Abbeville progress. (Abbeville, Vermilion Parish, La.) 1913-1944, 1915-01-09
CHAPTER XXXVIi.
Fireplay.


Contented with the promise Of a
thousand dollars advance on his con-
tract. providing he returned with
horses within a stipulated time, Mr..
Hopi James Slade drifted quietly away
into the desert night.
Well content, persuaded that the
mOrrow's sun would never set upon a
world tenanted by one Alan Law, that
mOnomaniac, Seneca Urine, forgot his
recent i'll temper and set himself diplo-
matically to adjust the differences be-
tween his daughter, Judith, and his
first lieutenant, Marrophat.
1t was no facile task: Marrophat
could not be trusted to work with
single mind because of his infatuation
for Judith; Judith could no more be
trusted faithfully to serve out her VOW
to bring Alan Law to her fathers feet,
alive or dead. because-O cruel irony
of Fate!-she herself had fallen in
love with that same man whose death
she had pledged herself to compass.
Only when, as now, half mad with
jealousy, determined to see Alan dead
rather than yield him to the woman
he loved, her sister, might Judith be
counted upon to serve her father in
his lust for vengeance as he would be
served-and even so not without Mar
rophat at her elbow to egg her on
through her resentment of his surveil-
lance. Neither could be trusted, in
deed, to work alone to the desired con-
summation; for Urine had secret rea-
son to fear lest Marrophat might,
given opportunity. connive at Alan's
escape in order that he might marry
Rose and so throw Judith back into
his, Marrophats, arms.
Poor, deluded fool!
Such was the private comment OF
Marrophat's master.
For all that, 1t was the man and not
his daughter, whom Urine designated
to lead the expedition, cunningly
counting on Judith's chagrin to work
upon her passions and excite her to
one last, mad, blind attempt that
should prove successful.
Smiling his secret smile, Urine an
nounced his decision at the last mo-
ment, while Hopi Jim waited with his
horses and an assistant-one Texas
for whose utter innocence of scruples
Mr.. Slade unhesitatingly vouched.
Sullenly submissive, at least in out
ward seeming, Judith bowed to this de-
cision, marched out of the car, and
suffered Marrophat to help her mount
her horse.
Now, deliberately, as the little caval-
cade rode through the moonlit desert
night, the girl Unanswered her horse
to the side OF Hopi Jim, and then
dropped back. permitting Marrophat
to lead the way with Texas.
AS deliberately she set herself TO
work upon the bandits susceptibility
to her charms.
Within an hour she had him ready
to do anything to win her smile.
In that first rush of golden day a.
thwart the land, the party came quietly
into the town of Mesa, riding slowly in
order that the noise of their approach
might not warn the fugitives, who
Hopi asserted confidently would still
be sound asleep in the accommoda-
tions offered by the towns one hotel
1t was to be termed a town only in
courtesy, this Mesa: a struggling
street Of shacks, ramshackle relics Of
what had once been promising COM
munity, the halfway station between
the railroad and the mining camns
secreted in the Businesses of the Paint.
ed hills-camps now abandoned. their
very names almost faded out OF the
memory Of mankind.
Midway in this string Of edifices the
hotel stood-a rough, implanted. wood.
en- edifice, mainly veranda and bar.
room as to Its lower floor.
jealousy Judith watched the win
dows of tie second floor: and she
alone of the four detected the face that
showed for one brief instant well back
/ in the shadows beyond one OF the bed.
room windows face that glimmered