Bandit's Honor by Max Brand

Author:Max Brand [Brand, Max]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Western
Publisher: Roy Glashan's Library
Published: 2020-03-05T23:00:00+00:00

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CHAPTER 11

WHEN we reached the house of Loveng, two days later, we paused in a screen of trees two hundred yards away. That delay was partly because we judged that it would be best to pause there until the dusk, at least, and in part because we wished to talk matters over. The chief discussion was as to whether or not we should go to the house together—as I proposed—or Dick should go alone.

The second view was the one which he maintained, and he upheld his idea with such vehemence that I had to give in to him. Because he declared that, if I would not let him go by himself, he would wait there until I changed my mind—if both of us had to starve in the meantime.

There was nothing to be done with such a state of mind in him. I kept struggling with him until after the darkness was complete, however, and even well after that. When I saw that I could do nothing whatever to change his determination, I let him. First I cautioned him to approach that house with care and to keep to cover constantly.

When he was as near to the house as cover would bring him, I advised him to wait until, by sight, or by the sound of voices, he tried to learn whether or not there was only Loveng and his family in the house, or several other men as well. In the latter case, I begged him not to continue.

After that, I had done all that I could. I let him pass on toward the house, but it was with a heavy heart that I saw him go. Loveng meant mischief. There was no doubt of that, or he would never have issued such a direct challenge to me as his statement in the paper had been.

However, I was glad to see that Dick Orton was willing to use caution in his approach to the house, no matter what might happen when the house itself was actually reached. I waited for fifteen or twenty minutes in the place where he had left me. Then I could endure it no longer, and I started out, creeping along as stealthily as I could manage it in the direction of the house and using what small cover lay before me.

I cannot tell you how peaceful and happy that scene was: The yellow flare of two lighted windows of the house of Loveng before me, and the shadowy outline of the house itself, roughened at the edges like an etching by the masses of climbing vines which tumbled over it. Even at that distance, I could smell the rank odor of the vegetable garden which the thrifty Loveng kept in cultivation on a large scale.

Or, when the wind changed a little, there was the fragrance of Mary’s rose garden just ahead. Well, there was a real aroma of home about that place. Hard as I felt toward Loveng at that moment, I

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