“I reckon you’ll be an angel—give you time,” he said. “I am accepting that proposition, though,” he added. “I’ve been wanting to leave here—I’ve got tired of it. And”—he continued with a mysterious smile—“if things turn out as I expect, you’ll be glad to have me go.” He rose from the bench. “Let’s write that agreement,” he suggested.
They entered the cabin, and a few minutes later Dakota sat again on the box in the lee of the cabin wall, mending his saddle, the signed agreement in his pocket. Smiling, Langford rode the river trail, satisfied with the result of his visit. Turning once—as he reached the rise upon which Sheila had halted that morning after leaving Dakota’s cabin, Langford looked back. Dakota was still busy with his saddle. Langford urged his pony down the slope of the rise and vanished from view. Then Dakota ceased working on the saddle, drew out the signed agreement and read it through many times.
“That man,” he said finally, looking toward the crest of the slope where Langford had disappeared, “thinks he has convinced me that I ought to kill my best friend. He hasn’t changed a bit—not a damned bit!”
CHAPTER X
DUNCAN ADDS TWO AND TWO
Had Langford known that there had been a witness to his visit to Dakota he might not have ridden away from the latter’s cabin so entirely satisfied with the result of his interview.
Duncan had been much interested in Langford’s differences with Doubler. He had agitated the trouble, and he fully expected Langford to take him into his confidence should any aggressive movement be contemplated. He had even expected to be allowed to plan the details of the scheme which would have as its object the downfall of the nester, for thus he hoped to satisfy his personal vengeance against the latter.
But since the interview with Doubler at Doubler’s cabin, Langford had been strangely silent regarding his plans. Not once had he referred to the nester, and his silence had nettled Duncan. Langford had ignored his hints, had returned monosyllabic replies to his tentative questions, causing the manager to appear to be an outsider in an affair in which he felt a vital interest.