Bad Man's Gulch by Max Brand Page A

close to him with its powerless weight. She could count the beating of his heart, feeble and fluttering, with pauses in the beats. It seemed that mere loss of blood could not so affect him. In that great bulk of muscle and bone there was only the faintest winking light of life, ready to snap out and leave all cold and dark forever. And it must be she, with an uninstructed wisdom, who should cherish that flame and keep it fluttering until it burned up strong again.
    â€œCan you try now, Billy?”
    â€œI’ll try now.”
    â€œThere’s one step up.” She lifted him with a fearful effort. “No, the other leg . . . the right leg, Billy. Steady. Now another step. Lean on me . . . I’m strong.”
    â€œI got to go. . . .”
    â€œIn a little while. When you’ve had half an hour’s sleep.”
    He muttered with a drunken thickness: “That’s it . . . a mite of sleep will set me up. . . . I’ll . . . I’ll sleep here . . . right on the stairs . . . it’s good enough.”
    It meant all his power every moment of that nightmare of a climb—and more than all her strength when he reeled and wavered—which was at every other step. But at last he reached the head of the stairs, and she brought him safely into her room. When she brought him into it, for the first time it seemed to her a mere corner—so small it was. They reached the bed—he slipped from her shoulder, and the bed groaned under his weight. There he lay on his back with his arms cast out clumsily.
    Once more there was that look of death in his face. The eyelids were slightly opened, and the glazed pupils glimmered with the suggestion of departed life. Only, as she watched him with dread in her throat, she saw a faint twitching of his lips. Then she hurried about the proper bandaging of the wound. She brought warm water and washed it. Then, with care, she closed the rough edges of the wound, still oozing blood. It was no easy task. The great, twisted muscles of the forearm were as firm and tough as the thigh of an ordinary man, but she fixed the bandage in place. She had half a bottle of rye whiskey. She brought it for him and sat on the bed, lifting his head. His head alone, limp as it was, was a burden. It seemed a miracle now that she had been able to support that tottering, wavering bulk of a man. At last the glass was at his lips, they parted, tasted the stuff, and then swallowed it down.
    Almost immediately a faint flush came into his face, and then his eyes fluttered open. They looked blankly up to her. “What’s wrong? What’s up?” he asked, half frowning.
    â€œNothing,” she said very softly.
    â€œNothing wrong? I thought . . . I dreamed . . . all right, then. I’ll sleep. I got work . . . tomorrow. . . .” He sighed and instantly he was sound asleep.
    She watched him for a moment, and then, hearing the
jingle
of her store bell, she rose hurriedly. She passed the mirror, and, catching a glimpse of her face, she found that it still wore a faint smile, half-wistful, half-contented.
    She was wondering at herself as she ran down the stairs. In the lunchroom she found the last man in the world she wanted to confront at that moment—Jack Hopper himself. She wanted to appear perfectly calm, perfectly cheerful, but, instead, sheknew that she had turned white and that she was staring at him.
    â€œI thought,” he said stiffly, “that maybe you might need something done . . . for your friend.”
    â€œFriend?” she answered. “Why, Jack, I never saw the poor fellow before tonight.”
    The raising of his eyebrows stopped her. He quivered with a passion of disbelief and of scorn. “He looked pretty bad hurt,” said Jack Hopper. “If there was anything that I could do . . .”
    â€œHe’s gone, Jack. I only kept him here until the sheriff was gone. . . .”
    â€œBilly Angel is gone?” exclaimed the