyes a gleam of mischievous triumph. He understood. She was glad, glad because she had teased him and touched him on the raw! A man was a fool TWISTED TRAILS 121 for wasting a minute on that sort of girl even if she were not engaged to another man. But he realized also that because she was that sort of a girl he was going to waste a lot of minutes thinking about her even if she was engaged to marry Georges Martel. The morning train bearing the pay-roll money pulled in and Stephen, with a short-barreled pump-gun held hunter fashion in the hollow of his left arm, stood guard while Octave Landry and Terry McGurk transferred the money bag from the express car to a company flivver for transportation to the office. At the office he laid the gun on his desk, its wicked muzzle pointing toward the cashier's window and he remained within reach of the weapon while the men were being paid off. The men, peering through the grilled window, saw the gun and grinned. "Fixing to get you a Snake hide, Mr. Warren?'* "Just a warning for him to leave us alone," replied Warren. At last the men were paid off. Octave and Terry had gone home and Steppy was preparing to close the office when Estella and Georges Martel stood in the doorway. "Ah, Warren!" said Martel. "Welcome to Lily City!" "Thanks, but you're rather late, aren't you, Martel? I've been on the job here for some time." "I came to apologize No ! To make an explanation," said Estella, and by the manner in which Georges started and stared at her Stephen knew the announcement was entirely unexpected. 122 TWISTED TRAILS "You see, I really thought Mr. Martel was ill." "Oh, bosh ! 'Stella," interrupted Georges. "Why drag that up now? We're here on a little call " "He told me he was ill," she continued with a slight tightening of the lips, "and you see I had grown up believing every word he said was true, so I believed him. I know now he was mistaken. I am not apologizing, merely explaining." "I am sure Mr. Warren appreciates it," said Georges with one of his mocking bows. He was furious, furi- ous with her and with Warren, yet his manner was en- tirely suave and friendly. "My father was a little up- set. An old man; it's all a trifle." "Now I have explained," said the girl. "That is what I came for. Entirely out of consideration for my own sense of the proper thing to do." Stephen almost laughed; in that moment she was so much like Dr. Thibodeaux, the same trick of elevating the chin, the same flash of the eyes. "Yes, yes, yes; of course," said Georges swiftly. "Now that we have that little matter out of the way let us turn to more pleasant things. You've taken hold with a will here, I understand, Warren. How do you like Lily City?" "Very well, thank you." "Thinking of locating here, Warren?" "Of course he is," said the girl. "Isn't it a chance to make money?" "Estella!" protested Georges, greatly pleased. "Nonsense! It's true, isn't it, Mr. Warren?" TWISTED TRAILS 123 "It is." "I told you so. Come, Georges. I have explained. That is all I came for." "Have you been to Camp Haut Isle, Warren?" called Georges from the doorway. "No? I understand the climate down there and Bomb Carkey are not favor- able to strangers." CHAPTER XVI , dang, clang!" The ringing alarum of a great iron triangle smit- ten by a hammer in the black hands of the cook awoke Warren a few days later in his bunk in the little shack he had occupied upon his first visit to Camp Haut Isle. Haut Isle was a tract of comparatively dry ground in the heart of the swamp, deriving its name from an infinitesimal elevation above the normal water level. Civilization was much further removed from Camp Haut Isle than the mere measure of miles indicated. It was a tough camp. The crew was half white and half black, and all bad irre- spective of color. And Foreman Bomb Carkey was lord and tyrant over them all by virtue of the skill and promptness with which he swung his two hard fists. It was Sunday. The men were sleeping late. The morning sun, which usually found them out in the swamp standing in water up to their knees, waiting for sufficient light to begin the day's work, was high and warm in the heavens by the time the breakfast gong sent its iron alarum through the silence upon the camp. The mists of the morning were gone from the swamp. Mocking birds, robins and blackbirds flashed in the sunlight, and above the coal-black kinky heads of the men gathered be- fore the negro bunk house, a scarlet tanager hung to a 124 TWISTED TRAILS 125 festoon of gray tree moss and idly surveyed the Sabbath scene. Even the clatter of breakfast in the two grub shacks seemed to have a subdued, sleepy note, and finally the clatter diminished and died away. Silence reigned for a space, and presently, from the colored quarters, arose the sound of primitively melodious voices raised in plaintive hymns. The colored loggers with Deacon Hogfoot, the biggest man and the best singer in camp, to lead them, were "having church." "Lawd, it's me, standin' in the need of prayer," chanted two score deep voices slowly, and were silent. " 'Tain't the elder, Lawd," chimed the solemn voice of the deacon. Wailed the anguished voices of the congregation: "No, Lawd, it's me!" "Lawd, it's me, standin' in the need of prayer." " Tain't mah bruddeh, Lawd." "No, Lawd, it's me!" There were a dozen verses to the strange song, and by the time it was finished the voices of the deacon and the chanters had worked themselves up to a quavering pitch. Suddenly a fresh voice broke out jubilantly: ff lfs deh old-time religion! It's deh old-time religion! Ifs deh old-time religion! And it's good enough foh me!" The congregation joined in with a vim that shook the roof: 126 TWISTED TRAILS " 'Twas good enough foh Moses, 'Twos good enough foh Moses, 'Twos good enough foh Moses, And it's good enough foh me!" "Can that bellering, you dinges !" The bull-of-Bashan voice of Carkey, the camp foreman, came roaring out of the open door of his bunk shack next to Steppy's. "Stop it, I say, or I'll be over there and make alligator food out of a bunch of you." The singing ceased. Silence reigned. "Mistah Cahkey," spoke a voice plaintively, "ain't the rules say as how we can have church Sundays?" Carkey came rolling out of his shack like a great bear aroused and angry. "Who was that talking?" he demanded as he marched across to the bunk-house door. "Who's the wise dinge that's pulling the rules on me?" He casually knocked down a colored chore boy who incautiously peered out, and snarled : "Cat Head ? That sounded like your voice." "No, suh, no, suh, Mistah Cahkey !" replied Cat Head. "Hogfoot let's hear you." " 'Twan't me, suh," said the deacon. "Huh!" Carkey stood with his head thrust into the silent bunk house. "Why don't you speak up now, some of you? I'm here; why don't you tell me about the rules now?" "Rules!" he snarled. "I'll give you rules. I'll tell TWISTED TRAILS 127 you when you sing and when you shut up. You don't want to sing now, do you? Eh, Hogfoot?" "No, suh, Mistah Cahkey " "Well, then, sing, damn you! Sing! You hear me? You don't want to sing, eh? Well, I say you'll sing and do it now. I'm the rule maker here; I'm still mak- ing 'em, even if there is a new company pet down here. Sing! You hear me? I'll let you all know, company pet and all of you, who's boss of this camp! Sing!" Terrified first into silence, then into song, the negroes broke out: "Deh fieh of deh Lawd am righteous, Deh fieh of deh Lawd am warm. Oh, Lawd, have a pity on dis poh old sinneh, And don't let it do me any harm." "Shut up!" The singing stopped. "Stay shut. I'm running this camp and every one in it pets included." McGill, the white engineer of the pull-boat which drew the rafts of logs out of the swamp to the bayou, chuckled with the familiarity of a favored toady as Carkey re- turned to his shack. "You're the boy who can give it to 'em, Carkey." But Carkey's ugly temper knew no friends this morn- ing. It never did the morning after the Saturday night before. Carkey was a man most regular in his habits, deplorable though those habits might be. "Who the devil asked you to butt in here?" was his response. 128 TWISTED TRAILS \ "I ain't butting in, Carkey, I was just saying " "Don't say so much. Use your mouth for poking food into. If you don't you may get it hammered off you." "Aw, come on, Bomb, you know '* "Get out of the way." The engineer laughed with mock cheerfulness and, seated on a near-by coil of cable, resumed his toadying. "That new guy, Warren, won't try to horn in here, if he knows what's good for him, ek, Bomb?" "What do you know about it?" "Who, me? I don't know nothing. You're the boy who knows. I don't have any chance to know anything about what's going on round here." Carkey, engaged in splashing water in his face, paused suddenly. "What do you mean by that, McGill?" he asked after a moment of silence. "Aw, say, Bomb " "Do you mean anything?" "Of course not. I don't mean anything. I just meant about this new guy, this kid, coming in here, that's all. Who is he, Carkey? How's he come here?" There was a period of silence; then Carkey spoke. "He's a pet. I suspect the old man has picked him for his kept poodle dog." "Huh! Pretty soft for him. Wish some millionaire would pick me for his pet." Carkey laughed shortly, a laugh like a contemptuous bark. "You get out of here!" he roared in a fresh access of TWISTED TRAILS 129 rage. "Get away from my shack. First it's those dinges, then you have to hang round. Go on, beat it!' 1 Stephen lay perfectly still in his bunk and smiled grimly up at the rough-slabbed ceiling. He had avoided Carkey as much as possible, for there was a world of work to be done in raising the camp to a satisfactory plane of productivity, and a clash with the foreman would not have aided in this work. Carkey being a man of simple mental processes had accepted the new superin- tendent's diplomacy as a tribute to his own well-known physical prowess. The tribute did not please him, for Carkey was too near the primitive to be capable of any definite sensation of vanity. Had he been capable of dis- cerning and appreciating Warren's present mood he would have been startled. Warren was a high-brow, an expert, an educated man; and to Carkey's mind it would have been impossible to believe that such a man might be in a mood in which a fight would be as welcome as to any rough-neck in camp. "It will have to be out of camp, though," thought Steppy. "It wouldn't do to let the men see their bosses fighting." Having decided upon this course, he leaped from his bunk, shaved carefully, and stepped out to greet the world with a cheerful countenance. After a breakfast of fried catfish, corn bread, molasses, and coffee as black and strong as only a Cajun cook dares to make it, he locked up his shack and started out upon the low ridge of solid ground which ran north from the camp. Carkey, watching him from his shanty door, 130 TWISTED TRAILS waited until Steppy was at the edge of the camp clear- ing, then called sharply: "Hey!" Steppy stopped cheerfully. "What is it, Carkey?" "Where the devil do you think you're going? You do too much snooping around to suit me. Understand ?" Stephen nodded good-naturedly. "Sorry. Don't mean to." " 'Don't mean to !' " mimicked Carkey. "I asked you where you going?" "Trail along and see," said Stephen blithely, and went on his way. Four miles north of camp, on the edge of the swamp, Terry McGurk had found an abandoned training track, and it was there he was waiting with Nailer. The track was on an old abandoned plantation. Fire had de- stroyed the buildings. Underneath a mass of vines Terry had found the remnants of a room of the burned mansion, four crumbling walls thoroughly concealed from the eyes of the world by the mass of vines, and it was from the doorway of the ruin that he called a greet- ing when Warren came pushing out of the canebrake on the trail from the camp. "You're late, bo, you're late," was his greeting. "What'd you do wait for the whistle to wake you? Me, I'm up with the humming birds this morning. I'm up before the whistle would have blown if it was a week day. Terry,' says I, 'to-day's the day when you'll know if Nailer has got a scrapping chance to make a come- TWISTED TRAILS 131 back.' You know, bo, I've been feeling him out a little these last few days. A rest was what he needed, and I give it to him. 'Nailer,' I says, 'you're a sick baby in a sanitarium. You've been up against the white lights, and now you're going up the river to get the jazz juice outa your system and the old pep in. You're going to rest first, Nailer, then start with a little light road work for your wind.' "Hey!" Terry bridled at Warren's smile. "You think he didn't understand me, eh? Listen! Hey, Nailer, here's a bird who don't think you're hep to my spiel. How 'bout it, old baby?" Nailer whinnied ea- gerly. "There you are. How d'you like it? You tell me horses don't understand what you say to 'em ? Well, maybe they don't from some birds. Some dubs ain't fit to speak to horses. But I used to sleep in the same stall with this old baby when he was a colt and I was curing him of that wrenched shoulder. In the morning he'd lean over and bite me ear to wake me up. Am I handing it out straight, Nailer?" The horse's prompt whinny seemed to corroborate the statement. "So I give him a rest, nothing to do but inhale his oats and lay round in this sun and let it soak through his bones. I believe the flu's all out of his system and his coat is beginning to shine a little. "Bo," continued Terry hoarsely, "you're the guy that's made it possible to get that baby looking right, and and awright, bo, awright. Say nothing, it is, but you're hep to how I feel about it. "So I begin to give him a little exercise. When do I 132 TWISTED TRAILS have time to do that? Why, when I ain't working, of course. When's that? Well, it's for about fifteen min- utes every morning when I'm supposed to be putting away me breakfast. And it's about half an hour at noon, when I'm supposed to be stowing in me lunch. And it's about an hour every evening after supper, and before it begins to get too damp along the bayou. I don't work him, you know; just let him ramble. First day he's like a guy just out erf the hospital. Next day he wants to go a little farther. And so on. I just let him ramble along easy over these soft roads; that's how I happed to hit this dump. "Say, bo, it's immense! Imagine these old birds down here having private training tracks so long ago they're forgotten now. "Well, I came down here to give him a work-out. Come on, Nailer, this is only a quarter-mile track, and it's too slow for any good work, but come on, you baby, lemme feel if you got any pep in your system." Nailer's response was to rear colt-wise the instant he felt Terry on his back. He arched his neck, pawed the air with his fore hoofs and blew two mighty blasts from his quivering nostrils before coming down on all fours. "He's bragging, that's all," explained Terry. "All set?" Warren had stepped to one side of the track and stood ready with a handkerchief held up in lieu of a flag. The racer quivered at the sight of the bit of cloth and gathered himself tensely as he felt his rider crouching for the start. TWISTED TRAILS 133 "Go!" shouted Warren and threw down the flag. Nailer leaped forward, eager with the colt's eager- ness to run from the drop of the flag, but the hands and arms of the boy on his back were against the notion. Terry held Nailer in with a grip of iron. The blood leaped in his veins as he sensed the new energy of the animal beneath him struggling desperately for his head. "Living dynamite!" thought Terry. "Oh, baby, if you only can work up enough bottom to stand the gaff !" For a furlong the colt fought for his head, and then Terry felt that the time was ripe. He spoke softly, and Nailer, subsiding, became in a flash the perfect running animal that he was. His time was not fast the soft old track precluded the possibility of that but his stride was superb, his gait a flashing, rippling thing that seemed as spontaneous, as tireless as the flowing of swift water. As he swept past Warren on the first round of the quarter-mile track Terry grinned, but as he swept round on the second lap the grin vanished and his freckled face grew tense with apprehension. Nailer was going good so far. He reached the great live-oak tree beneath which showed the halfway mark on the track with never a falter in his stride. Terry's mouth flew open and his breath came in short gulps as he swung into the finish and saw Steppy's figure at the side of the track. There was where the test would come. A half mile Nailer could run at top speed on nothing but his nerve had done so at New Orleans on Opening Day. Then he had faded, had died away, because the strength 134. TWISTED TRAILS was not in him to race farther. What would he do now? Would he falter, would he fade? Terry scarcely breathed. He crouched like a graven gargoyle above the withers, afraid to move, to speak, for fear of spurring the horse to a burst beyond his powers. Nailer was running close to the rail and true as an arrow. There was a passing flash. They were past, past the half-mile mark, and Nailer was going strong! "Oh, baby!" murmured Terry in ecstasy. The quarter post flashed past. Five-eighths, and Nailer still going strong. From his place at the starting point Warren was watching for the break which must come soon now. He had eyes only for the horse. The second post on the track showed up distinctly against the trunk of the great live oak. "If he makes it without breaking," mused Warren, "he will have run three-quarters of a mile at top speed, and " "Good God!" he cried aloud, and in an instant was racing across the infield as fast as he could run. As Nailer swept toward the halfway mark a man had leaped out from behind the tree and tossed a large branch at the horse's head. A cry from Terry, a shud- dering leap on Nailer's part, and the missile flew wild; but Nailer was doing his best to climb the rail that sepa- rated the track from the field. CHAPTER XVH '1117'HEN Warren arrived on the scene Terry had quieted the horse and was on the ground, hurling shrill imprecations at the man who had so dangerously stopped him. "Are you drunk or crazy, Carkey? You big stiff, don't you know you might have hurt somebody? For two cents I'd jump the horse all over your carcass, you big mutt !" Carkey paid no more attention to Terry than if he were a buzzing mosquito. He stood squarely planted on his thick legs in the middle of the track, watching through slitted eyes the figure that came racing across the field. He waited until Steppy had ducked under the rail and onto the track, then he blurted sneeringly: "What the hell do you think you're going to do?" There was no need to say more. He had expressed the purpose of his move clearly. Steppy understood. The inevitable clash with Carkey had come. It had been thrust upon him, and he could not avoid it "Terry," he said easily, "I thought you told me this Carkey was a pretty good sort of fellow." The silence that followed was breathless. Terry looked from one to the other, and swallowed a lump in his 135 136 TWISTED TRAILS throat; Carkey stood motionless, his eyes nearly closed, waiting. Through the stillness came Steppy's voice, saying easily : "Why, he's nothing but a bully and a four-flusher." It would have been difficult to say who struck first. Terry McGurk was unable to say. He saw Carkey's arm swing at Warren's last word, and to his amazement heard, in the same flash, Steppy's left fist smack against Carkey's mouth. Carkey had been waiting, keyed up to land the first punch, but Warren had been watching him, and even as he finished speaking had launched his first blow. They drew back after the first exchange, Carkey growling with an animal sort of joy. "That's what I was after, that's what I was after! 'Tis not I wanted to hurt the nag or the kid. You're the bird I want a crack at. Beat me to the first punch, eh ?" The battle mood was on Carkey ; he had no fresh liquor in him, but he was fight-drunk and though his speech was thick and incoherent his movements were uncannily tiger- ish for a man of his bulk. "The first punch. So be it. A big, strong kid, with lots of meat on his bones to pound up. Ye young stiff, ye hit me with a sack of oats me, Bomb Carkey." He struck as he uttered his own name, a blow with his full body weight thrown behind it to drive the sparlike arm crashing through any possible guard, and though Stephen leaped back, he felt a thud on his breastbone which shook him to the heels and sent him staggering backward. TWISTED TRAILS 137 "Hi, Carkey!" muttered the foreman. "What's the -matter? Falling short?" Feinting and ducking to draw attention, he slid his feet skillfully forward and suddenly unloosed an uppercut. Caught and drawn to close quarters by the trick Steppy saved himself only by the youthful flexibility of his neck and body. Instinctively he threw his head far back. The blow barely clipped the point of his upturned chin, yet though it caught him going away it lifted him in the air and threw him back on his shoulders his length away. The pride of youth, aroused and outraged at being knocked down, saved him further, for he leaped instantly to his feet just in time to escape Carkey's crushing kick, leaped in time to stop the big man's rush with a furiously wild overhead swing which landed solidly on Carkey's flat nose. Stopped in his tracks the ex-pugilist shook his head like a man rising from a long plunge and vented an inarticulate growl of relish. ^"Few could do it, few could do it after that knock- down," he muttered in his fight-drunk tone. "Ah, it's going to be a grand fight, Bomb Carkey. Hammer and tongs. He'll last more'n a round or two. You'll need no whisky to-day, Bomb, you'll need no whisky to-day." "So that's the way you fight," said Stephen. A yelp like the bark of a wolf rose from Carkey's lips. "He don't like it, Bomb!" he roared. "You're too rough." For answer Steppy ducked a wide swing and drove 138 TWISTED TRAILS his head solidly against the lower ribs of Carkey's enor- mous chest. Again Carkey laughed his ugly laugh. "Butt away, kid, they're solid ; butt away." He leaned forward, sticking out his barrel-like chest. "Butt me!" he challenged. "Ram your head against it and feel of a man." Steppy feinted with his head as if to butt, and instead lashed out with his left to Carkey's eye. "Ha, ha, Bomb! He's foxy too. He knows some tricks. All right. Now we'll show him a few real ones." Then followed a slashing display of every trick of the ring, fair or foul, every trick of rough and tumble fight- ing. Stephen, warned by the weight of the uppercut that had knocked him down, dropped all attempt at fighting back, and sought only to keep away. His long legs nullified Carkey's rushes, and his caution brought the tricks to naught. "He ain't a fighter, Bomb," muttered the foreman, "he's a dancer. Stand up like a man, ye stiff !" Warren continued to step away and Carkey continued to rush and follow him until his poor condition asserted itself and be began to breathe hard. When he paused, Steppy was on him like a whirlwind, driving both arms like pistons, feinting, striking, ducking, dancing away, jumping in, striking at head and body, and forcing Car- key to guard, strike, duck and step at top speed to avoid hard punishment. Few of the young man's blows went home through the erstwhile professional's skillful guard. On the defensive Carkey's trained fists and arms formed TWISTED TRAILS 139 a barrier before him, picking off Warren's blows in the air, while behind the barrier Carkey grinned contemptu- ously. To Terry McGurk, crouched in excitement, the scene was one of agony; to any untrained observer Steppy's efforts would have seemed futile, pitiful. Carkey's hands moved with the precision of an invincible machine, his head rolled easily when the occasion demanded, his foot- work made Steppy miss widely time and again. When the opening offered the expert would send over one well- timed blow, driving his opponent back, and holding him helpless. It seemed as if Carkey was playing with his opponent, as if he were holding him in the hollow of his hand, letting the fight run along merely for the pleasure of the thing, and ready and able to end it whenever he saw fit. And so he would have done but for the little incidents of age and lack of condition. Carkey had ceased his talking. He was fighting easily, but silently and with an intentness that contrasted with his looseness at the beginning. Steppy watched the thin, wide mouth. The lips were closed tightly, but by the ridges of muscle at their sides Warren knew they were held so by an effort. He waited his opportunity and drove his long left arm at Carkey's middle. The lips popped open with a groan. Carkey snapped them shut again, but the tale had been told. Carkey lowered his head and rushed in to end it at once. His fists flailed into thin air. He leaped after the fleeing Steppy, barely touching his retreating guard with his blows, rushed again, slipped and fell. Instantly Carkey rolled himself