"I'm all right, Uncle Tad--only tired an' worried. I--"
"Tad, how's your hurt?" interrupted Colter.
"Reckon I'm easier," replied Jorth, wearily, "but shore I'm in bad shape. I'm still spittin' blood. I keep tellin' Queen that bullet lodged in my lungs-but he says it went through."
"Wal, hang on, Tad!" replied Colter, with a cheerfulness Ellen sensed was really indifferent.
"Oh, what the hell's the use!" exclaimed Jorth. "It's all--up with us--Colter!"
"Wal, shut up, then," tersely returned Colter. "It ain't doin' y'u or us any good to holler."
Tad Jorth did not reply to this. Ellen heard his breathing and it did not seem natural. It rasped a little--came hurriedly--then caught in his throat. Then he spat. Ellen shrunk back against the door. He was breathing through blood.
"Uncle, are y'u in pain?" she asked.
"Yes, Ellen--it burns like hell," he said.
"Oh! I'm sorry.... Isn't there something I can do?"
"I reckon not. Queen did all anybody could do for me--now--unless it's pray."
Colter laughed at this--the slow, easy, drawling laugh of a Texan. But Ellen felt pity for this wounded uncle. She had always hated him. He had been a drunkard, a gambler, a waster of her father's property; and now he was a rustler and a fugitive, lying in pain, perhaps mortally hurt.
"Yes, uncle--I will pray for y'u," she said, softly.
The change in his voice held a note of sadness that she had been quick to catch.
"Ellen, y'u're the only good Jorth--in the whole damned lot," he said. "God! I see it all now.... We've dragged y'u to hell!"
"Yes, Uncle Tad, I've shore been dragged some--but not yet--to hell," she responded, with a break in her voice.
"Y'u will be--Ellen--unless--"
"Aw, shut up that kind of gab, will y'u?" broke in Colter, harshly.
It amazed Ellen that Colter should dominate her uncle, even though he was wounded. Tad Jorth had been the last man to take orders from anyone, much less a rustler of the Hash Knife Gang. This Colter began to loom up in Ellen's estimate as he loomed physically over her, a lofty figure, dark motionless, somehow menacing.
"Ellen, has Colter told y'u yet--aboot--aboot Lee an' Jackson?" inquired the wounded man.
The pitch-black darkness of the cabin seemed to help fortify Ellen to bear further trouble.
"Colter told me dad an' Uncle Jackson would meet us heah," she rejoined, hurriedly.