LITMIR.BIZ

      IV. GOOD SAMARITANS

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      The half mile up that grade was no easy walk under any circumstances. With a staggering storm from one side, with the rocks slippery from snow, and with the burden of another man weighting him, it was a terrific task for Jack Chapel. Looking up into his face, Alp saw the fighting jaw thrust out and the muscles over the angles of the jaw harden. Yet he took the half mile with only three brief pauses for rest. Finally, just a brief distance from the house, he deposited the wounded man in a bank of snow and leaned over him, panting.

      "I don't know what our story is going to be till I see the people of the house," he said. "The thing for you to do is to keep your ears open and your eyes shut. You understand?"

      "You want me to faint?" grinned Lou Alp.

      "Sure. Soon as I come close up to the door, I'll give you the word and you go limp. That'll bring me to the door with an unconscious man. As soon as I go in, they'll rush around until your senses come back. I'll have a chance that way to size up the gang in that house and frame a story. I'll tell the story so you can hear it. It won't be long, and you hang on to what I say. Will you do that?"

      "I'll turn a flop," said the sneak thief, "that'll have the real thing beat a mile. Lead on!"

      Where it was a mere matter of stratagem, Alp felt at home. His head cleared and his pulse strengthened as matters approached this new crisis. Once more he was taken up and they came in full view of a square-built ranch house whose tall windows promised capacious rooms within.

      "Now!" cautioned Jack Chapel, and the thief made himself limp.

      He became so perfectly inert that his left arm dangled toward the ground, his head dropped back and allowed his hat to fall off, while his long black hair blew in the wind. He heard a grunt of satisfaction from Jack Chapel that was music in his ears. Then he closed his eyes.

      He was too much of an artist to attempt to look through the lashes at what passed around him. He remained in darkness, his mouth agape, his head dangling, his whole weight utterly inert. He felt Jack prop him up on one knee and then heard the clatter of knuckles against the front door; it was opened. Warm air rushed out around them.

      "Hello, there! What you got? Not dead, man?"

      It was a deep, strong bass voice.

      "No. But drilled through the leg. Accident. Hunting." The reply of Jack Chapel was a tumbling mass of words panted out. "Lemme get him to a bed, will you?"

      "Of course. Let me carry him."

      "No, I'll manage him. Not serious, but he's played out. Lost a lot of blood."

      "Up this way, then, son. Hello! Mother! Kate! Come here. Hurry up. Hurry, I say!"

      A scurry of voices and footsteps in the distance, and then Lou felt himself being carried up a flight of stairs. The feminine rustling and voices came from behind and below and poured up around him. A young, pleasant voice had cried: "Poor fellow!" The voice of an older woman had screamed.

      "Now, none of that foolishness," said the man who led the way. "Keep your head, Mother. He ain't goin' to die. Just a scratch. Lost a little blood. Kate, I want you to stand by to help. Get some water and bandages."

      They reached level flooring, turned, and a door was opened. Lou could tell by the changed temperature of the air.

      "I'll have a fire going in a jiffy," said the big man's voice. "Kate, get that hot water. But how did you get him here? How far'd you carry him?"

      Lou felt himself laid upon a bed and then Jack Chapel was answering: "Not so far. We'd been hunting through the mountains. The storm got us, and we started down for lower levels. Coming along fine when this accident happened just in the hills, there above your house. And mighty lucky we were so close. Barbed wire is a curse, sir. Climbing through a fence got my holster caught... tried to get it loose... reached to pull my gun out... and somehow the thing went off and drilled Lou through the calf of his leg."

      All the time he talked brokenly, he was working swiftly, taking off Lou's clothes. Presently Lou Alp found himself slipped in between chilly sheets. In the meantime, a pair of massive fingers closed over his wrist.

      "He'll come along all right," said the deep voice after a moment. "Lucky it wasn't higher. Lucky it didn't hit the bone. Men of this generation don't know how to handle guns any more. No sense for 'em. Don't mean to hurt your feelin's, my young friend. By the way, my name's Moore, Roger Moore."

      "My name is Jack Chandler and this is Louis Angus."

      "Glad to know you. He ain't one of the Barr County Angus family, is he?"

      "Might be related. I dunno."

      "No, he ain't got bone enough to be one of 'em. Well, son, lucky you landed here. And you're welcome as long as you'll stay, and that'll be ten days anyway before he's on his feet. Come on in, Kate. Meet Jack Chandler. This is my daughter. Put that basin down over here, Kate. There's a good girl. Nothin' to be white about. The gent ain't goin' to die. Got a .45 through the calf of his leg, though. Was it a .45?"

      "A .32," said Jack Chandler.

      "What! Never seen a .32 tear things up like that, but bullets are as tricky as guns. Never know what they'll do. Look at that scar on my wrist. Bullet went in there, twisted clean around my forearm, and come out by the elbow. Didn't break a bone or tear a tendon and my arm was as good as ever inside three weeks. That's one of the queer things a bullet'll do. Luck, eh? Hello! He's comin' to!"

      Alp had felt a covert nudge from the knee of his companion and he took it as a signal to open his eyes. He did it very well. First he blinked. Then he glared up at the ceiling and murmured: "It's all right, Jack. You couldn't help it."

      "Delirious a little," muttered the deep voice.

      Alp sat bolt upright in the bed and stared wildly around him. "What the devil!" he exclaimed.

      His words met a pleased chuckle from half a dozen faces, and each with shining, kindly eyes.

      "The snow," said Lou vaguely, rubbing his eyes. "The wind... I..."

      A silver-haired woman with a youthful, beautiful face came beside him and laid her hand gently on his shoulder.

      "You lie down, my boy," she said. "The snow and the wind and the trouble are all left outside. And now we're goin' to take care of you."

      He allowed himself to be pressed back into the bed, but still his eyes went the rounds of the room. He saw Jack Chapel standing over him, his face grave with well-simulated trouble. He saw behind the woman the owner of the deep, bass voice. From the hand and the voice, he had expected a giant. Instead, he saw a stubby fellow, middle-aged, with a prodigious pair of shoulders and a not over large head set between them. His arms were very long, and the hands in exact proportion to the shoulders. Yet the small face which topped off this clumsy body was so filled with energy and penetration that Lou Alp forgot the lack of proportion.

      Rattling at the fireplace at one side of the big bedroom was evidently a

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