“You lyin’?” the old man questioned.
“I’ll prove that I ain’t,” the boy replied, and he retold part of Gale’s story.
“You win,” Kent said at last. “I never should have opposed you. But I ain’t afraid to die. Best that I do, I guess. Molly is against me. You killed her love for me—and she did love me. Yes, she did! Won’t you fix it some way, Johnny, so that she won’t know all—that—that she wasn’t my girl?
“I ain’t taken a penny of her money. In fact, I’ve doubled what I got out of the mine. It’s all hers. Gallup’s got my notes for thirty thousand. He won’t be able to collect. That’s good, ain’t it—beatin’ him?
“He shot ‘Cross.’ Got him from the top of one of those box cars while I was tryin’ to make an alibi for myself by sittin’ in Ritter’s office. Think of him turnin’ on me after what we’d been through—tryin’ to take Molly. God, I’m glad she’s free of him! Tell her you and me made it up, Johnny—that I said I hoped you two’d be happy. Will you do that?”
The old man tried to lift his arm beseechingly.
“Don’t let her know about me—don’t tell her she wasn’t my child,” he begged. “I raised her, Johnny—her little baby hands. I can feel them.”
In spite of Johnny’s efforts Kent forced himself half erect. “You’ve got to promise me, do you hear?” he went on. “I couldn’t die if I thought she was goin’ to know. I couldn’t, I tell you—I—I—couldn’t.”
He fell back before the boy could catch him. Madeiras put his ear to the man’s chest.
“He’s gone,” Johnny whispered to the Basque. “Yes, sir, the old man’s gone! There’s all that’s left of Jackson Kent. Two months ago who’d ever have thought it would come to this?”