"She's coming, Eddie, old man," he said gently. "Rose will be here before you know it."
Whereupon Hurley sighed and closed his eyes again and lay still, seeking to hold what strength was still in him against the coming of his wife. He wanted to ask if she were bringing Eddie with her … but of course she wouldn't on a night like this …
"Joe Embry got him," Steele explained softly to Rice and Turk. "Thought he was getting me. Hurley had my hat on, put on my coat before he left the shack here, went down and saddled my horse."
Bill Rice nodded slowly, his eyes dark with rage.
"Hurley's bad hurt," he said softly, guarding his words from his former employer's ears. "I don't believe he's goin' to stick it out until she comes. … Sure it was Embry, Bill?"
"That's the hell of it all!" cried Steele, his two big fists going white as they lay on his lap. "I'm not sure of anything! But who else could it be?"
"I wish," murmured Turk plantively, "that I knowed who rolled that rock on my legs! … Give me another shot of hooch, one of you two Bills, will you?"
A long night for Steele and Rice, held in anxious inaction; for Turk Wilson whose injured leg pained him sorely; and for Ed Hurley an eternity to drag heavily by before the first light of a pale dawn. He had set himself the task of living and retaining full consciousness until Rose came to him … Rose and, possibly, little Eddie. Manfully he sought to shut out of his heart all bitterness at the thought that it might be that
