Seaforth trembled a little as his anger shook him, for he had seen enough. "I think you are the man we want," he said.

He had desired to make quite certain and succeeded, but he afterwards regretted it, for the effect of that speech upon the prisoner, who did not answer him, was considerably more than he had anticipated. The man, who appeared, as Seaforth decided later, suspiciously cowed and dejected, said nothing to any of his captors all next day, and lay down at night in apathetic sullenness, but when the rancher who slept beside him awoke in the morning he had gone, and by way of ironical farewell somebody had hung a pair of rusty handcuffs whose snap-spring was evidently defective upon a neighbouring tree. One man had kept watch beside the fire, which he had left for a few minutes to bring in more wood, and another by the horses; but while neither of them had seen or heard anything, the fact that their captive was no longer with them remained, and half-an-hour spent in very pointed and personal recriminations did nothing to solve the mystery. It was Horton who terminated the discussion.

"We've no use for more talking, boys," he said. "The man was here last night, and he isn't now, and it don't count for very much how he got away. Head right away for the railroad, two of you. Another two will strike for the pass in the main divide, and if you get through quick enough you'll turn him off into the back country. The rest of you will stop right here and help Okanagan to pick up his trail."

There was a hurried saddling of horses, four mounted men went crashing through the undergrowth downhill at the risk of neck and limbs, and an hour later Seaforth and Okanagan stopped a few moments breathless beside a frothing stream.

"He'll have gone this way for the river, sure," said the latter. "You can tell Horton to send Thomson and Andersen across to watch the canon."

Seaforth looked at the bushman, and his face was curiously grim. "You know who he is, Tom? We must have him at any cost, and I think it is my fault he got away."

Okanagan laughed a little almost silent laugh that had no mirth in it.

"If the boys can head him off from the railroad I'll find him sure," he said. "Oh, yes, I think I know him. When we get him I'm figuring we'll find the marks of Harry's knife on him."

Okanagan found the trail again lower down the valley, and he and another tireless man headed for the river through a country no horse could traverse all that day, leaving Seaforth behind them worn-out at noon. He sat down to wait for Horton considerably disturbed in mind, and his anxieties would not have been diminished had he known that Alton was starting for Somasco by the Atlantic express that afternoon.

It was next day when Alton reached the settlement and found the few women there in a state of excitement, while when he had heard their story he borrowed the best horse he could find and rode out at a gallop towards the ranges. He had also spent several days in the bush without finding any trace of the party when he camped one evening on the edge of one of the many deep ravines the torrents wear out of the hillsides.

It stretched, a dim shadowy chasm, across his path, and looking down he could faintly see the firs that clung here and there to the sides of it loom faintly black through the drifting mist. It was too dark to seek for a way of descending or round the head of it, and he decided to remain where he was until the morning. Twenty minutes sufficed to make his simple camp, and he sat with his back to a cedar-trunk and a can of green tea beside him, while the shadows crept higher up the hillsides and night tame down to meet them out of the dimness of the east.

The fire crackled joyously. There was hope in all the smells of spring, and the stir of life in every growing thing, while the chill that came down from the white peaks fired the blood like wine; but Alton sighed as he glanced up at the stars above him and his face was sombre. There was, it seemed, no possibility of the railroad being built to Somasco, he could only see disaster in front of him, and knew that with the hope of prosperity a brighter one had gone. He would be a poor man, and was a cripple, and--for he had not forgotten his deficiencies--could have laughed at the folly which had led him to grasp at that which could never be his. Then his slow, enduring stubbornness came to his help again as he remembered that there yet remained to him the fight with Hallam.

"I was a fool. She only wanted to be kind," he said.

Still, he groaned in a fit of passion as the memory of one moment at midnight in Somasco ranch returned to him, for all his pulses throbbed feverishly as he felt in fancy the warm white arm steal round his neck.

"I must have dreamt it--with the rest," he said. "And if I didn't, that was enough to remember. God bless her for her gentleness."

Again he flung the memories from him with an effort that brought a dew to his face, but the conflict which must be fought every day was over, and he stretched his long limbs amidst the soft cedar-twigs and lay down to sleep with a stolid acquiescence that if wholly free from bitterness was but little brightened by the victory. The man's life had been a struggle almost since its beginning, and he was stubborn, but his own headstrong passions had been the most obdurate enemy he had ever brought into subjection.

Sleep came and brought him forgetfulness. The fire sank to a lambent flicker above the white-flecked embers, the pines sang their mystic songs about him as a little breeze awoke, and their soft sighing was answered by the growl of the torrent far down in the ravine. Now and then the horse stamped restlessly and tugged at the lariat that was pegged down within reach of Alton's arm, and once came up and looked down on him. Alton usually slumbered lightly in the bush, but man's primitive instincts reassert themselves in the wilderness, and because it is possible that his senses were not wholly dormant and there was some subtle sympathy between him and the beasts that served him he did not awaken.

Then the horse grew restless and pricked its ears, stood still snorting, and backed away to the length of its tether as a face looked out from the undergrowth. The sinking light of the fire was on it, and it was an evil face with the stamp of hunger on it, and malevolence in the staring eyes. Again the horse snorted and trembled as an arm was thrust out of the bushes and something glinted in the hand, but Alton still lay motionless with the pack saddle under his shoulders.

Then a man crawled clear of the undergrowth, rose up, and stooped over the lariat with a knife in his hand. He needed a horse badly, and one stroke with the blade would give him one; but he needed food and a saddle almost as much, and moving forward a few paces gazed at the sleeping man. He saw the pack that had been seized to the saddle, and guessed that there were several days' provisions inside it, while a wolfish gleam came into his eyes as he straightened himself and stood very still listening. His garments hung in thorn-rent rags about him, weariness was in his very attitude, but his face had written on it the cunning and courage of desperation, for he had been hunted by tireless men who were then close behind him, and had travelled for the most part starving and without sleep. With a good horse and provisions he could yet escape his enemies, and the man looked scarcely human as he stood watching the sleeper with a sullen glow in his eyes.

There was nothing audible but the sighing of the pines and the faint sound of breathing, and moving a pace nearer he stopped again. The man he watched was very still, but a little breeze fanned the fire, and when the flickering radiance passed across his face the watcher almost betrayed himself with a cry as he recognized him. There was only one course open to him now, and with the muscles of his right arm contracting and the lean soil-stained fingers he had clawed his way up the ravine with closing on the knife, he crept forward another pace.

He had no great fear of anything Horton and the ranchers could do without the help of this man who could condemn him, and he knew his capabilities. Now one swift thrust would silence him forever, and once he could reach the railroad there was a man who for his own sake would help him safely out of the country with as many dollars as he might demand. Still, he slipped out of the firelight next second, and the knife shook a little in his hand.

Alton had lain with his right arm under him, and the starched shirt he had worn when he left the city showing white where the jacket and blanket had fallen apart, but now the arm was stretched across his body. Still, his eyes were closed, and the man who surmised that he must have moved while he glanced at the provisions closed with him swiftly, crouching. He stopped again, stooping further, for the arm and blanket were in the way, and he knew he might have no opportunity for a second thrust. Something must be risked, and moving his eyes from the sleeper's face he endeavoured to draw the blanket gently aside.

That was a blunder, for the soil-stained fingers had scarcely touched the fabric when a fist was dashed full in his face, and as he staggered backwards something hove itself partly upright and fell upon him.

After that neither of them knew all that had happened, but the knife fell from a hand whose wrist yielded under a crushing grasp, and was kicked away and trampled on. Then breathing stertorously they reeled into a fir, and the assailant's hand was free again, while stones rattled beneath them as Alton, half-suffocated, flung him almost at arm's length from him. Then the ground seemed to slip away beneath him, and he wound an arm about his adversary as he smote again.

Faint as he was with the blow, Alton did not, however, strive to shake him off now, but grappled with him the more closely, and next moment they had rolled crashing through a juniper. Then the other man came down undermost and struck a stone, there was a swift glissade over rattling shingle and through smashing undergrowth, and Alton lay still alone, while something rolled on down the slope beneath him, until hearing a splash below he rose with a little hoarse cry and swung himself off the ledge which had arrested him. He rolled over several times, but came down, as he discovered later, whole in limb, for he could think of nothing then as he groped in and out amidst the pools and boulders for his enemy. When he found him the man lay with his face apparently in the water, and only moaned a little when Alton shook him.

Then suddenly his passion fell from him, and with a gentleness that was in no way akin to pity he dragged the limp body from the water, and sat down to wait for morning with the wet head upon his knee. The morning was also a very long while coming, but at last, when the stars were paling and the dark pines slowly grew into shape and form, there was a sound of footsteps on the heights above and a voice he recognized came down:

"Come right along. Here's his fire, but the man has gone."

"Charley!" cried Alton, and there was an exclamation of astonishment followed by a scrambling, and presently Seaforth stopped with a little gasp by his comrade. Alton's face showed drawn and grey in the creeping light, and there was another more blanched one in the wet fern beside him.

"Good Lord!" said Seaforth. "What's the meaning of this, Harry?"

"Look at him," said Alton gravely. "You should know him. I think this is the third time."

"Damer!" said Seaforth hoarsely. "We were trailing him, and knew he couldn't be far off when we saw your fire. We took it for his. Is he dead?"

"No," said Alton gravely, "I hope not. We have some use for him. Go back and get the lariat, and we'll try to heave him up."

CHAPTER XXXII

ALTON HOLDS HIS HAND

It was very quiet and somewhat chilly in the little back room of Horton's hotel when Damer, who lay on a trestle-cot, moved his head a trifle and made a feeble sign. The fire had sunk in the stove, and it was then towards two o'clock in the morning, when man's vitality is at its lowest. The young doctor Horton had brought in from a distant settlement shivered a little as he rose and stooped over the bed.

Damer glanced at him out of glazing eyes, and made a faint gesture. "I have no use for you," he said. "It's Alton I want."

The doctor crossed over to Horton, who sat in a corner. "If there is anything you want to ask him lose no time," he said. "The man can't last until the morning."

"Well," said Horton gravely, "it would be a favour if you went down for Neilson, the surveyor. He's sitting up waiting. You see we want some witnesses not connected with the thing in case he's going to tell us anything. Harry, you'd better talk to him."

Alton crossed the room and sat down by the bed. He had, as it happened, come out almost scatheless from the fall into the ravine, which was not the case with his assailant, who had been carried down to the settlement with the life just clinging to his crushed body. All that was possible had been done for him, and now Alton waited with intense suspense, with something akin to compassion in his eyes, and his anger diverted from the dying wretch to the man who had made use of him.

"You're going to talk?" he said. "Well, it's only square to warn you that it will be all put down."

Damer glanced at Horton, who sat with a pen in his hand and a paper on his knee, and from him to the surveyor holding one or two Government appointments, who came quietly in.

"That's all right," he said very slowly. "Well, I wanted to kill you, but I don't know that I've a great deal against you now. You and the boys did what you could for me, and it was a man in the city who held me to it. Oh, yes, he's sitting down there raking in the dollars, and don't care two cents that the man he sent up to make them is dying here. The thing's not square, anyway."

Alton was sensible of a faint disgust, but he remembered that he could not afford to be fastidious, because the men he had drawn into his venture must stand or fall with him.

"We want to know who he is," he said.

There was a glimmer of malice in Damer's face. "Well," he said, and the strained voice grew clearer, "it was Hallam of the Tyee. There was something I did that gave him a pull on me, and that man has no mercy for anybody."

Alton heard the scratching of Horton's pen. "And Hallam hired you to murder me?"

"Yes," and Damer glanced at Horton. "You have got that down? At first he only hired me to go up to Somasco and watch you while I worked for you. You're a tolerably smart man, Harry Alton, but it's kind of curious you didn't know me."

Alton stared at the drawn face with a bewildered expression, and then moved a trifle in his chair. "Good Lord!" he said. "Black Nailer's partner! Well, I didn't see you that often--and it was dark when----"

Damer's face went awry with pain, but his gesture implied comprehension.

"Yes," he said feebly. "When you got him with the axe. Nailer had been on the whisky, and that gun of his was a little stiff on the magazine-spring; but he was the best partner I ever had, and I left a good claim behind when you and the boys chased me right out of that part of Washington. Now you've got the beginning. Give me a little more brandy."

The doctor came forward softly and held a glass to the cracked lips, then lifted the dying man a little. After that there was silence for at least five minutes, and Alton sat rigidly still, choking down his fierce impatience as he saw his last hope slipping away from him. Then he drew in his breath with a quivering sigh as the feeble voice commenced again.