Hazel had come to meet him at her lover's urgent request, and she was glad enough to get away from the old ranch house, where the charge of her captive there was seriously beginning to trouble her. Now she had at last voiced something of those feelings which the rapid passing of the weeks had steadily inspired. She knew that her peace of mind demanded some change from this worrying situation. In her loyalty she had struggled to perform her share in the conspiracy. She knew, too, that she had succeeded fairly well, and that her efforts were all appreciated to their full. She had contrived that her lover's father should never know a moment's discomfort. That his life in captivity should be made as easy and pleasant as possible. There were no signs that it had been otherwise, but now, seven weeks had elapsed since his arrival, and what had just seemed a scandalous joke to her originally, had become a sort of painful nightmare which she was longing to throw off. The moment she and Gordon were actually alone, she had been impelled to break the silence which was steadily undermining her nerve.
Gordon's horse was close abreast of the brown mare, and its rider smiled down from his great height upon the pretty tailored figure of the girl who had become all the world to him.
"I know," he said sympathetically. "It's sort of that way with me, too. I don't just mean I'm scared. There's nothing for me to be scared about. It's—sort of conscience with me. As for your father—say"—his smile broadened—"he's taken to his eye-patch with everybody—me, too. I guess that means he's worried no end."
"What—what are you going to do—then?"
Hazel eagerly watched that big, open, ingenuous face with its widely smiling blue eyes. And, watching it, she discerned added signs of a growing humor. Finally he laughed outright.
"Say, we're just the limit for a bunch of conspirators. Yes—the limit. You're the only one of us who's had the moral courage to put your feelings into words. We're all scared. We've all been scared these weeks. Your father's scared, so he can't look at any man with two eyes. Peter's all of a shiver every time he comes within hailing distance of the sheriff. As for Mike—well, Mike's sold all his holdings, and is bursting to sell his livery business, all but one team, so he'll have the means of skipping the border at a minute's notice. Say, have you figured out how we stand? How I stand? Well, from a point of law I guess I'm a good candidate for ten years' penitentiary. I've kidnapped two men; one's a dirty dog, anyway, and the other's one of the biggest millionaires in the country. I've fraudulently played up a railroad. I've started this boom on the biggest fraud ever practiced. I've—say, ten years! Why, I guess the tally of this adventure looks to me like twenty in the worst penitentiary to be found in the country. It—makes me perspire to think of it."
He was laughing in a perfectly reckless fashion, and, in spite of her very real fears, Hazel perforce found herself joining in.
"It's desperate, Gordon," she cried. "And as for you, who worked it all out, and led it, you—you are the dearest blackguard ever breathed." Then quite suddenly her eyes sobered, and her apprehension returned with a rush. "But how long is—it to last? I—I can't go on much longer, and your father's getting restive and suspicious."
Gordon reached down and patted Sunset's crested neck.
"It's finished now. That's why I asked you to come and meet me. I've sold."