“But who’s to look out after the place, the chickens and stock and——”
“I got it all fixed for a man to come this afternoon—Billy Higgins,” he called out. “He’ll ride over from camp every day an’ look around. Come on, hon! Do’s I say, can’t you? That driver is chargin’ fifteen dollars an hour.”
Dot capitulated. She hurried into her room and closed the door after her. Hesitating an instant, she locked it cautiously; then she dragged a suit case out of the closet and spread it open on the bed. For some seconds, she stood motionless, undecided, in troubled thought. In the middle drawer of her bureau lay a fortune in stolen money. During her father’s absence in camp she had carefully counted it over to satisfy her suspicions that it was stolen money, and she had found that it reckoned up to the amount Lemuel had told her was stolen by Billy Gee from the paymaster’s car of the Mohave & Southwestern Railroad Company—twenty thousand dollars.
What must she do with it? Here she was the custodian of a great sum, ill gotten, placed in her hands without her knowledge or consent, without a word or hint as to what was expected of her. She had been made an innocent accomplice. She knew that, in the circumstances, were the house to be searched for this missing booty of Billy Gee, she would have a desperate time, if the officers should discover that drawerful of bills, to account for the presence of an amount of money the same as that lost by the railroad company.
Until her father had burst in upon her, urging this uncalled-for hurried departure that for some unexplained reason he had given her not the slightest hint about, she had quite decided that the best course for her to pursue was to go to Geerusalem and turn the booty over to the constable or the postmaster, stating simply that she had found it and wished it returned to its rightful owners. This she had determined to do in person; for if there was one thing on which she had firmly settled her mind, it was that Lemuel should be kept in ignorance about the money. After his display of desperation last night and the fearful threats he had made, she shrank from telling him of her discovery, lest in a moment of recklessness he might be tempted to force her to surrender the treasure to him, and appropriate it to his own uses. She had grown sick at the terrifying thought.
Another thing—one that had impressed her more deeply than she really knew at the time—was the realization that Billy Gee had left her this fortune out of appreciation for the little she had done for him. The act bespoke the character of man he was at the core—plunder though this fortune represented. It was about as big a gift as he could have made to her. He had risked his life to get it—been shot and bled white in the bargain. While she and her father had been quarreling over him he had lain in the darkness of her room, listening. He had learned that they were very poor, that the dream of the Huntingtons had been to give their daughter an education, that, notwithstanding their financial straits, that daughter was not in favor of surrendering him—outlaw, though he was—to gain the comforts that ten thousand dollars’ reward would bring. She also knew that later, in the hayloft, he had purposely misled her as to the contents of his saddlebags, in order to make his secret gift certain of acceptance.
Just now she stood in her room and pondered over what she should do with this unwelcome gift, since her father’s impetuousness had upset her plans. She reasoned that it would be nothing short of folly to leave the money hidden until their return, thus risking its loss by fire or theft. There seemed no other way except to take it along with her. They wouldn’t be gone but a few days, perhaps two weeks at the longest. Once back home she could carry out her original intention of putting it in the hands of the Geerusalem authorities for transmission to the general offices of the Mohave & Southwestern Railroad.
So thinking, she opened the bureau drawer and hurriedly wrapped up the stacks of bills in her mother’s old silk shawl, tied the bundle securely with string, and packed it into the suit case along with some articles of clothing. Then she began dressing, in a growing fury of joyful anticipation and excitement, for her long-wished-for trip to a big city was at hand, her longing of years to be gratified at last.
Half an hour after Lemuel arrived from camp he was locking the front door of his home and placing the key under the mat for Sangerly. He walked slowly down the gravel path to the gate and crossed the garden toward the trim little grave under the drooping pepper tree. Wistfully he gazed down at it, and the moisture crept into his eyes when he saw Dot kneel and kiss the tips of her fingers and press them gently on the mound.
“Little angel mother,” she breathed. “How I wish you were going with us. How I wish you were here, darling.”