Eight-twenty-five—They’ve set fire to the cabin. Throwed straw out from behind that go-devil. Curse the man that made that, anyway. I might have had a chance if it hadn’t been for him.
Eight-thirty-five—The roof’s afire. I’ve got to make a run for it. If I can make the gulch I may get away, but the chance is slim. Good-by all.
Bertram did not put the diary in his pocket with the letters. He thrust the rudely scrawled notes back in the man’s belt, and he left undisturbed the notice which Swingley had pinned to Caldwell’s breast.
Still kneeling beside the body, Bertram for the first time thought about himself. Should he go or stay? No doubt the whole countryside was being aroused, and men would soon be flocking along the trail of the invaders. It would not do to be found at the scene of the fight, but would he be better off anywhere else? He was a stranger in a hostile land. He had entered the country as one of a band of armed invaders, and it was not likely that any explanations he might make would be heeded. Hot-headed men, intent on vengeance, would not hesitate to shoot him down at sight. He smiled ruefully, as he thought of Arch Beam’s words: “The people in this country will scalp you alive!” No doubt Arch was right. But, if he was to be killed, it would be better to meet death on the open road, rather than at the scene of a crime so despicable.
As Bertram was about to rise to his feet a rifle cracked from across the clearing, and a bullet tore through the young Texan’s left shoulder. Although the shock of the impact spun him half around, Bertram struggled to his feet. His heavy revolver was drawn with amazing celerity, and he was about to empty the weapon in the direction from which the shot had come, when he heard a cry in a girl’s voice.
At the same time the thicket parted. As the young Texan stood with feet firmly planted, in spite of the intense pain that racked him, while his finger almost pressed the trigger, Alma Caldwell came running toward him.
CHAPTER V
A RIDE TO SANCTUARY.
The Texan had only a confused idea of the events that followed immediately after he had been shot. He knew that the wound was serious, for the impact of the bullet had fairly staggered him. Yet he managed to find his feet steadily enough, and the young woman, who ran toward him, had no idea that he was hurt.
To Bertram it seemed as if the girl floated toward him on a billowing sea of ether, instead of running swiftly, as she did, across the sparse verdure of the clearing. Also, in the young Texan’s eyes, she seemed more lovely and more unattainable than before. He had caught only fleeting glimpses of her during their previous meetings, and one of those meetings had been under a very poor brand of artificial light. But now, in the bright Wyoming day, he caught the full beauty of her youthful color, the regularity of her features and her grace of movement. Her lithe figure was outlined in all its charm against the green of the thicket from which she had sprung. She had dropped her hat and tossed aside her riding gauntlets, and her spurs jingled at the heels of her small riding boots, as she ran.
“By all the gods!” thought the wounded and dazed Bertram, “this country up here was made as a background for her.”