It was about time of sunset, warm and still in the canon, with rosy
lights fading upon the peaks. The men were all busy with one thing
and another. Strange it was to see that Gulden, who Joan thought
might be a shirker, did twice the work of any man, especially the
heavy work. He seemed to enjoy carrying a log that would have
overweighted two ordinary men. He was so huge, so active, so
powerful that it was fascinating to watch him. They built the camp-
fire for the night uncomfortably near Joan's position; however,
remembering how cold the air would become later, she made no
objection. Twilight set in and the men, through for the day,
gathered near the fire.
Then Joan was not long in discovering that the situation had begun
to impinge upon the feelings of each of these men. They looked at
her differently. Some of them invented pretexts to approach her, to
ask something, to offer service--anything to get near her. A
personal and individual note had been injected into the attitude of
each. Intuitively Joan guessed that Gulden's arising to follow her
had turned their eyes inward. Gulden remained silent and inactive at
the edge of the camp-fire circle of light, which flickered fitfully
around him, making him seem a huge, gloomy ape of a man. So far as
Joan could tell, Gulden never cast his eyes in her direction. That
was a difference which left cause for reflection. Had that hulk of
brawn and bone begun to think? Bate Wood's overtures to Joan were
rough, but inexplicable to her because she dared not wholly trust
him.
"An' shore, miss," he had concluded, in a hoarse whisper, "we-all
know you ain't Kells's wife. Thet bandit wouldn't marry no woman.
He's a woman-hater. He was famous fer thet over in California. He's
run off with you--kidnapped you, thet's shore. ... An' Gulden swears
he shot his own men an' was in turn shot by you. Thet bullet-hole in
his back was full of powder. There's liable to be a muss-up any
time. ... Shore, miss, you'd better sneak off with me tonight when
they're all asleep. I'll git grub an' hosses, an' take you off to
some prospector's camp. Then you can git home."
Joan only shook her head. Even if she could have felt trust in
Wood--and she was of half a mind to believe him--it was too late.
Whatever befell her mattered little if in suffering it she could
save Jim Cleve from the ruin she had wrought.
Since this wild experience of Joan's had begun she had been sick so
many times with raw and naked emotions hitherto unknown to her, that
she believed she could not feel another new fear or torture. But
these strange sensations grew by what they had been fed upon.