The Bells of San Juan by Jackson Gregory (notion reading list txt) 📕

Perhaps a much more important factor than she realized in her action was Florrie's new riding-habit. It had been acquired but three days before and she knew very well just how she looked in it. There would be a moon, almost at the full. The full moon and the new riding-habit were the allies given by fate to Jim Galloway.

Besides all of this, she had not seen Elmer Page for a month. Further, she knew that Elmer had gone riding upon at least one occasion with a girl of Las Palmas, Superintendent Kemble's daughter. And finally, there lies much rich adventure in just doing that which we know we should leave alone. So Florrie, while her mother and father thought that she had gone early to bed, was on her way to meet Galloway.

They rode out of the cottonwood fringed arroyo just before moonrise, circling the town, Florrie scarcely marking whether they rode north or south. But Galloway knew what he was doing and they turned slowly toward the southwest. As they rode, his horse drawn in close to hers, he talked as he had never talked before; his voice rang from the first word with triumphant assurance.

"When he calls she will follow!" Virginia had thought fearfully of them. To-night he was calling eloquently, she was following, frightened and yet obedient to his mastery.

Galloway's influence over the girl, that of a strong will over a weak and fluttering one, was quite naturally the stronger when they were alone together. She had always been willing, sometimes a bit eager, to make a hero of him; he had long thoroughly understood her. To-night was the brief battle of wills, with him summoning all of his strength, flushed with victory. Abruptly now he urged that she marry him; a moment later his insistent pleading was subtly tinged with command. He was the arbiter of the hour; he told her of a priest waiting for them at a little village a dozen miles away. They would be married to-night; they were eloping even at this palpitant instant!

When Florence would have stopped, of two balancing minds, he urged the horses on. When she would have procrastinated, he beat down her opposition with the rush of his words. Even while she struggled she was yielding; Galloway was quick to see how her resistance was growing fainter. And all the time, while he spoke vehemently and she for the most part listened in a fascinated silence, they were riding on through the moonlit night. . . . It seemed to her that surely he must love her as few men had loved before. . . .

The village he had promised her was in reality but two poor houses at a crossroads, inhabited by two Mexican men and dowdy women. On the way they encountered but one horseman; Galloway turned his own and Florence's animals out so that, though seen, they might escape recognition. At the nearest of the two hovels he dismounted, raising his arms to her. When she cried out and shrank back trembling, he laughed softly, caught her in his arms, and lifted her free of the saddle; when he would have kissed her she put her face into her two hands.

"I . . . I want to go back!" she whispered. "I am afraid! Please, Mr. Galloway, please let me go home."

Dogs were barking, a man and woman came out. The man laughed. Then he gathered up the bridle-reins and led the horses to the barn. Florrie, shrinking out of Galloway's embrace, looked particularly little and helpless in her pretty riding-habit.

She went with Galloway into the lamplighted room. The woman looked at her curiously, then to Galloway, something of wonder and upstanding admiration in her beady eyes.

"Has the priest come?" demanded Galloway.

"No, señor. Not yet."

She added by way of explanation that word had been sent; that the priest was delayed; a man was dying and he must stay a little at the bedside. She muttered the tale like a child repeating a lesson. Galloway, watching Florence, who sat rigid in her chair by the table, waited for her to finish.

At the end he gave the woman a sharp, significant look. She said something about a cup of coffee for the señorita and went hastily into the kitchen. Florrie sprang to her feet, her hands clasped.

"You must let me go," she cried wildly. "The priest isn't here. I am going home."

"No," said Galloway steadily. "You are not going home, Florence. You must listen to me. I love you more than anything else In the world, my dear. I want you, want you all for mine."

She saw a sudden light flare up in his eyes and it seemed to her that her heart would beat through the walls of her breast. "I am not a boy, but a man. A strong man, a man who, when he wants a thing, wants it with his whole heart and body and soul, a man who takes what he wants. Wait; just listen to me! You love me now; you will love me more and more when I give you all that I have promised you. To-night, in an hour, I will have made the beginning; I will have gathered about me fifty men who will do exactly what I tell them to do! Then they will go with us down into Mexico; they will be the beginning of a little army whose one thought will be loyalty . . . loyalty to you and to me."

"No," said Florence, her voice shaking. "I am going. . . ."

"You will marry me when the priest comes," he cut in sternly. "Otherwise, if you make me, I will take you with me anyway, unmarried. And I will make you marry me when we have crossed the border. And now . . . now you will kiss me. I have waited long, Florence."

He came toward her; she slipped behind the table, crying out to him to stop. But he came on, caught her, drew her into his arms. And Florrie, some new passionate, terrified Florrie, beat at him with her fists, tore at him with her nails, hid her face from him, and with the agility born of her terror slipped away from him again, again put the table between them. Galloway, a thin line of blood across his cheek, thrust the table aside. As he did so the man came back into the room and stood watching, a twisted smile upon his lips. Galloway lifted his thick shoulders in a shrug and stood staring at the girl cowering in her corner.

"Married or unmarried, you go with me," he told her. "Your kisses you may save for me. Think it over. You had better ask for the priest when I come back." He turned toward the Mexican. "All ready, Feliz?"

The man nodded.

"Tell Castro, then. It's time to be in the saddle."

With no other word to Florrie he went out. But his last look was for her, the look of a victor.

Roderick Norton, every fibre of his body alive and eager, his blood riotous with the certain knowledge that the long-delayed hour had come, rode a foam-flecked horse into San Juan shortly after moonrise. Galloway was striking at last; at last might Norton lift his own hand to strike back. As he flung himself down from the saddle he was thinking almost equally of Jim Galloway, striking the supreme blow of his career, and of Billy Norton, whose death had come to him at Galloway's command. Galloway was gathering his forces, had delivered an initial blow, was staking everything upon the one throw of the dice. And he must believe them loaded.

At the clank of spur-chain and rowel Struve came hastily into the hallway from his office. He saw the look in the sheriff's, eyes and demanded quickly:

"What is it? What's happened?"

There were grim lines about Norton's mouth, his quiet voice had an ominous ring to it.

"Hell's to pay, Julius," he retorted. "And there's little telling where it'll end unless we're on the jump to meet it. Galloway's come out into the open. Kid Rickard and ten men with him, all Mexicans or breeds, crossed over into the next county yesterday, raided the county jail late this afternoon, shot poor Roberts, freed Moraga, and got away in a couple of big new touring-cars. Every man of them carried a rifle and side-arms."

"Killed Roberts, huh?" Struve's frown gathered.

"He's badly hurt, if not dead. The Kid did the shooting."

"Sure it's Galloway's work and not just the Kid's?"

"Yes. Only a couple of hours ago a lot of Galloway's crowd was gathering up in the mountains. They've gone to his cache for the rifles. I have sent word for Brocky Lane and his and my cowboys. It begins to look as though he were up to something bigger than we've been looking for. And he's sure of himself, Struve, or he wouldn't have started things by daylight."

Virginia had heard and came into the hallway from her room, her face white, her eyes filled with trouble. Struve turned back into his room abruptly, going for his rifle.

"You heard?" asked Norton quietly. "It's the big fight at last, Virginia. But we've known it was coming all along."

"Yes, Rod." she said half listlessly. "I'll be glad when it's all over."

He sketched for her briefly what little more he knew and suspected. Throughout the county where there was telephone communication the wires were buzzing. Over them the word had come to him of Kid Rickard's attack on Roberts and the freeing of Moraga. But in many places the lines were reported "out of order" and towns were isolated by cut wires. Already men were riding sweating horses, carrying word from him. He knew that del Rio had gathered a crowd of men at Las Vegas; he was certain that del Rio was working hand in glove with Galloway; further that the Mexican had been with Galloway on his recent trip below the border and among the revolutionists.

"They're solid down there," concluded Norton. "What they are up to is something big here, then a dash for safety, carrying their booty with them. But we're going to be on time to put a stop to it all. I am going down to see Engle now; will you come with me?"

But before they left the hotel he swore Struve in as a deputy and sent him hastening to carry the word to other men to be counted on. As they passed the Casa Blanca Norton paused a moment, looking in at the wide-open door; it was very quiet within, the place seeming deserted.

"No use looking for Galloway here," he said as they went on. "Nor for any of his gang. But, when they come back . . . unless we head them off . . ."

Her hand tightened on his arm. She looked up into his thoughtful face with shining eyes.

"You think that they would attempt further robbery and outlawry here?"

"I am going to advise Engle to take the bulk of his money out