White Bluffs spokesman. [volume] (White Bluffs, Wash.) 1907-1938, 1932-08-04
CHAPTER VII-Continued

3
His stride faltered He stood still,
taken by surprise. There was about
her such an air of tense feminine
ferocity that his purpose was shaken.
II wasn't amin to hurt her none
he explained sulleny.
Get away from her"
He hesitated his vanity in arms.
The position was a humiliating one,
but he did not see any way out Of it
just now.
''All right. It's yore say-so," he adj
mitted vindictively. "But don't come
belly-achin' to me when you get ar
rested. I've done give you yore chance
an you wouldn't take it. Suits me If
it does you"
He turned and walked down into the
arroyo where he had left his horse.
Ethel looked piteously at her sister.
"Is it true-what he said?" she asked.
Ann did not ask to what she re-
ferred. There was no need to specify.
In the forefront Of both their minds
was the death of Tom McArdle and
AIMS relation to it.
ITS true"
They stared at each other, horror in
their eyes.
IT was afraid So" Ethel
murmured. "It's been awful for me,
too / was awake when you came in
that morning-and l knew something
was wrong by the way you looked. |
nI IA ho DC hnt co
clean the rifle. You acted so !. SO
kinda dead for days $50. like you
were numb. And when this Jasper
Stark came and told me one day when
you were out that you had done
it :. why just knew you had"
She ended with a wall of distress.
They went into each others arms
and sobbed together. After a time,
when they had cried themselves out,
Ann told her story.
She had spent the night at one Of
their sheep camps and was riding home
in the early morning when she met
Tom McArdle. He had stopped her,
though she had tried to push past
him, and she had dashed him savagely
in a spate of words for what he had
done to Nora.
II thought of her, lying out there
under the ground in California, and Of
him riding around big as Cuffey," Ann
said to her sister. But that wasn't
the worst Of it. You know how he
kept coming to the house after
ward, pretending he wanted to hear
about our dear girl and all the time
trying to make up to you. You know
how told him never to come again.
morning he bowed and thanked me
with sheer and rode away. When he
got to the edge of the road above the
outbank he called to tell me he'd be
over to see you Thursday. You don't
know how hatefully he said it. Some
thing in me snapped. didn't have
time to think. l just fired at him
and he threw up his hands and slid
from his horse down the cutbank. l
didn't wait to see any more, but just
rode away fast as I could. For I
knew by the way he fell that he
was dead"
you poor poor girl p Ethel held the
slender figure close as though to keep
her from the cruel reach Of the law
that was going to snatch her away and
lock her up for years. "Oh darling,
why didn't you tell me?'
II don't care, If you don't hate me
for doing it," Ann replied brokenly.
So, with love, they comforted each
other.
It was characteristic Of Jasper that
he did not at once go to the authori-
ties and charge Ann Clifford with the
murder of Tom McArdle. Instead, he
wrote an anonymous letter to Sheriff
LIE Page and accused her Of it.
He did not want to burn his bridges
behind him. 1t would be better, he re
Elected, to see what the effect would be
of covert imputation. Hank woult
very likely go out to the sheep ranch
and ask questions. This would Fighter
not only Ethel but Ann, too, In spite
of the high hand she had taken witt
him. They might come to terms
Anyhow, it could do no harm to wal
a few days and watch developments.
Most of his waiting was done a
Pedro's place, bottle in front Of him
But as the days passed he grew i'm
patient and decided to talk the matter
over with Carl Gitner. 1t might b.
n good idea to send the big Texan VI
TO the sheep ranch just to show the Gif