The Project Gutenberg eBook of The range-boomer
This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and
most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms
of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online
at www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States,
you will have to check the laws of the country where you are located
before using this eBook.
Title: The range-boomer
Author: W. C. Tuttle
Release date: July 25, 2026 [eBook #79180]
Language: English
Original publication: New York, NY: The Ridgway Company, 1922
Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/79180
Credits: Prepared by volunteers at BookCove (bookcove.net)
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE RANGE-BOOMER ***
THE RANGE-BOOMER
by W. C. Tuttle
Author of “Tangled Trails,” “Ajax for Example,” etc.
The dull hum of conversation in the Thunder County courthouse died down
as the door leading to the jury room opened and twelve men filed out.
They were all hard-bitted men, wearing the stamp of the range. There was
not a hint of the verdict on their impassive faces as they moved into
their seats.
From the opposite side of the room, through the door leading to the
jail, came the sheriff and a deputy with their prisoner, a tawny-eyed,
lithe young man, who walked forward with a half-smile on his thin lips
as he looked at the twelve men who had decided his fate.
The judge, portly and gray-haired, came in slowly and sat down behind
his desk. The courtroom was filled to suffocation, for the case had
caused much local interest and range folks like to sit in court when the
case has any interest to their business.
Seated just inside the railing reserved for the principals in the case
were four people—two men and two women. One of these men was a giant,
with a great shock of grizzled hair and mild blue eyes, which belied the
fighting-power revealed by his massive, deep-lined face. He was “Flint”
Moore, owner of the Box M cattle outfit, and father of “Wild” Moore, the
tawny-eyed prisoner.
Beside him sat his wife and his daughter, Patricia, known as “Pat,”
while with them sat “Bud” Deal, the foreman of the Box M. Patricia had
the same tawny eyes as her brother, and black hair and a creamy skin
which defied tan. Her mouth was full-lipped and her nose was just a
trifle tilted. Patricia had been the cause of many a cowboy’s day
dreams, but they all grew love-shy under the gaze of her yellow-brown
orbs and went away afraid to speak their feelings.
All except Bud Deal, the champion rider and pistol shot of the Thunder
Range. Bud’s coal-black eyes clashed with Pat’s tawny ones—and the black
eyes won. Bud was thirty years of age, slender, with the face of a
Spaniard and the nerve of a wild-cat. Few people loved Bud Deal; but
they all respected his ability. He was a first-class cow-man.
Flint Moore’s eyes turned from the jury, flashed to his son and centered
on the sheriff, who turned his head. Their eyes met. It was only a
flash, yet it was full of bitter hatred. Between Flint Moore and the
sheriff, Jeff Garvin, was bad, bad blood. Garvin was nearly as large a
man as Moore, with sandy hair and mustache. His eyes were deep set and
steel-gray in color.
For several moments there was tense silence in the little courtroom,
broken finally by the creak of the judge’s old swivel chair as he faced
the jury and said—
“Gentlemen, have you reached a verdict?”
A tall man, with a long, thin face, stood up, hitched nervously at the
waist-band of his overalls and said softly:
“Yes, sir, judge, we has. Here is our verdict.”
He held out a sheet of paper to the clerk, who handed it to the judge.
Every one in the courthouse leaned forward, watching the face of the old
judge for a hint of the verdict. He glanced down at Flint Moore and
handed the paper to the clerk to read aloud.
The drone of several flies, buzzing up and down the dusty windows, was
plainly audible.
Then the clerk read—
“We, the jury, find Wild Moore—uh—”
The clerk turned the sheet of paper around to better catch the light
from the window.
“We, the jury, find Wild Moore not guilty as charged.”
For an instant there was silence. Then a huge sombrero sailed up from
the rear of the room and seemed to skate along the ceiling. Following it
came the suppressed yelp of an enthusiastic cowboy—
“Ee-e-e-e-e-yah!”
The judge hammered on his desk, as he got to his feet, but his voice was
not heard above the commotion. Flint Moore had got to his feet and
stepped closer the sheriff, who had also got up. Patricia and her mother
had rushed to Wild and were smothering him in their embrace.
The sheriff was angry, explosively angry, and did not conceal it.
Cowboys vaulted the railing to shake hands with Wild Moore and some of
them jostled the sheriff nearer Flint Moore. It was like holding a flame
near powder for those two men to be near each other.
“That was a —— crooked verdict!” snapped the sheriff, glaring into Flint
Moore’s face; and a second later the sheriff went crashing backward into
a jumble of loose chairs from a smashing blow to the jaw.
The prosecuting attorney threw himself in front of Flint Moore, trying
to stop him, but a huge shoulder crashed into his chest, tossing him
aside. The sheriff heaved himself up from the floor, drawing his gun as
he came, but Bud Deal sprawled into him, clutching his gun-hand, while
other men grasped the sheriff to prevent a killing.
In the middle of the railed space stood Flint Moore, alone, Colt in
hand. Jud Frawley, the deputy, was watching him closely, but making no
effort to mix into the game. He knew that Flint Moore was in a killing
mood.
“Gentlemen! Gentlemen!” cried the judge, trying to elbow his way off his
platform; but a number of fight-loving cowboys blocked him from
interfering.
The jury had mixed into the quarrel, and it began to look as if the
Thunder County court would become a wreck, as far as the interior was
concerned. Patricia stepped in and put her hand on her father’s arm.
“Stop it, dad,” she ordered. “Let’s not make things any worse than they
are. Nothing can be gained by fighting.”
The boys had managed to take the sheriff’s gun away from him and now the
judge was heard above the uproar.
“Clear the courtroom!” he commanded. “This is a disgrace, gentlemen.”
“The whole —— case was a disgrace!” rasped Flint Moore. “Let that
star-packin’ coyote loose and fill his arms with guns.”
“Dad!” chided Pat. “Don’t say foolish things. Let’s all go home and call
it a day.”
“Good idea,” said Wild Moore, smiling. “Has been quite some day, folks.
C’m on, dad. Yuh can’t get no battle out of Jeff Garvin, ’cause he ain’t
got no gun—and yore lookin’.”
Jeff Garvin heard the implication, but he did not reply. He was
white-hot. His jaw still ached from Flint Moore’s fist, but he knew that
the men would not permit him to make any attempt to retaliate. He
shifted his glance to Wild Moore, and his eyes clashed with those of
irresponsible youth. Then Wild Moore laughed mockingly and turned his
back on the sheriff.
Flint Moore turned away and left the courtroom with his family and Bud
Deal. Several of the jury shook hands with Wild at the courthouse steps
and slapped Flint on the back, telling him to forget Jeff Garvin.
* * * * *
Other men argued with Jeff Garvin, telling him to forget Flint Moore;
but Jeff Garvin said nothing. He was a powerful man and jealous of his
prestige in the Thunder Range. He had been chief witness against Wild
Moore, in which Wild had been accused of rustling cattle. Every one knew
that the hard Winter had hit the Box M, and that Flint Moore was pinched
for ready cash. Wild was an inveterate gambler—a plunger, and it was
reported that he owed some large poker bills. He had suddenly acquired a
lot of money. His poker bills were paid and he plunged heavier than
usual.
A bunch of seventy steers had disappeared from the ranch in which Jeff
Garvin owned half-interest. Garvin knew that several small herds had
disappeared prior to his own loss. He wanted to talk with Wild Moore
about several things, but Wild was missing. Several days later he showed
up and plunged into the gambling-halls. When the sheriff questioned him
he merely laughed and told the sheriff to go to a place which, they say,
is hotter, on an average, than Fourth of July in Yuma.
Thereupon the sheriff arrested him and tried to build up his case
against him, but cattle jurors must be shown something material. In
fact, a rustler must almost be found with the stolen animal—to be
branded a rustler.
“Whitey” Allen, one of Moore’s punchers, rode out with them from Oxbow,
while the crowd from the courthouse watched them go and speculated on
what would happen when Flint Moore and Jeff Garvin met again.
Oxbow was the county seat of Thunder County, an unpretentious little
cow-city at the terminus of a railroad branch. It had been a
stage-station, a trading-post, and the advent of a railroad, the
appointment as a county seat, had changed it little.
There was a main street, narrow, dusty, fortified on both sides by
unpainted, false-fronted buildings. There was a cross street started,
which did not continue beyond a few more buildings of the same type of
architecture. There was nothing in Oxbow to attract tourist nor capital.
It squeaked in the Winter blizzards and creaked in the Summer heat. Men
died with their boots on, and the survivors went on in their own dumb
way, talking cattle prices, trading horses and whittling chairs.
When poker, faro and roulette palled, they pitched horseshoes for twenty
dollars a corner or spat at a crack for the price of a steer. It was
little wonder that Wild Moore’s trial had been of interest.
Whitey Allen was a thin, emaciated, tow-haired cowboy, whose features
seemed to blend. He was one of those indescribable individuals who are
like a sketchy drawing to which neither shade nor high-light has been
added, or a half-tone drawing of a cowboy’s body with the head and face
merely indicated.
None of the party had much to say during the ten mile ride to the Box M,
which consisted of a rambling old ranch-house in the cottonwoods along
Leloo Creek. There were several pole corrals, a long shelter shed and a
one-story bunk-house.
Thunder Range was mostly low, rolling hills, which stretched Eastward to
the high banks of Bitter River and Westward to the high range of the
Thunder Mountains, which circled the big range like a crescent. There
was plenty of water, and just now the hills were ablaze with Spring
wildflowers and new bunchgrass, which grew up as if nature sought to
cover the bones of the stock which she had wiped out with a terrific
Winter.
Every ranch on the range had suffered, but none so heavily as the Box M.
Magpies chattered over their nest-building in the willows along the
stream. Prairie-dogs whistled from the sides of the hills, and overhead,
high in the blue haze, flocks of geese and brant honked their way to the
Northern lakes.
It was twilight when they rode into the Box M ranch and dismounted
beside the rambling old porch. Deal and Whitey took the horses to the
sheds, while the family went into the house. Flint Moore seemed to have
aged ten years in a week. Wild was silent; but there was a gleam of
exultation in his tawny eyes. He faced his father across the center
table in the living-room and a defiant look came into his face as he
waited for his father to speak.
“Son,” Flint Moore spoke very softly. “Son, where did you get that money
yuh was spendin’ so free?”
Wild Moore threw back his head.
“Jeff Garvin asked the same question, dad.”
“I know he did—but you ain’t goin’ to give me the same answer yuh gave
him.”
“Ain’t I?”
Flint Moore shook his head.
“No, son.”
“Havin’ money ain’t no crime.”
“No-o-o it ain’t no crime; but after the Winter we had
it’s —— noticeable, son.”
Wild laughed.
“Everybody’s so —— poor around this forsaken country that an extra
two-bits makes folks suspicious that yo’re a thief.”
“This ain’t no time for jokin’, son. Yo’re goin’ to tell me where yuh
got that money, and I’m goin’ to tell the Thunder Range folks where yuh
got it. The Box M and the Moore family comes clean with God and man.
Now, talk.”
Wild Moore’s eyes narrowed as he looked at his father. He was not a
dutiful son; and Flint Moore knew that his question would not be
answered. It was with misgivings that Flint Moore had watched the
growing-up of his boy. He had never shown affection for any one. There
was a queer, wild strain in his blood, which grew into a devil-may-care
attitude toward every one and everything. He was a throwback to some
remote ancestor, whose eyes were a yellowish brown—probably a laughing,
king-hating swashbuckler, who swore allegiance to no power.
Patricia had the same eyes, but Flint Moore knew that Pat was just a
sweet, warm-hearted girl, who loved this wild-riding brother, but did
not ask his love in return. Perhaps she understood him better than the
rest.
* * * * *
For a full minute the two men watched each other. Came the jingle of a
spur on the threshold and they turned to see Bud Deal standing in the
doorway. Flint Moore had no way of knowing how long he had been there.
“Didja want that roan mare turned into the hills?” asked Deal softly.
“Her back’s kinda sore.”
Flint Moore nodded.
“Yeah. Yuh might put a little axlegrease on the spots, Bud.”
Bud nodded in agreement, but made no move to leave. He produced a
cigaret paper and tobacco and began leisurely to roll a smoke. Wild
relaxed and accepted the “makin’s” from Bud, while Flint Moore studied
them closely. Somehow, it seemed to him that the coming of Deal was a
bit too opportune. It had saved Wild the clash, which was most surely
due between them, when he had refused to explain where the money had
come from.
Patricia came into the room, her eyes shining as she threw one arm
around her father’s shoulders and patted him on the cheek.
“Just think, dad; this is the first time in three weeks that we have all
been able to eat together. Isn’t it fine? I have never had much use for
the law; but I was mighty grateful when it spoke up and told us that we
didn’t have a thief in our family.”
Wild turned and stared at her.
“Didja have to have the law tell yuh that?”
Bud Deal laughed softly over his cigaret. Patricia did not reply, but
her eyes did not waver.
“I hope the law—” began Flint Moore softly, but did not finish.
“I—I think we had better eat supper,” stated Patricia sadly.
“I don’t reckon I’m hungry,” grunted Wild, and turned out of the door,
jingling his spurs down the steps and walking away toward the
bunk-house.
Bud Deal tossed his cigaret away and turned to Flint.
“Yuh hadn’t ought to try to make him tell——”
“Yo’re only the foreman, Deal,” Flint Moore’s voice was as cold as ice.
“Yore business is not connected with my personal affairs. _Sabe?_ You
must ’a’ been there quite a while before yuh jingled that spur.”
Deal’s dark face flushed, but he did not reply. Pat looked keenly at him
and he tried to smile. Flint Moore turned away and went slowly to the
dining-room door, where he turned his head.
“Deal, yuh better give Whitey his time tonight. There ain’t enough work
around here for all of us, and I’ve got to cut down expenses. May sell
out—I dunno.”
Deal nodded.
“All right, boss. I reckon we’ll get along.”
Flint Moore went into the dining-room, and Deal turned to Pat.
“The old man’s kinda upset, honey.”
“Don’t you think he has a right to be, Bud?”
Bud grinned and shook his head.
“Not a bit. The jury cleared him as clean as a whistle, didn’t they?”
“The jury—yes. Wild refused to testify. There was only the sheriff’s
suspicions to pass judgment upon, and you know that no cattle jury will
accept suspicions, Bud. That jury knew that Jeff Garvin hates dad.”
“Well, that trial is all over, and your dad ought to forget it. A young
feller don’t like to have anybody hornin’ into his business, and I can
see why Wild—see how he feels about it.”
“Perhaps you can, Bud,” replied Pat softly, and Bud wondered why she
emphasized “you” so strongly.
They went into the dining-room together.
II
It was just at the hour when night fades into the pale shades of the
dawn. No. 52 was thirty minutes behind schedule, which accounted for the
extra throb and sway of the long string of Pullmans, as the huge
compound engine thundered its way around the curves of the Snake Creek
hills.
Suddenly there came the screech of brakes and the train ground to a
shuddering stop. There was no sign of water-tank, station or signal. The
front end of the train was just around a sharp curve.
A man darted back from the engine, running close to the side of the
baggage car. He stepped in between the baggage car and the next coach,
broke the air-hose, lifted the coupler and swung out, waving his free
hand. As the engine started ahead he swung up on the rear of the car and
the engine and one car went on around the curve.
In the rear of the engine cab stood a masked man, with a pistol in each
hand. Lying half across his seat was the fireman, a bloody welt on his
head, while the engineer looked straight ahead and drove according to
directions. The fireman had attempted to fight the two masked men, and
had paid for his foolishness. A mile farther on the man gave the command
to stop, forced the engineer to precede him out of the cab, and the two
of them went back to the baggage car.
Under the baggage car, huddled on the precarious rods was a man. His
face was covered with a once-clean bandanna handkerchief to protect him
from the stinging particles of dust. His clothes were driven full of
grit and he was smoke-blackened until it was impossible to tell whether
he was a white man or a negro.
The halting of the train had been a godsend to him, as he was nearly
exhausted from an all-night grip of the rods, where he had fought
against sleep and exhaustion. He could see the lower half of the
engineer’s and the masked man’s bodies, as they came to the door of the
baggage car. He saw the other man come from the rear of the car and join
them.
He strained his ears to hear what was being said, but was unable to get
more than an occasional word. He heard some one mention “dynamite” and a
little later, “good sense.” Then he heard the door slide back in its
grooves.
He relaxed for a moment and reached for his cigaret papers and tobacco.
He grinned through the grime on his face at the cigaret he managed to
make. It was greasy from his fingers, and his dry tongue had little
power to seal the smoke.
Suddenly there came a crash above him—a jerking crash, which almost
threw him off the rods. His cigaret fell to the road-bed and he clung
with both hands. The three men dropped back to the ground, and he could
see that one of them was carrying a canvas sack, which was heavy with
its contents. One of the men started toward the engine.
It suddenly struck the man on the rods that this was a train hold-up.
One of the men seemed to take a backward step, and from up by the engine
came the dull report of a pistol. The man who had staggered went to one
knee and the other sprang to him. The man on the rods could see that
this kneeling man was completely masked. The other was firing toward the
engine.
He stopped and helped the other to his feet, and as he did so he dropped
his pistol to the rocky ground. He yanked the other man to his feet,
swept up the pistol, and the two of them slid off the grade into the
brush, taking the heavy canvas sack with them.
The man on the rods uncoiled swiftly and crawled out the opposite side
of the car, and a moment later the engine and car began backing swiftly
toward the rest of the train. The man had rolled into the brush and
stayed concealed until the engine had disappeared around the curve.
Then he got to his feet and crossed the track, looking curiously in the
direction taken by the bandits. It was a heavily wooded slope, and the
two men were nowhere in evidence. He glanced down at the ground. A bent
and blackened silver dollar lay among the rocks and near it was a small,
almost triangular piece of pearl. He picked it up and studied it, and
finally put it into his pocket. Then he crossed the track and plunged
into the hills, going in the opposite direction to that taken by the
bandits. He swore softly at himself for being fool enough to leave the
train at that time. He realized that the rods of that train, even if he
was discovered at the next stop, would be safer than being found in the
hills.
He watched the train pass the spot of the hold-up, roaring its way to
the next stop to spread the alarm, which would send mounted men on the
trail of the outlaws. In a few hours the hills would be searched by men
who knew every inch of them.
The man plunged on over a ridge and down into a ravine, where he found a
stream of water. In lieu of soap he used sand, and did not cease
scrubbing until he was restored to his normal color. He was wearing a
cheap flannel shirt, an old vest, overalls and short boots. His hat was
a nondescript sombrero.
When he had laundered himself as well as possible he sprawled at the
edge of the stream and drank deeply. The reflection of his own face in
the pool seemed to amuse him. All his life Jimmy Devlin had smiled at
his own features; for Jimmy Devlin was far from handsome.
Jimmy’s hair was a cross between a roan and a sorrel. It would not part.
His eyes were very blue and deepset. His nose was a trifle too generous
and had been knocked a bit askew in a fight. His mouth was large and
seemed to hold a perpetual smile. He was thirty-two years of age; five
feet eleven inches tall and weighed a hundred and seventy-five. He was
an expert cow-hand, willing to argue anything from psychoanalysis to the
right way to bake a bean—and had just got out of the penitentiary, after
fifteen months served on a three-year sentence.
Jimmy had been sent up for doing just what he had seen these two men
doing a short time before. According to the records of Red Lodge County,
Jimmy Devlin was a bold, bad train-robber.
This was one of the reasons why Jimmy did not want to be picked up by
the officers. Inside his vest pocket were his parole papers. He knew
that the officers would be very glad to find him, and he also knew that
he would have a hard time making them understand that he had nothing to
do with it.
If he had been found on the rods of that robbed car he might have been
able to convince them that he had nothing to do with it; but a paroled
train-robber’s words are of little weight, especially when zealous
officers are seeking some one to imprison.
Therefore, Jimmy Devlin headed once more into the land of purple sage
and dim trails. He felt that he was many miles removed from the spot
where he had been arrested and tried, and there was little danger of any
one knowing him. Jimmy hated the parole. He would have to stay within
the boundaries of the State, and to report at regular intervals to the
sheriff of the county. Just now he felt of the bit of paper sewed inside
his vest pocket, and it brought a frown, as he plodded along.
He stopped and looked across the hills, which stretched away to the
horizon, an endless sea of hill-waves. As far as he could see there was
no hint of a squatter’s cabin nor sign of barbed-wire fences. Thunder
Range was still the open land—a land of the dim trails.
Suddenly Jimmy’s serious face broke into a smile and his hand crinkled
the paper in his pocket.
“Sure,” he muttered, half-aloud, “I should be glad that the paper says
Montana instead of Rhode Island, because I hear they have a small area
down there.”
He turned and started through the sage, disturbing the day dreams of a
jack rabbit, which darted from in front of him and went spindle-legging
its way down the hill, gathering speed at every jump, until it became
but a gray blur in the sage.
“You should be glad, too,” chuckled Jimmy, as the rabbit faded from
view. “Sure, you’d only get goin’ good and run off the edge into the
ocean.”
Jimmy hitched up his pants and started on, hat in hand. Here was a big,
free land—an empire of hills and valleys, far from real civilization;
yet Jimmy Devlin felt that he could not be a part of it. He could never
be a free man, as long as he must report to the law.
“Twelve wise men said I was a train-robber,” he muttered softly, “and
who am I to dispute twelve wise men?”
He shaded his eyes with his hand and glanced around, as if challenging
some one to dispute the question.
“Three years they gave me to repint of my sins, and in fifteen months
they got tired of feedin’ me. Repint on your own meal-ticket, says they.
Be a good citizen from now on, lie to the sheriff fluently, and by doin’
so ye may save the State the cost of feedin’ ye slumgullion stew and the
wear and tear on large rocks.”
Jimmy grinned and scanned the country.
“Talkin’ to meself like a shepherd. I must take another name, that’s
very sure, except with the sheriff—bad luck to him. Still, he may not be
a bad sort. I hope I get a job before the hills are full of
man-hunters—so I do.”
He topped a rise and stopped. Before him spread the Thunder Range. He
could see the great crescent of mountains, the long, sloping foot-hills.
He took a deep breath and shook his head in wonderment.
“Sure I’m a lucky devil, so I am. I was in the Thunder country and
didn’t know it.”
He scanned the country and looked back, where he could see the dim,
green line of Bitter River.
“It’s the place,” he muttered. “I’m too far South yet, though. Sure, I
wonder if he did what he said he would? Wish I knew where he was, the
poor divil. He wanted to go to Arizony and try to fight the pain in his
chest. I was fool enough to cut into the game and let the sheriff chase
me. I thought I had a fast horse; but I miscounted me speed per mile.
“Ah, well, it was only fifteen months. I hope that some soft-hearted
Mick will help me out in return, if I ever need it. Fifteen months in
the penitentiary and further orders not to leave the State. Mebbe it was
worth it—I dunno. Talkin’ to meself again! Hm-m-m!”
He shook his head and started toward the North.
III
Jeff Garvin opened his mail, which had collected for several days. It
was mostly reward notices, which he scanned and tossed aside. Rewards
for yeggs, counterfeiters and even the lowly pickpocket. The sheriff
passed them all until he came to a letter which bore the imprint of the
State penitentiary. He opened it and frowned over its contents.
Jud Frawley looked up from his newspaper when the sheriff grunted aloud.
“They’ve paroled Jim Devlin,” stated the sheriff.
“Who is he?” asked Frawley. “Oh, yeah. He was sent up before we went
into office, wasn’t he, Jeff?”
“Uh-huh. Robbed a train in Silverbend County and they trailed him plumb
over here before they got him.”
“And never got the money, did they?”
“Nope. He got away with twenty thousand dollars. Now they let him out on
parole and he’ll likely dig it up, thumb his nose at the law and live
easy.”
“Did you know him?” asked Frawley.
Garvin shook his head.
“Never even seen him. Heard all about the case. Swore he didn’t know a
thing about it, but they sent him up. Why, he was ridin’ a pinto, with a
white rump. The sheriff of Silverbend had follered that pinto for a
week. They gave him three years. ——! I’d serve fifteen months for twenty
thousand dollars.”
Frawley nodded in agreement and folded up his paper.
“Seen anything of any of the Box M outfit lately?”
The sheriff snapped around in his chair.
“None of ’em been here in ten days—not since the trial. Mebbe I made a
fool of myself, Frawley; but I was sore. That —— Wild Moore would make
anybody sore, and his father——”
The sheriff snapped back to his desk and began writing on some legal
papers. Frawley nodded, deep in thought. Then—
“Wasn’t it reported that Devlin was killed in a jail-break?”
“Yeah. A month ago. Newspapers never get things right. It was denied
later. Anyway, he wasn’t, or they couldn’t parole him, that’s a cinch.”
The sheriff picked up the letter again and scanned it. He grunted
something unintelligible and turned to Frawley.
“Where do yuh reckon this letter has been all this time? Posted two
weeks ago.”
Frawley got up and examined the postmark. It was quite true that the
letter was two weeks old.
“Likely got shoved aside,” said Frawley, slowly. “It don’t matter none,
does it, Jeff?”
“No, but it might ’a’ been somethin’ important.”
Frawley pursed his lips and went back to his chair. He had been carrying
that letter in an inside vest pocket ever since the morning it arrived,
but he wasn’t going to tell the sheriff. The vest had not been worn
since that morning until now. Still, it was not important.
A man, bareheaded and in his shirt-sleeves, came in the door and walked
to the sheriff, to whom he handed a telegram, watching the sheriff read
it. Frawley got up, as if to get a peek at the message, which had
suddenly galvanized Garvin into life.
“Listen to this, Jud,” ordered the sheriff, and read the message aloud:
“NUMBER FIFTY-TWO HELD UP BY TWO MASKED MEN IN SNAKE CREEK HILLS
AT DAYLIGHT THIS MORNING. FIREMAN JOHNSON KILLED. BLEW SAFE AND
GOT AWAY WITH BIG SHIPMENT OF GOLD. TRAIN WAS STOPPED AT FIRST
CURVE NORTH OF SNAKE CREEK BRIDGE. ENGINEER SAW ROBBERS GO EAST
FROM RAILROAD.
(signed) SHERIFF FRANKLYN, COTTONWOODS.”
“Snake Creek Bridge,” mused Frawley. “No use goin’ down there, I don’t
reckon. They’ll have hours start of us.”
“Cinch,” agreed the sheriff. “Only thing we can do is to go out the Box
M road and cut across the hills to Snake Creek. It’s almost a cinch that
they won’t try to hide out East of Bitter River. Mebbe we’ll cut their
trail some’ers.”
“Take a pack-outfit?” queried Frawley, and the sheriff nodded. “One
horse. Throw on enough for about four days, Jud. Better pack the brown
mare. She’s got more speed than the rest. I’ll wire to Franklyn and tell
him we’ll work the Thunder Range, but for him to watch that they don’t
get across into the breaks of Swan River.”
Jud Frawley worked swiftly and in half-an-hour they were ready to hit
the trail.
Both men were well mounted and the small pack was diamond-hitched to a
rangy brown mare.
Without causing any questions or excitement they rode out of town,
heading down the dusty road, which led to the Box M. They covered ground
swiftly, with the pack-mare swinging along at a stiff gallop. Both men
knew it might be a hard trip, with the odds greatly in favor of the
hunted. There were hundreds of places in the east side of the Thunder
Range where two men might hide out indefinitely. It was a case of
cutting their trail, more by accident than design, because the range was
full of loose horses, some shod, some barefooted.
Jeff Garvin did not intend to stop at the Box M ranch. He knew that his
presence was not at all desired at that certain place. The enmity
between him and Flint Moore was of many years’ standing, and was caused
by a horse race and the native truth of an Indian.
* * * * *
It was only a cayuse race, yet much money had been wagered. Flint Moore
had a horse in the race as did Jeff Garvin. Both owners were too heavy
to ride their own horses, and expect to win; so Garvin suggested that
they each hire an Indian boy to ride.
Moore agreed and selected his boy the day before. That night Garvin
drank much whisky and made many bets on his horse. Moore took part of
the bets, in which Garvin gave foolish odds. Moore’s horse won.
An hour or so after the race Moore found his jockey, almost beaten to
death, and doctored him back to life. The Indian boy told Moore that
Garvin had tried to kill him. After much questioning Moore found that
Garvin had bribed the Indian boy to throw the race. He had given the boy
ten dollars to do this, but the boy had not understood the white man’s
crooked scheme and had ridden to win.
Moore hunted out Garvin and found him in a gambling hall. Before the
crowd, Moore told what the Indian boy had told him and then proceeded to
whip Garvin. It was a complete job. Later that night, some one hit Moore
over the head with a gun and robbed him of his own money and the
winnings of the race. The next day Garvin had plenty of money, but Moore
could not prove who hit him. From that time on there was an enmity which
grew with the years.
* * * * *
The sheriff and his deputy rode past the sagging gate to the
ranch-house, and started into the hills, past the corrals, when they met
Patricia, leading her saddle-horse. She watched them ride up to her and
made no effort to avoid them.
Garvin eased himself in his saddle and glanced back at the ranch-house
before he said—
“Yore dad at home?”
Pat shook her head.
“No.”
“Yore brother?”
“Why do you ask?” Pat looked straight at him, and Garvin smiled.
“Then he ain’t, eh? Where’s Bud Deal and Whitey Allen?”
“Whitey isn’t working here. Hasn’t been here for about ten days.”
“Which don’t tell me where Bud Deal is,” reminded Garvin.
“No?” Pat was not a bit afraid of Jeff Garvin. “Perhaps you had better
find Bud Deal and ask him.”
“Yeah,” nodded the sheriff. “Mebbe it would pay me to do just what yuh
say. They’re all out in the hills, ain’t they?”
“Are they?” queried Pat interestedly. “Know any more news about our
affairs, Mr. Garvin?”
Garvin swore under his breath and spurred ahead. Jud Frawley grinned at
Pat and lifted his hat as he followed the sheriff. Down in his heart
Frawley applauded Pat Moore, and he was not going to let Garvin’s
prejudices against the Moore family change his opinion that Pat was
about the finest girl he ever met.
The sheriff led straight into the south, until the broken hills
concealed them from the ranch-house; then he turned his horse at right
angles and swung up the bottom of a dry ravine. They climbed to where
the ravine forked and the sheriff stopped and dismounted.
“What’s the big idea?” queried Frawley, as he watched the sheriff swing
his field-glasses over his shoulder.
“We’ll climb up here to the top and watch that —— ranch, Jud. I ain’t
takin’ no chances this time. Flint Moore needs money pretty danged bad,
I’m tellin’ yuh. Him and that go-devil son of his ain’t home, and I’m
goin’ to see when and from which way they do come.”
“How about Bud Deal?” asked Frawley, as they settled down in the rocks,
looking down at the distant ranch-house.
“All depends,” grunted Garvin. “I’m lookin’ for two men ridin’ together.
Bud Deal is goin’ to marry that yaller-eyed girl, and the Box M needs
money pretty danged bad.”
Frawley grunted and stretched out in the shade. As far as he was
concerned it was all right. He would rather lie in the shade than to
ride in the sun, and if the sheriff wanted to loaf on the job, he was
willing to help him.
It was about four o’clock when the sheriff picked up the two riders
heading toward the ranch-house. It was Flint Moore and his son, beyond a
doubt. Frawley took the glasses and nodded in agreement.
“Still that don’t spell nothin’,” stated Frawley, as he handed the
glasses back to Garvin. “Two men ridin’ together don’t mean they robbed
a train.”
“Ke-rect!” snapped the sheriff. “But it resembles such to the extent
that I’m goin’ to find out where they’ve been. It’s about twenty-five
miles from here to where that hold-up was pulled off, Jud. Come on.”
Garvin got to his feet and started down the hill toward their horses.
“Think a little about this, Jeff,” cautioned Jud, angling down the hill,
digging his high-heels into the turf. “Flint Moore ain’t no shrinkin’
vi’let, and he hates you a lot. Wild ain’t exactly got any cause to love
yuh—and they’re both pretty —— fast with a six-gun.”
Garvin turned at the horses.
“Stay out of it if yo’re scared, pardner; but I’m goin’ down there.
_Sabe?_”
Frawley swung to his saddle and circled the pack-mare.
“I ain’t afraid, Jeff; and you know it. We’ll just be rammin’ ourselves
against hot lead, thasall. Lemme go in alone and talk to ’em.”
“Fine chance!” sneered Garvin. “Have folks find out that I was scared of
Moore. No, we go in together, or I go in alone.”
“All right, all right,” grunted Frawley. “Statistics shows that most men
die before they reach thirty years of age, and I’m ten years over the
average right now.”
Flint Moore and his son reached the ranch-house ahead of the sheriff and
his deputy. Flint had gone into the house, while Wild had taken the
horses to the corral. Garvin and Frawley rode boldly through the gate
and up to the porch.
* * * * *
Flint Moore stepped out on the porch, minus his belt and gun and
carrying a newspaper. He stared at Garvin steadily, wonderingly. Then he
said—
“What do you want here, Garvin?”
“Just a little information, Moore,” replied the sheriff easily, noting
with satisfaction that Moore was unarmed.
He eased himself in the saddle and dropped the reins over the
saddle-horn.
“Where yuh been, Moore?”
“Where have I been?” Flint Moore repeated the question.
“Uh-huh.”
Moore took several moments to collect his thoughts, and then—
“What business of yours is where I have been?”
“None—mebbe. Saw you and yore son ridin’ in and I’d kinda like to know
where you’ve been, thassall.”
Moore frowned. It was inconceivable that the sheriff should ride in and
ask where he had been—especially as he and Garvin were sworn enemies.
“I don’t _sabe_ your reasons, Garvin; and it’s none of your —— business
where we’ve been.”
Garvin fidgeted with his bridle reins.
“Have you met anybody who could swear where yuh was at a certain time?”
Moore frowned and shook his head.
“Didja leave home today?”
“No, we left yesterday. Now, what in —— is all this about?”
“The train was held up at Snake Creek bridge this mornin’ about
daylight,” replied Garvin slowly.
The newspaper slipped from Moore’s hand. For a moment he stared at
Garvin and then came straight down the steps and up to the horses.
Garvin’s hand slid to his gun. He had felt the weight of Flint Moore’s
fist and was not going to take any chances.
“You accuse me of doing that?” Moore’s voice was very low, but distinct.
“Don’t get het up,” advised Garvin. “If yuh didn’t, yuh can prove yuh
didn’t, can’t yuh?”
“Can you prove I did, Garvin?”
“I reckon,” said Garvin slowly. “I reckon we’ll let the jury decide
that.”
Garvin’s hand came up quickly and his pistol pointed at Flint Moore.
“Yo’re under arrest, Moore. Don’t move,” and then to Frawley, “Go and
get the kid, Jud.”
As Frawley turned his horse toward the sheds Pat came out on the front
porch. For a moment she stared at her father and the sheriff and then
she came down the steps and up to them. She looked at the pistol in the
sheriff’s hand and at her father’s tense face.
Wild Moore came out of the stable and saw Frawley riding toward him. He
could see his father standing beside the sheriff’s horse, with Pat a few
feet away.
He knew that something was wrong and waited for Frawley to come up.
Frawley was doing something he did not want to do; but he was only the
sheriff’s hired man.
“I reckon yo’re under arrest, Wild.”
Wild Moore looked up at him. He did not dislike Jud.
“What for?”
“Sheriff thinks that you and yore dad held up the train at Snake Creek
this mornin’.”
“The —— he does!” exploded Wild, and walked rapidly up to the sheriff,
paying no attention to the gun.
“What’s all this fool talk about?” he demanded.
Frawley rode up beside him and waited for the sheriff to speak.
The gun turned slowly to cover Wild, and the sheriff spoke to Frawley—
“Take his gun, Jud.”
The tall deputy dismounted and removed the gun from Wild’s holster.
“Wild, can’t you prove where you were yesterday and today?” asked Pat.
“Didn’t you see anybody?”
Wild shook his head.
“Never seen a soul, Pat. We made camp at Dancin’ Flats last night. Why,
we wasn’t within eight miles of the railroad.”
“Well,” said the sheriff, “I reckon you can saddle up again and come
with me to Oxbow.”
“You mean—” began Flint Moore.
“Jail—sure,” nodded the sheriff. “If yuh can prove yuh didn’t do
it—fine. I’m listenin’ for a proof.”
“And while you are listening for innocent men to prove their innocence,
the real robbers are making their way to safety,” said Pat.
Garvin laughed aloud and started to drop his pistol back into its
holster. His prisoners were unarmed. He looked down at Pat.
“Sister, that sounds real smart; but I’m one _hombre_ that yaller eyes
and a smooth tongue never did faze.”
Flint Moore was only a few feet away from the sheriff, and his spring
caught the sheriff unawares. His arms circled the sheriff’s body, and a
backward heave, with his knees braced against the horse’s side, threw
Garvin out of the saddle and sprawling to the ground. Like a flash,
Flint Moore tossed aside the sheriff’s gun and waited for him to get up.
Jud Frawley started forward as if to help Garvin, but Wild tripped him
with an out-flung foot and he almost fell over the sheriff. Before he
could regain his balance Wild dived into him, knocking him sidewise and
almost under his frightened horse, where Wild yanked his gun from its
holster and secured his own from where it had dropped in the mixup.
Jeff Garvin struggled to his feet, cursing madly, and rushed at Flint
Moore. They were nearly equal in size, but Flint Moore had whipped him
before and both men knew he could do it again. This knowledge won for
Flint, just as it lost for Garvin.
Moore smashed through Garvin’s clumsy guard and drove him across the
yard with terrific smashes, which Garvin could not block. Garvin fought
back like a tiger for a moment, but a blow to the jaw took all the
strength from his muscles, and a second later a haymaker swing crashed
against his chin and he went down like a stricken steer.
Flint Moore turned toward the porch, where Wild and Pat were sitting
side by side. On the steps sat Frawley, his hands on his knees, a
half-smile on his face. Moore noticed that Wild was dangling a pistol in
his hand.
“That,” declared Frawley in appreciation, “that was complete and plumb
sudden. Fallin’ around thataway caused me to miss a little of it. Kinda
like a prizefight I was to in Pendleton once. They rung the bell and I
turned m’ head to spit. Missed the fight, by jing! Hope he seen me start
to help him.”
Flint Moore leaned against the porch and watched Garvin struggle back to
his feet. He was a badly whipped man and did not seem to know just where
he was going.
“Busted his rudder!” exclaimed Frawley, and then to Wild, “Mind lettin’
me steer him?”
Wild grinned and shook his head. Frawley got Garvin by the arm and led
him back to his horse, where Garvin clung to a stirrup and tried to
clear his brain. Frawley turned to Flint Moore.
“I reckon he won’t take yuh with him this evenin’.”
“I reckon he will!” retorted Flint. “If he don’t take us in with him,
we’ll take him in with us. He’s made his arrest, now he’s got to make
good on it. Go get the horses, Wild.”
Garvin got slowly on his horse. He was sore from his beating and his
head ached badly. Flint Moore walked in close to him, and Garvin
flinched at the feel of the muscular hand on his knee.
“Garvin, if you ever speak to my daughter or about her, I’ll beat you to
death.”
Garvin nodded with evident understanding and caressed his aching jaw. He
dreaded having to speak to any one.
Mrs. Moore was busy in the kitchen at the rear of the house and knew
nothing of the turn of events until Pat went into the house and told
her. They both went outside as Wild rode up leading his father’s horse.
The leavetaking was short. Mrs. Moore, a patient little woman, bowed her
head sadly over the inevitable. She knew that they were not guilty, but
that the sheriff would try to make them as much trouble as possible.
Pat and her mother stood on the porch and watched them ride away, with
Garvin, unarmed, riding in the lead, closely followed by Frawley, also
unarmed. Flint Moore and Wild rode side by side. Frawley turned and
waved his hat at the two women, as he yelled a good-bye to them. Garvin
rode straight ahead, never taking his eyes off the road. He knew that
Oxbow would laugh when they heard how he had brought in his prisoners;
and Jeff Garvin hated to be laughed at.
Frawley did not mind. In fact he was secretly pleased over the turn of
affairs. It had looked to Wild as if Frawley had started ahead to assist
the sheriff, when Flint Moore yanked him from his saddle; but the fact
of the matter was that Frawley intended to jump Garvin for his words to
Patricia.
IV
Jimmy Devlin disliked walking and refused to take it in large doses. In
fact, he did not have a definite destination in view. He wanted to get a
job on a cattle-ranch. He had been unable to prove his innocence at the
time of his trial, but the brand of train-robber sat lightly on his
shoulders. He whistled softly to himself and kept to the low ground,
taking no chances of being seen and picked up as a suspect.
He had felt sure that he would find a ranch, where he could get a meal;
but no ranch could he find, and hunger grew great within him. A
well-directed stone secured a small brush-rabbit, which he dressed at a
small creek and prepared for broiling.
He was about to light a fire, when he saw a rider cutting along the
sky-line, traveling north. It was Bud Deal, heading for the Box M, but
Jimmy did not know him.
“Ah-ha!” grunted Jimmy aloud. “That’s either an officer of the law or an
innocent man; otherwise he wouldn’t be skylarkin’ along on the top of
the hills. I should be wise and crafty, so I should; but eat I must,
even if I’m spotted by me firelight and hung at daylight.”
Even a fat, young brush-rabbit is not exactly food for the gods, when
salt is conspicuous by its absence; but Jimmy ate it all, loosened his
belt and curled up on the ground.
The heat of the day gave way to the chill of night, and Jimmy grew
uncomfortable. Finally he got to his feet and gazed off across the
hills. A moon was coming up behind the Thunder Range. Far away came the
mournful yelp of a coyote.
“Ye have nothin’ to yowl about,” commented Jimmy aloud. “From what I can
see, ye have plenty to eat. Old Man Winter sure stocked up your
grub-box, ye loafer. I am no —— owl, but I’d rather walk than freeze,
and I’ve a hunch I’m goin’ to find a ranch pretty soon.”
He stamped out the remains of his little fire and started climbing the
hill. He stopped at the top and scanned the country. A mile away
glimmered a tiny light in a window at the Box M.
“There it is,” whispered Jimmy. “Me guidin’ star.”
His voice lifted in a lilting Irish tenor—
“Like a candle that stays in a window at night,
Your fond love has cheered me and guided me right.”
For Jimmy Devlin could sing, and many a crowded bunk-house had remained
hushed long after his voice had died away. Jimmy had only sung once in
prison. It was not allowed; but one night, long after the corridors were
quiet, his voice was lifted in melody and he sang “My Wild Irish Rose.”
A burly guard, with a deep brogue, came to his door and haltingly
commanded him to “desist that yowlin’!” But it was only after the last
note had died away. Jimmy said nothing, but a prisoner across the
corridor swore feelingly at the guard, who made no reply. Even prison
guards are human.
Jimmy struck a well-worn cattle-trail, which led him straight to the
ranch-house. He could smell the odors of cooking, as Mrs. Moore cooked
supper for Bud Deal. He could see two people standing on the front
steps, back-lighted by the lamplight from the open door.
Jimmy did not know just what conditions might be found at this
particular ranch-house; so, instead of walking boldly to the people on
the porch, he stopped and announced his coming with an old cowboy song:
“I’m so goshawful hungry, I’m plumb out of breath;
If some one won’t shoot me, I’ll sure starve to death.”
Jimmy waited a moment, and then a girl’s voice replied—
“Grub-pile!”
“’Tis heaven,” muttered Jimmy and came up to the porch. Pat Moore and
Bud Deal looked curiously at him, as the lamplight showed his homely
features. Jimmy smiled and removed his hat.
“Friends, it is not me mind that makes me a night intruder; because I
have a control over me own brain, but the stummick of me contains
nothin’ but a tiny brush-rabbit, half-cooked and unseasoned. Could ye
give me a bit to eat and a place to sleep?”
“Yore kinda off the beaten trails, ain’t yuh?” asked Bud Deal.
Jimmy knew that Bud Deal thought he was a common tramp.
“Aye; but the best of us get off wrong, pardner.”
“Come in,” said Pat kindly. “Can you eat ham and eggs?”
“Lord love ye!” gasped Jimmy. “I could that.”
The three of them walked into the dining-room, and Jimmy bowed low to
Mrs. Moore, who was just coming in with a platter of food.
“Mother, this man just walked in, and he said he was very hungry,”
stated Pat.
Mrs. Moore smiled at Jimmy—
“You are welcome to what we have, I am sure.”
“And who could ask for more, ma’am? The fruit of the beautiful hen and
the runnin’ gear of the noble hog is a fit repast for the gods. I thank
ye from me heart.”
Bud Deal had studied Jimmy a bit closer in the light. His clothes were
of the range—not the kind a tramp would wear. Jimmy had picked them up
at a second-hand store.
“Cow-hand?” asked Bud.
Jimmy looked up and reached for the sugar—
“Aye.”
There was something about this glib-tongued, homely young Irishman that
appealed to Pat. She was also of Celtic blood, but several generations
removed. This man had come out of the night with a smile and a song,
just when they needed a smile and a song. He was soft of tongue, ready
of wit, and Pat felt that he would fight just for the love of battle.
Jimmy stole occasional glances at Pat. She was a new type to him.
“Irish, except for the eyes,” he reflected to himself. “I wonder now if
a heart of gold has anythin’ to do with colorin’ her eyes? Jimmy, you
paroled bandit, take your thoughts off the lass.”
He glanced across the table at Bud Deal. Jimmy did not like Bud. The
swarthy face, coal-black eyes, the small, pointed mustache, sleek, black
hair—none of Bud Deal’s features appealed to Jimmy. Bud was handsome,
graceful—a dashing figure of a cowboy; but Jimmy disliked and feared
that type.
“You’re a clever divil,” reflected Jimmy. “Slick as silk, and unless I
misdoubt ye, my lad, ye wouldn’t be of much value in backin’ up a
friend. Ye think too much of your good looks—more than ye would of
friendship.”
Jimmy smiled at Pat.
“I was so hungry that I forgot me manners. My name is Jimmy Smith.”
Pat smiled back at him.
“Out here we wait for folks to tell their names. My name is Patricia
Moore.”
Jimmy got to his feet and bowed.
“Miss Moore, it is the greatest pleasure of me life.”
He turned to Mrs. Moore, before Pat had a chance to introduce them, and
held out his hand.
“Mrs. Moore, I know ye are; and ’tis a pleasure to come out of the night
and meet a lady like ye.”
He turned to Bud Deal, who was looking on, a slight sneer on his lips.
“Mr. Smith, this is Mr. Deal,” said Pat.
“How do ye do, Mr. Deal,” said Jimmy, bowing.
Neither of them offered his hand. Pat noticed this and frowned slightly.
“Mr. Smith can share the bunk-house with you tonight, Bud,” said Pat.
Bud grunted and finished his coffee. Pat and her mother went into the
living-room and Jimmy sauntered out on the porch to smoke a cigaret. A
collie pup came up and nuzzled at him and Jimmy took the woolly little
fellow in his arms. The pup squirmed with delight and Jimmy sat down on
the steps to play with it.
He could hear Pat and her mother talking and some of the fragments of
conversation came plainly to his ears. They were talking about the
holdup and the arrest. Bud Deal came out on to the porch and jerked his
head toward the bunk-house.
“I’ll show yuh where to sleep, Smith.”
“Sure, that’s a welcome sound, pardner. I’m dead on me feet, and a bed
sounds like the tinkling of cymbals to me ears.”
Inside the bunk-house, Bud pointed out a bunk. Jimmy sat down and slowly
drew off his boots.
“Not much of a crew around here, eh?” he queried.
Bud Deal shook his head.
“Nope. Sheriff took the boss and his son to jail this afternoon.”
Jimmy looked down at the boot in his hand and then at Bud.
“For what?”
“Holdin’ up a train.”
“Indeed? Holdin’ up a train, eh?”
“This mornin’,” mumbled Bud, as he licked the edge of a cigaret paper.
“So lately?” Jimmy considered the boot closely. “Well, well! Sure, it
must be the girl’s father and brother.”
“Yeah,” rather indifferently. “Flint Moore’s her dad. Brother’s name is
Wild.”
“Now that’s too bad, so it is,” Jimmy’s voice grew sympathetic. “What
proof did the sheriff have?”
“Proof?” Bud shook his head. “I dunno. Seems that he was just lookin’
for two men on horseback.”
“Which proves nothin’,” grinned Jimmy. “Sure they can bail themselves
out, can’t they?”
Bud shook his head slowly.
“I don’t think so, Smith. You see, the robbers killed the fireman.”
“That’s right, they—um-m-m!”
Bud turned and looked curiously at Jimmy.
“What did you say?”
“I was just goin’ to say that it comes under the head of murder, which
ain’t bailable.”
Bud nodded, although seemingly not satisfied. Finally he said—
“Where did you come from, Smith?”
“Me?” Jimmy grinned slowly. “It would take a lot of tellin’, Deal. All
me life I’ve been comin’ from some place. Ask the wind where it comes
from. I’m a drifter—a boomer, a man without a home. I was born with an
itchin’ foot, and I have neither kith nor kin to say that I may not
scratch it where I will.”
“Where are you goin’?” asked Bud.
“The same thing applies,” smiled Jimmy. “If I had a job I might tarry a
while right here.”
Bud smoked for a while in silence. Then:
“I dunno what I can do for yuh, Smith. I’m goin’ to Oxbow in the mornin’
and see the old man. Yuh might stay here until I get back, and maybe
they’ll want a man to help me, now that the two of them are away. You
might as well take the job, if there is a job.”
“Sure. Well, I’ll pound me ear a few, pardner. I ain’t had a real sleep
for so long that I’ve began to think that I traded me bed for a lantern.
Good-night.”
“Good-night,” grunted Bud.
* * * * *
Jimmy was awakened by the sound of galloping hoofs. He glanced around
the bunk-house, trying to remember where he was. Bud Deal was not there,
so after a moment’s reflection, Jimmy decided that the galloping horse
meant that Bud was on his way to Oxbow.
He got up and dressed quickly. Somehow he was glad that Bud Deal was
going to be away for a while. The collie pup was sitting on the low step
of the bunk-house, as if waiting for Jimmy to come out, and met him with
a yelp of joy. Jimmy’s heels were blistered from his walk of yesterday;
but he forgot them and romped with the pup.
Suddenly the pup shot between Jimmy’s legs, tripping him, and Jimmy
sprawled ungracefully on his face, while the overjoyed collie yipped
with delight.
“Have you no consideration for the cook?”
Jimmy sat up and blinked at Pat, who was standing on the porch of the
ranch-house, looking seriously at him. He got to his feet and recovered
his hat, which the collie tried to take from him.
“My apologies to the cook, Miss Moore. The blessed pup made me forget
that I had overslept. Look at the face of him, Miss. Sure, he’s laughin’
at us both. Has he anythin’ against the cook?”
Pat laughed. Jimmy’s serious expression was irresistible.
“Come in and eat your breakfast, Mr. Smith.”
Jimmy laughed and romped around to the kitchen door, where he knew he
would find a wash-basin and cold water. Pat went through the house and
came out of the kitchen door, where great masses of hop-vines twined
over the porch and half-masked the rear of the building.
Another dog sauntered up from the stables and Jimmy stood, basin in
hand, and watched it.
“That is Klooch,” said Pat. “She’s the mother of the pup.”
“Half-wolf, so she is,” smiled Jimmy. “The father of the pup must ’a’
been pure collie, because the pup don’t show any wolf strain, Miss.”
Klooch stopped a few feet from Jimmy, watching him closely with her
half-closed, almond-shaped eyes. The wolf blood showed in her every
action.
“No one has ever made friends with Klooch,” stated Pat. “She merely
tolerates us.”
Jimmy held out his hand to Klooch and started toward her.
“Look out for her,” cautioned Pat. “She’ll snap.”
“She will not,” contradicted Jimmy and placed his hand on the wolf-dog’s
head.
Klooch made no move to show fight. Her eyes shut to mere slits and not a
muscle of her body moved, while Jimmy rubbed her muzzle and scratched
her ruffed neck.
Jimmy turned back to his wash-basin. Pat looked wonderingly at Klooch,
who moved in closer and watched Jimmy. Finally the wolf-dog nuzzled at
Jimmy’s hand.
“Why, she never did that before in her life!” exclaimed Pat.
Jimmy tossed the basin of water aside and smiled at Pat.
“Ye’ve all been afraid of her, miss. ’Tis the wolf in her, which
mistrusts fear.”
Jimmy followed Pat into the kitchen, closing the screen door behind
them. Klooch and her pup followed up on the vine-covered porch and sat
down in front of the door, looking inside. Pat told her mother of
Klooch’s actions and pointed her out, sitting before the door, evidently
waiting for Jimmy to come out.
Mrs. Moore smiled and said:
“It is hard to deceive a baby or a dog. I think it would be still harder
to deceive Klooch. Animals and babies have an instinct which tells them
good from evil in human beings.”
Jimmy blushed at the compliment and bent over his breakfast.
“Sure, ye overrate me, ma’am. I’m just a lazy, wasteful drifter and if
there’s any good in me it’s buried deep under a pile of sins.”
“You have never failed to help a friend,” stated Mrs. Moore, with
conviction.
“Well, now,” Jimmy frowned thoughtfully, “it seems that I haven’t always
been careful to find out who I was helpin’. There’s a wide difference
between what is known as friendship, ma’am. Just knowin’ folks and bein’
able to call ’em by their first name don’t mean that they are your
friends. Ye may find a friend in a flash, or ye may go all your life
without one. Clear skies and fair weather is a poor barometer. ’Tis only
when the storms hit ye, that ye need friendship.”
Mrs. Moore sighed and tucked away a stray wisp of gray hair. Pat leaned
against the doorway, deep in thought. Jimmy lifted his head and looked
at Mrs. Moore’s patient face.
“Mrs. Moore, it comes to me that foul weather has hit the Box M, and
that ye are in need of a friend.”
Pat looked up quickly—
“Did Bud tell you?”
“Aye,” softly.
“They are both innocent.”
Jimmy nodded slowly.
“No doubt they are; but bein’ innocent is only personal satisfaction,
unless ye can prove it to the judge and jury. Ye’ll find few
mind-readers siftin’ evidence in a court of law.”
As Jimmy turned back to his food the collie pup set up a vociferous
barking and raced around toward the front of the house. Mrs. Moore
walked into the living-room and on to the front porch. Jeff Garvin was
just about to dismount from his horse.
When he spoke it was plainly audible to Pat and Jimmy.
“Mrs. Moore, I want your husband’s gun—his pearl-handled six-shooter.”
“Why—I—I don’t know—” faltered Mrs. Moore.
Pat whirled from the doorway and glided softly into the living-room, out
of sight of Jimmy.
“He didn’t have a gun on him,” explained Garvin. “I rode out to get his
gun.”
Jimmy heard Mrs. Moore turn and come back into the living-room, followed
by Garvin, jingling his spurs and walking heavily. Jimmy got to his
feet, and as he did he glanced out of the kitchen door and saw Pat dart
past the vines and go toward the barns.
Jimmy walked slowly to the living-room door, where he stood and looked
at Garvin’s back. Mrs. Moore was evidently searching in a bed-room for
the gun, while he looked on. After a few moments Mrs. Moore said:
“I am sure I do not know where it is. When he was not wearing it he kept
it hanging in his belt at the head of the bed.”
“Yeah?” Garvin’s query was sarcastic. “Well, now that seems kinda funny,
don’t it? Ha, ha, ha!”
“I’m sure that no one has—did Mr. Moore tell you where it was?”
“Didja think he would? I’ll find that gun if I have to take this ranch
apart! _Sabe?_”
Garvin whirled on his heel and started toward the front door, when he
happened to see Jimmy. He stopped short and stared at him.
“You spoke of takin’ the ranch apart,” reminded Jimmy seriously.
Garvin stared at him and Jimmy returned the stare with interest.
Garvin’s face showed the effects of the fight of the night before and
Jimmy smiled at these unmistakable marks of conflict.
“Who in —— are you?” growled Garvin.
“No reply from the defendant,” grinned Jimmy. “The son-of-a-gun refuses
to answer.”
Garvin snorted disgustedly. Jimmy’s easy manner and wide grin rasped on
his nerves. But Garvin did not want trouble—not physical trouble.
Pat came up to the front door and simulated great surprize at seeing the
sheriff.
“I hardly expected to see you today.”
“Mm-yah!” snarled Garvin. “Know where yore dad’s gun is?”
“My dad’s gun? Didn’t he have it on last night?”
“He did not! I’m out here to get it. _Sabe?_”
“Easy,” cautioned Jimmy. “File the point off your voice, pardner. The
lady has nothin’ to do with her father’s gun.”
“Where do you come in on this?” demanded Garvin.
“Right at this point,” replied Jimmy, all trace of his smile vanishing.
“You came here to run a bluff on two ladies, didn’t you? You was goin’
to take the ranch apart, wasn’t you? Well, start in.”
“Mebbe you don’t know who I am,” Garvin glowered at Jimmy. “I represent
the law in this county, young feller.”
“Oh, ye do, do ye? Represent the law accordin’ to the statutes?”
“I sure do!” snapped Garvin.
“Then go back and git a search warrant. Ye have no right to come into
this ranch-house and ransack the place, without a warrant. Now, git
out!”
Garvin’s face flushed scarlet and he scratched an itching palm against
his holster. He hated to let this outsider tell him his duty. Finally he
walked to the door and turned for a parting shot.
“There’s a penalty for withholding evidence in a case like this. I’ll
come back with a warrant and enough men to comb every inch of this
place. I have a description of Flint Moore’s gun—now, I want the gun.”
Garvin clumped down the steps and got on his horse. Pat and Jimmy
watched him ride away and Jimmy noticed that Pat sighed with relief when
the sheriff had disappeared.
“I do not understand it at all,” said Mrs. Moore, almost on the verge of
tears. “I really thought that they would be back before this. Surely
they can furnish bonds.”
Pat shook her head.
“Mother, this is not a case of getting bonds. The robbers killed the
fireman.”
“Will they have to stay in jail, Pat?”
“I—I’m afraid they will, mother.”
Jimmy walked out on the porch and sat down. There was nothing he could
do to lessen Mrs. Moore’s grief, and he wanted to think a little. Klooch
and the puppy came around the house and up to him. The wolf-dog put her
chin on his knee and looked up at him with her squinted wolf-like eyes.
Jimmy rubbed her muzzle, absently, thinking about the details of the
hold-up—the details he had seen. Why did the sheriff want that gun so
badly? Was it of a distinctive type, which might have been noted by the
engineer or the express messenger?
He rubbed his nose and squinted down at the wolf-dog—
“Klooch, would any self-respectin’ robber pack a gun which any one might
identify?”
The dog peered up at him with her inscrutable eyes. The pup chased a
buzz-winged grasshopper toward the barn, but was outwitted. Jimmy smiled
at the pup’s antics. Suddenly it looked back toward the porch, hesitated
for a moment and then trotted to a small pile of loose lumber beside the
bunk-house and began to paw at it.
Jimmy watched it for a while; but the pup finally tired and came back to
the porch, where it curled up in the shade. Jimmy could hear the subdued
tones of the two women; but was not able to hear what they were talking
about.
He got up and walked slowly down to the bunk-house. There was no
question in his mind that Pat had hidden the six-shooter. He walked past
the bunk-house, stopped at a corral, where several horses were standing
in the meager shade, switching their tails at the annoying flies.
Then he came in at the rear of the bunk-house and around to the side
where the lumber was piled. He lifted several of the boards aside, knelt
down and picked up a heavy Colt gun, which he shoved inside his shirt,
replaced the boards and sauntered inside the bunk-house, without being
seen from the ranch-house.
The puppy had seen Pat hide the gun, and with the curiosity of a puppy,
wanting to investigate, had made the hiding-place plain to Jimmy Devlin,
_alias_ Smith.
He examined the gun. It was a .45 Colt, with a six-inch barrel and
beautiful pearl handle. A small triangular piece had been broken from
the lower inside corner of one of the pieces of pearl.
Jimmy squinted at this closely and then reached in his pocket for the
piece of pearl he had picked up at the scene of the hold-up. It fitted
exactly.
He dropped the piece of pearl into his pocket and sat down on the edge
of a bunk. There was not the slightest doubt that it was Flint Moore’s
gun—and it was the gun, or one of the guns, used at the hold-up. It was
an easy gun to identify. Few cattlemen carry a pearl-handled gun,
especially of that weight and length.
Jimmy examined it closely. The barrel was clean and every chamber
loaded.
“The lass will be worried when she finds it’s gone,” reflected Jimmy,
“but a lumber-pile is a poor place to hide anythin’. ’Tis a good feel of
a gun and I hate to lay it away.”
Jimmy rubbed his chin thoughtfully and looked at the gun. A grin rippled
across his lips and he shoved the gun inside his shirt and walked
outside. He picked up a piece of a cedar board and examined it, after
which he walked down back of the corrals, sat down in the shade of a
willow clump and began to whittle.
V
Bud Deal spent the greater part of the forenoon with Flint and Wild
Moore, in their quarters at the jail. Flint Moore had not engaged a
lawyer, because he did not think there was sufficient evidence against
them to demand legal assistance.
Bud had circulated around Oxbow, getting opinions and from what he had
heard it seemed likely that both of the Moores would be held for the
next term of the superior court. Oxbow was laughing at Jeff Garvin for
the way he brought in his prisoners, but Oxbow knew that Flint Moore and
his son were hard men to handle.
“Looks kinda like Garvin was set on makin’ us a heap of trouble,” agreed
Flint. “There ain’t a bit of evidence against us, except that we rode in
from that direction.”
“Where was you that day, Bud?” asked Wild.
“Well,” grinned Bud, “I reckon I was closer to the hold-up than you was,
as far as that’s concerned. I slept at Crazy Horse Springs that night
and worked kinda northwest to the foot of the range. I never seen a
soul. My idea is that them two bandits went straight across Bitter River
and into the Silverbend Hills.”
“Leaves the Box M kinda short-handed,” mused Flint.
Then Bud told them of the range-boomer who drifted in the night before
and offered to take a job.
“Take him on,” advised Flint. “Yuh can’t work the place alone, Bud.”
They fixed up the details. Bud said he would hitch up the buckboard team
the next morning and bring in the women, and also bring in some clean
clothes. Frawley locked up the cell after Bud came out, and walked
outside with him.
“What do yuh think of the proposition, Jud?” queried Bud.
Frawley considered the question for a moment.
“Bud, I don’t think they can hang the deadwood on them folks, a-tall;
but they sure can hand ’em a bunch of grief. Garvin hates Moore and when
yuh hate a man it kinda makes yuh blind to right and wrong.”
“I reckon so,” nodded Bud. “Well, I’ve got to go back to the ranch. See
yuh tomorrow, Frawley.”
Jud watched him ride up the street. Bud was the best rider in the
country—and he knew it. He rode a spindle-legged sorrel, which was famed
for its speed at a quarter-mile—a sleek, nervous animal, whose hoofs
seemed barely to spat the earth as it fretted against the curb-bit.
Jud shook his head and reached for his cigaret papers.
“I ain’t no free-nol-o-gist,” muttered Jud, “and I ain’t no good at
prognosticatin’; but I’ll be teetotally —— if I trust that _hombre_. ’F
a fly lit on him it would skid and bust a leg—and when yuh find a slick
cowpuncher—ha’r-oil, per-fume and—aw, shucks!” Jud gave it up in
disgust.
Then Bud Deal met Jeff Garvin on the road. They pulled up in the shade
of a cottonwood and exchanged views on the weather.
“Didja get it?” asked Bud. Garvin shook his head.
“No. It wasn’t there.”
Bud had started to lick his cigaret paper, but looked up quickly.
“Wasn’t there?”
Garvin shook his head and told Bud what happened at the Box M. He was
peeved because Bud hadn’t told him about the new man.
“I never thought about him, Jeff,” assured Bud. “He don’t amount to
nothin’. But where is that —— gun, do yuh suppose?”
“You find it,” ordered Garvin. “I need that gun danged bad. Course the
engineer can’t exactly identify it, but he said one of ’em had a long,
black Colt, with pretty pearl handles, and that he would swear it was
a .45.”
Bud nodded.
“I’ll find it, Jeff.” Then as an afterthought: “You better have a talk
with Frawley. He talks too much.”
“What about?”
“Says that he don’t think Moore is guilty, and that you just arrested
him because yuh hate Moore.”
“Zasso! Well, I’ll talk to him about it. Comin’ in tomorrow?”
“Yeah. I’ve got to bring in the women. Prosecutin’ attorney wouldn’t let
’em out on bail, eh?”
Garvin grinned.
“How could he? Murder charge. See yuh tomorrow—and I want that gun.
_Adios_.”
Bud rode on down the dusty road, a rutty, yellow ribbon, full of
chuck-holes from the Spring thaws. Thunder County roads were not built
for fast traffic, being used more as the shortest distance between two
points than as the easiest line of travel.
* * * * *
It was supper-time when Bud rode up to the gate to the Box M. He sat on
his horse and seemed lost in contemplation of the rambling, old,
homey-looking ranch-house, lying half in the shade of the cottonwoods.
Beyond it he could see the long, low shelters and pole corrals, backed
by the tall willows and the green masses of cottonwood foliage. To the
right of the ranch-house was the long log bunk-house. From far back in
the willows of Leloo Creek a rooster crowed shrilly. The odors of
cooking were wafted to his nostrils.
Bud seemed to rouse from his reverie and smiled softly to himself. He
could see Bud Deal in sole charge of the Box M, doing as he pleased. It
was true that the Box M was in bad shape financially, but....
Pat came to meet him as he rode up toward the house, and asked for the
news. Bud had little to tell, except that the prosecuting attorney had
refused bail, and that her father and brother were to be held until the
next term of court.
“I’ll take you and your ma in to see ’em tomorrow,” said Bud. “Better
rustle up some clean clothes to take in with yuh, Pat.”
He started to ride on, but turned back.
“Met Garvin, as I was comin’ out. Said he wanted yore dad’s pistol. Know
where it is?”
Pat smiled.
“Garvin threatened to take the ranch apart, but when he saw Mr. Smith he
stopped bluffing.”
“Did Smith stop him from searching?”
“Yes. Told him to get a warrant.”
“Oh, he never even looked for the pistol, eh?”
“Started to,” smiled Pat. “Why does he want the thing?”
“I dunno. Suppose he’ll have to have it, Pat. Anyway, a six-gun is only
a six-gun, and little good it will do him.”
Bud turned back and rode down to the corral, where he unsaddled, turned
the horse into the corral and hung his saddle and bridle under the eaves
of a shed.
As he started for the ranch-house, Jimmy cut across from the bunk-house
and intercepted him. Jimmy was carrying an old cartridge belt and
holster, which he showed to Bud.
“Anybody goin’ to care if I wear this thing?” asked Jimmy.
Bud looked curiously at the belt and shook his head. “No, I don’t reckon
so. Don’t even remember who owns it.”
Jimmy buckled the belt around his waist, adjusted it to a fit over his
hips. From inside his shirt he took out a big, blued Colt .45, with
plain, dark wood handles, and fitted it into the old holster.
“Ye get tired of havin’ a large gun rubbin’ your ribs,” smiled Jimmy,
patting the holster.
He twisted the gun to loosen up the harsh leather and dropped it in
again.
Suddenly he lifted his hand above his waist, fingers splayed far apart.
His hand snapped down and up, almost too fast to follow with the eye,
and the big gun was tensed at his hip, with the hammer at full cock.
Bud had smiled at the makeshift belt and old, warped holster; but now
the smile left his lips. Bud knew he was fast with a gun—faster than any
man in the Thunder Range; but here was a man, working under the handicap
of an ill-fitting holster and an extra heavy gun, able to shade the
swiftest draw Bud had ever made.
“Sure, I need practise,” smiled Jimmy apologetically.
“Hm-m-m!” grunted Bud seriously. “I reckon we better go and eat supper.”
“If you’re goin’ to town soon, would ye mind gettin’ me some shells for
this gun?” asked Jimmy. “Sure, I’ve only got six to me name. It’s
a .45.”
“Mebbe there’s some around here,” replied Bud. “Flint Moore uses a .45,
and he may have some extra shells.”
Pat looked curiously at the gun hanging to Jimmy’s belt, and Jimmy
smiled softly.
“Sure, ma’am, I have to dress accordin’ to the prevailin’ styles. With
the sheriff gallivantin’ around arrestin’ men because they ride horses,
which are goin’ north, and the innocent trains bein’ held up on the iron
highway, I suppose I must burden meself with armament.”
“God forbid that we have any more trouble,” sighed Mrs. Moore.
“Aye,” nodded Jimmy. “’Tis a good wish, ma’am.” Then to Pat, “Mr. Deal
tells me that your father has a gun of this same size. Do ye know if he
has any shells?”
“I’ll get his belt,” said Pat, and left the room.
Bud frowned at Jimmy.
“Couldn’t you wait? I said I’d get them for you, Smith.”
Jimmy made no reply. He wondered what Bud meant. Pat came into the
dining-room and placed a heavy belt and holster on the table beside
Jimmy. About one-third of the belt-loops were filled with .41 caliber
cartridges.
Jimmy slipped several loose and looked at them closely. He lifted his
eyes and glanced across at Bud Deal, who was busily engaged with his
meal.
Jimmy put the cartridges back into the loops and handed the belt across
the table to Bud, who looked up wonderingly.
“What’s the idea?”
“Would ye look at the size of them shells?”
“Where does the joke come in, Smith?”
“Observe closely that they are .41’s, will ye? The ladies will also
examine the caliber numbers.”
Mrs. Moore and Pat looked at the cartridges, and Jimmy handed the belt
to Pat.
“Will ye please put this in a safe place, ma’am?”
Pat nodded, with no understanding of the reasons for this, and started
for the door.
“Where is the gun?” asked Bud.
Pat turned and looked at him.
“Dad’s gun? Which one, Bud?”
“The pearl-handled one.”
“That’s the one the sheriff was after,” interrupted Jimmy, getting up
from the table. “Sure, he was mad as a wet hen. I misdoubt his statement
to take the ranch apart to find that gun.”
Jimmy laughed and went out the rear door, going back to the bunk-house.
Klooch and her puppy met him at the door and went with him; the puppy
vociferous in its admiration for Jimmy, the wolf-dog slow and easy of
movement, pacing beside Jimmy and looking up at him through slit eyes,
as if wondering deeply why she admired this human being above all.
Pat leaned against the kitchen door and watched Jimmy disappear with the
dogs, while Bud finished his meal, frowning at her. He couldn’t afford
to let her get away from the fact that he was going to marry her. He
must tell this wild Irishman to keep his distance. He got up from the
table and went out on the front porch to smoke, while Pat and her mother
washed the dishes.
Klooch came up from the bunk-house and walked past him. He spoke to her
and snapped his fingers, but she merely turned her head and walked on.
Bud had never placed a hand on this dog, and it irritated him to think
that this stranger could make friends with her right away.
Klooch sauntered past him, but turned and trotted back to the bunk-house
with the long, swinging trot of a wolf and squatted on her haunches in
front of the door.
The sun went down behind the big curve of the Thunder Range, tinting the
peaks with a glow of gold, and the vast reach of foot-hills and tiny
valleys seemed to blot out in a sweep of misty blue. Night-hawks boomed
and skirled in the air over the cottonwoods, a pair of magpies flapped
their way down the stream, chattering harshly. From afar came the
plaintive bawling of a calf.
Pat came softly out on the porch and stood near Bud, leaning against a
porch-post, looking off across the hills. Bud moved uneasily and looked
up at her.
“Pat, when do we get married?”
Pat did not reply. It seemed as if she had not heard Bud’s question.
From down at the bunk-house came Jimmy Devlin’s voice, singing, and a
hush seemed to settle over the Box M.
“You may search everywhere,
But none can compare
With my wild Irish Rose.”
Jimmy was putting the love of his Irish soul into his voice—
“... And some day, for my sake,
They may let me take
The bloom from my wild Irish Rose.”
Jimmy’s voice died away, and there was silence for a while before Bud
got to his feet and said softly—
“Pat, when do we get married?”
Pat turned her head and looked at him.
“I don’t know, Bud. Sometime—perhaps.”
Pat turned and walked slowly into the house. The tip of the rising moon
silvered the Box M, and seemed to throw a direct beam across the ground
in front of the bunk-house, where the wolf-dog sat waiting patiently.
Bud snapped his cigaret away viciously and muttered to himself—
“That —— range-boomer!”
* * * * *
He got to his feet and started down to the bunk-house. He heard Klooch
growl softly and saw a shadowy figure move in between the bunk-house and
the corral. The figure stopped in the shadow. Bud glanced quickly around
and shifted his direction, as if to go to the corral. The figure fell in
behind him, and the two of them stopped out of ear-shot of the
bunk-house.
“I told yuh not to come here!” growled Bud. “Whatcha want, Jim?”
Moonlight showed the face of a big Indian of perhaps fifty years of age,
dressed in calico shirt and overalls.
“Waum sick,” he grunted. “Waum-sick-cole-sick. All the time _cultus
wauwau_. Mebbyso _hyas wauwau_.” Which meant that some one had fever and
chills, talked deliriously and might shout out loud at any time.
“What do yuh want me to do?” asked Bud. “You want medicine?”
“Whisky. Heap sweat. Mebbyso _memaloost_.”
“Might not be such a —— bad thing at that,” grunted Bud as he led the
Indian down behind the corrals and into the willows along the creek.
From the hollow snag of an old tree he drew out a gallon demijohn, half
filled.
“If you get drunk I’ll scalp yuh!” grunted Bud. “No more whisky! You
_sabe_ that? No more! Keep away from here after this. Whisky all gone,
Jim.”
“_Kloshe_,” came a sibilant cluck as the Indian glided away in the
willows, hugging the demijohn.
“Good, eh?” muttered Bud, and retraced his way back to the corral, where
he noisily replaced some bars and carried a coil of rope back to the
bunk-house.
The Indian had said, “mebbe _memaloost_,” which translated means, “might
die,” and Bud seemed to derive a certain amount of satisfaction from
this thought. The rattling of the bars and the carrying of the rope were
merely an alibi, in case any one had seen him go to the corral.
Klooch growled at him as he came up to the door. Klooch hated a rope.
She knew it to be a symbol of captivity and an instrument of torture.
Neither did Klooch like Indians, and Bud carried the Indian scent from
his conversation in the willows. He cursed softly at the dog and went
into the bunk-house.
VI
The next morning Bud hitched a team to the buckboard and drove up to the
house to get Pat and her mother. Jimmy held the team by the bits, while
the women got in.
“I’ll get yuh some shells in town, Smith,” said Bud. “You kinda stick
around here and take care of the place today. We’ll be back late, I
reckon.”
“Can I get you anything in town?” asked Pat.
Jimmy smiled and shook his head.
“Thankin’ ye very kindly, but I have need of nothin’, miss. All of ye
come back safe, which is enough bringin’, I think.”
Pat smiled softly, but Bud scowled and gathered up the lines. Mrs. Moore
looked gravely at Jimmy and flashed a sideways glance at Pat. Mrs. Moore
knew that Jimmy meant for Pat to come back safely. Bud knew this, too;
but his quick glance at Pat’s face gave him no assurance that she had or
had not understood Jimmy’s meaning.
Jimmy stepped away from the horses and swept off his hat as the
high-spirited broncos yanked the light vehicle past him and headed down
the dusty road.
He stood, hat in hand until they disappeared, and then walked swiftly to
the corral, where he selected a saddle, blanket and bridle. He took a
coiled lariat rope and went over to a corral, where several horses
browsed around over a scattering of hay.
“Ignorance of the lot makes me cast at beauty,” grinned Jimmy, shaking
out his loop.
The horses whirled and started circling the corral, kicking up a cloud
of dust. Jimmy turned slowly, swinging his loop. Suddenly he jerked the
rope forward and the loop sailed over the backs of two horses and
dropped over the head of a hammer-headed roan.
The roan plunged and reared, shaking its head like a hooked trout trying
to loosen the hook. Jimmy went slowly along the rope, talking softly to
the animal. The others bunched across the corral and snorted their
disfavor of such actions.
The coaxing voice seemed to drive the fear from the roan and it allowed
Jimmy to rub its muzzle.
“You’re a fine little animal, so ye are,” soothed Jimmy. “A fine bit o’
a horse; but I’d feel more satisfied if ye had saddle-marks.”
He led the animal outside and held up the saddle for its inspection. The
roan snorted in wonderment and Jimmy rubbed his chin. He looked back at
the other horses, but none of them showed any saddle-marks.
“Likely none of ye have been ridden,” mused Jimmy. “Well, roan, ye can’t
any more than dump me.”
He managed to get the bridle on, after much persuasion and main
strength, and then tied a handkerchief across its eyes. The roan only
flinched when the saddle was put on, but it arched its back under the
pull of the cinch.
Jimmy lost no time in preliminaries. He threw the reins over its neck,
swung into the saddle, settled himself and reached over, yanking off the
blind.
The removing of that handkerchief seemed to release a mighty power
within the roan. It whirled like a flash, sprang into the air and came
down, with all four feet bunched together, in a jarring crash, bounding
from there like a rabbit, reversing in mid-air and hitting the ground
with every muscle tensed.
Jimmy had swung sidewise in the saddle, hooked one foot almost under the
roan’s shoulder and threw all of his weight on the other foot, taking
the jar off his body to a great extent. The roan’s head seemed fastened
between its forelegs, but Jimmy made no effort to draw it up. He was
doing an exhibition ride, minus an audience.
The roan bawled like a calf, took several stiff-legged hops and began a
weaving buck, known as the “worm-fence.” Up past the ranch-house they
went and down along the fence, with the roan using every trick known to
outlaw buckers. But the rider still remained.
At the gate it whirled, rearing wildly, but Jimmy slapped it across the
head with his hat and it sprang ahead, throwing itself from side to side
in a desperate effort to shake the man loose. Jimmy threw himself
sidewise to escape smashing his leg against the corral fence, and horse
and rider went down in a heap of dust and broken poles.
Jimmy was unhurt and on his feet when the horse got up, and without a
moment’s hesitation he mounted again. The roan trembled and heaved from
the effort and fall, and Jimmy waited calmly for a continuation, which
did not come. He spoke to the roan, spurred it gently with his heels and
the animal walked away with him. Jimmy got off and opened the gate. He
expected the roan to buck again when he got on, but the roan was no
longer a bucker. It had used every trick in its repertoire—why repeat?
Jimmy found the roan hardly bridle-wise but willing to be taught.
“Fifteen months hasn’t hurt me for ridin’,” grinned Jimmy aloud, patting
the roan’s neck. “I might do better if I wore spurs; but spurs hurt.
Cuttin’ and slashin’ with sharp spurs is no square deal. Ye roan divil,
I hope ye appreciate that I gave ye an even chance.”
They crossed Leloo Creek and headed into the hills. Wild flowers
carpeted the ground, making the hills look as if they were covered with
giant Oriental rugs. The coulées were filled with cottonwood and poplar,
which added a fresh note of green, while the green-gray of the mesquite
made it a wonderland of color.
Up on the point of a bluff a coyote was busily engaged in remodeling
last year’s den and making it habitable for this year’s family. She saw
Jimmy and paused in her work to watch him pass. A big, gray badger
trundled out of his way and stopped to peer at him from the cover of a
granite outcropping.
He rode around the head of a draw, which was filled with trees and
brush. The roan pricked up its ears and slackened its pace, as a big,
black-tail doe trotted out of the brush and looked at them inquiringly.
“Good-morning, Mrs. Deer,” called Jimmy, and the doe nosed higher in the
air, sniffing cautiously for a moment and then moving away like a
shadow.
Jimmy rode to the top of the ridge and stopped.
Below him the rolling hills stretched far away to the banks of Bitter
River, which was the dividing-line between Thunder County and Silverbend
County. To the left, a mile or so away, was a peculiarly shaped rock
butte, like a giant platform. It was known as the Devil’s Rostrum, or
the Devil’s Pulpit. Jimmy looked at it and a smile of reminiscence came
across his face.
“Sure, that’s the place. Over fifteen months ago and it seems yesterday
that I met him on that ridge beyond. He told me he’d leave half the
money in a little cabin down the coulée below that tall cliff. I wonder
did he?” Jimmy wrinkled his nose from the smoke of his cigaret. “Bedad,
I’m no receiver of stolen goods, but I’ve a curiosity to see if the poor
divil kept his word.”
He rode straight toward the butte. A number of cattle had been caught on
that hillside in a blizzard and their bones, gnawed clean by the wolves
and coyotes, looked like clumps of strange plants. Here and there were
small bunches of cattle, wearing the Box M brand, their sides already
filling out with the luscious grass of Spring.
Jimmy rode past the big butte and swung to the left to the edge of a
deep, brush-filled coulée. He followed a deep cattle-track to the bottom
and came out into a small clearing, where a tiny cabin was hidden in the
trees. A small pole corral was built at the right-hand side of the
cabin, using one side of the cabin for part of the enclosure. The corral
was empty, but a saddle hung on a peg near the door.
“Somebody livin’ in it, from the looks of things,” reflected Jimmy as he
dismounted and tied his roan to the corral fence near the door.
No one answered his knock, but the door creaked at his touch, showing
that it was not fastened. He pushed it open and looked inside. It took
him some time to get his eyes accustomed to the dim light after the
bright sunlight. There was some one moving inside, and he discovered
that the somebody was on the floor, about midway of the room. A strong
odor of liquor pervaded the place.
* * * * *
He walked inside. The person on the floor appeared to be an Indian and
said Indian was just as drunk as a human being could possibly get. One
arm was lovingly twined around a demijohn.
A white man was sitting on the bed, braced against an extra roll of
bedding—a white man, his face was the color of wet clay, his eyes wild
with fever. Jimmy stared at him wonderingly. The wild look seemed to
leave the sick man’s eyes and he stared at Jimmy.
“Jimmy Devlin’s ghost!” he exclaimed in a weak whisper.
“Ye poor divil,” grunted Jimmy. “’T’is no ghost I am, Whitey Allen.”
“Alive?” gasped Whitey, and relapsed in a fit of coughing, which racked
his thin frame. Jimmy waited until he recovered.
“Aye—alive, Whitey, me lad. And ye never reached Arizona after all.
Hard, hard luck. Have ye been here all this time?”
Whitey Allen stared at the ceiling for a moment and nodded. Jimmy looked
down at the Indian, who was snoring contentedly, and stirred him with
his foot.
“And this has been takin’ care of ye, eh? Drunken Injun. Some white man,
with the soul of a coyote, has sold ye fire-water. ’T’is a shame, so it
is. Have ye no doctor, Whitey?”
Whitey Allen shook his head.
“No, I don’t need one.”
Jimmy nodded sadly. Whitey Allen had told him over fifteen months before
this that nothing but Arizona would save him from tuberculosis. He and
Jimmy had bunked together in the eastern part of the State. Jimmy had
drifted on and had not seen Whitey until one day a little later he met
him near the Devil’s Pulpit.
Haltingly he had told Jimmy of a train robbery in the county to the
east, across the Bitter River. He had robbed a train to get money enough
to go to Arizona to win back his health; but the sheriff was close on
his trail, and he knew the sheriff would win.
Jimmy’s heart went out to Whitey, and his impulsive Irish blood made him
offer himself as a sacrifice. He made Whitey trade horses with him,
which gave Jimmy a pinto of peculiar markings. Whitey had cried like a
baby over it all, and swore that he was going to leave half of the money
under the floor of that certain cabin in the coulée to the left of the
Pulpit, where Jimmy could find it. Jimmy led the sheriff a merry chase;
but was captured. He had no alibi.
He sat down on a broken chair and looked at Whitey. There was no
question in Jimmy’s mind about Whitey’s being in the last stages of the
disease. It seemed hard that he must pass out under these conditions. He
could imagine Whitey in that leaky little cabin during the terrible
Winter. No wonder the man was dying.
The stove was a mass of rust-eaten sheet-iron and looked as if it might
fall apart under the weight of a skillet. A small dry-goods box, nailed
against the wall, was used as a cupboard, and its visible contents would
hardly make a meal for one hungry man.
“Sure, we’ll have to get ye out of here, Whitey,” said Jimmy cheerfully.
“A drunken Injun is —— poor company for a sick man.”
Whitey shook his head.
“Lemme alone, Jimmy. I’m fine. Please don’t try to move me—please.”
“Well, may the divil fly away with ye!” grunted Jimmy. “I’d only do it
for your own good. Did ye know the judge gave me three years and the
State got tired of me in fifteen months? I’m out on parole.”
Whitey choked softly.
“I’m—sorry, Jimmy. Somebody got that money—the money I was leavin’ for
you.”
“Aw, to —— with the money! I would never take it, even if I did earn it
in that human corral.”
“I planted yours,” said Whitey painfully. “Under the floor, like I said,
but——”
“Forget it, Whitey. Tell me about yourself.”
“I’m here yet,” Whitey smiled sadly. “I hid out here for a while,
thinkin’ maybe they’d find me. I got worse and had to stay. The big
Injun took care of me. Thassall.”
“Where did he get the whisky, Whitey?”
“I dunno. Came in last night with the jug and drank himself pink.”
“And feeds ye on slumgullion, I suppose. Man, ye need milk and eggs and
nursin’.”
“Jimmy, will you promise me one thing?”
“I’d be hard-hearted as ——, if I didn’t. What is it?”
“Don’t tell anyone I’m here. I’ll get along.”
Jimmy studied Whitey for a while. It seemed strange that he preferred to
die alone. Human nature is a queer combination of desires, and Jimmy
knew this. Perhaps Whitey had a good reason for it. Disease plays queer
pranks with a man’s mind, and it might be that Whitey had an aversion to
seeing any one.
“You’re free, white and twenty-one,” said Jimmy slowly. “If ye desire it
that way, Whitey—God bless ye. But can’t I do nothin’ for ye?”
“Nothin’,” said Whitey shortly. “Just lemme alone.”
He coughed deeply and settled down on his pillow. Jimmy watched him for
a few minutes and went to the door. The drunken Indian snored harshly
and rolled over, still clutching the demijohn.
Jimmy untied the roan and vaulted into the saddle. He studied the cabin
for a while, rode around the open side of it and into the coulée, taking
a cattle-trail, which led out at the head of the coulée and on to the
ridge.
He had ridden perhaps two miles, sitting loosely in the saddle, deep in
thought. He wanted to help Whitey, but did not want to break his promise
to tell no one. He felt the roan throw up its head and slow its pace. He
glanced up and saw Jeff Garvin riding down the slope toward him.
Jimmy stopped and waited for Garvin to come up.
“Kinda warm,” remarked Garvin, shoving back his hat and wiping his brow
with his sleeve.
“Sure it is,” agreed Jimmy, turning in his saddle and looking back
toward the coulée, “I’ve been kinda lookin’ around and it seems that the
Winter did ruin a lot of good beef.”
Garvin nodded and squinted across the hills.
“Did yuh come up that brushy coulée?”
Jimmy nodded.
“Yes. I swung into it below that old cabin and came out at the head of
it.”
“Anybody livin’ in the cabin?”
“No. Wouldn’t be fit for anybody to live in.”
Garvin nodded as if just a trifle disappointed. Jimmy did not want
Garvin to go down there and find Whitey Allen and the drunken Indian.
“Been over to the Box M today?” asked Jimmy.
Garvin shook his head.
“Naw. I passed the bunch goin’ to town.” He yawned sleepily and relaxed
with a grin. “I wonder where in —— that pearl-handled gun is.”
Jimmy said nothing. If Garvin only knew it, that gun was hanging within
his reach right now; but the plain wood handles, stained dark by rubbing
with powdered pencil lead, bore little resemblance to those beautiful
pieces of pearl. Garvin eased himself sidewise in his saddle and
squinted at Jimmy.
“Pardner, where did you come from?”
Jimmy stared down at the ground thoughtfully for a few moments and then
grinned at Garvin.
“Do I look queer? Is there anything about me that seems different from
other folks? Do I wear strange raiment or cut my hair unlike other men?”
“Why ask all them questions?” grunted Garvin.
“Because folks are always askin’ me where I came from. What in
the —— has me last stoppin’ place got to do with you or any one else?”
“Strangers ain’t never very numerous around here,” replied Garvin
evenly, “and you kinda drifted in at a bad time.”
“Well,” Jimmy’s eyes twinkled, “well, should I go back and get a fresh
start? Or is it that you’ve found you arrested the wrong parties?”
Garvin glared at Jimmy for a moment, struggling to keep his temper, and
then,
“Which don’t tell me who you are or where you came from, pardner.”
“No,” softly, “and that’s only a part of it, sheriff.”
The smile had left Jimmy’s good-natured face, and his blue eyes seemed
to fade to a steel-gray. Garvin started to say something, but changed
his mind. He turned, as if to ride away.
“Talkin’ now might save yuh trouble.”
“Sure now, I never depend on me tongue to keep me out of a bit o’
trouble. Good afternoon.”
Jimmy shook up the roan and rode straight up the slope, while Garvin
rode along the side of the hill, heading back toward Oxbow.
“Now why did he speak of that little cabin?” reflected Jimmy. “I had to
lie to him about the place, but I’m sure the lie hurt no one. Poor
Whitey. Nursed by a drunken Injun. He needs good care and he needs good
eats. I’ve heard that eggs and milk is the proper grub. Hm-m-m! From the
looks of him he’d keep the chickens and the cows workin’ a day and night
shift.”
Jimmy rode slowly back toward the Box M, deep in his thoughts; letting
the roan take its own way.
VII
Mrs. Moore, Pat and Bud went straight to the office of Dave Cleland, the
prosecuting attorney. He had known the Moore family for years, and
sympathized with them; but his duty was to prosecute, in spite of
friendship. He shook hands with them and patted Mrs. Moore on the
shoulder. Cleland was tall and thin, with keen eyes, sharp nose and
partly bald head. He smoked flake-cut tobacco in a well-seasoned
cob-pipe and spent a great part of his time stuffing in fresh tobacco.
“Are you going to keep my husband and son in jail, Dave Cleland?”
demanded Mrs. Moore.
Cleland refilled his pipe slowly and lit a match on his shoe sole.
“Well, Mrs. Moore, I—I wish I could turn ’em both loose; but I can’t.
Judge Whaley will be here this week and give them a hearing. As far as I
can see, there is no evidence; but the sheriff assures me that he’ll
have the evidence. It appears that the bulk of the evidence centers in
and around a pearl-handled pistol of large caliber.”
Pat flushed slightly. Bud had been watching her closely, and wondered
what she knew about this gun.
“My husband had such a gun,” declared Mrs. Moore.
“Hm-m-m!” Cleland seemed to have trouble with the stem of his pipe. “I
believe so. In fact I have seen it myself; but it can only be put into
evidence in its material form.”
“Then you—the law can not do a thing until after the hearing takes
place?” queried Pat.
“I’m sorry,” said Cleland. “Honest, I am sorry, Patricia. Please don’t
hold this against me, will you? I am only a tool of the law.”
“Of course you can not help it, Dave. You are only performing your
duty.”
As they left the office Cleland walked to the door with them, his arm
around Mrs. Moore’s shoulders. He thought a lot of Mrs. Moore, and it
distressed him to think that he was partly instrumental in bringing
sorrow to them.
They went to the sheriff’s office, which they found to be locked. They
had met Garvin on the road. He had barely nodded to them. There was no
way of getting into the jail to talk of Flint Moore and Wild. While they
debated the situation, Jud Frawley rode in and dismounted across the
street.
He saw the three in front of the sheriff’s office and crossed the street
to them. Frawley owned a bony, seamed countenance, which never seemed to
change expression, being habitually serious. He was of medium height,
slightly bowed of legs and walked with a slight limp, a memento of a
gun-fight with a Mexican, in which Frawley got a bullet in the knee and
the Mexican got attended by the coroner.
“Kinda lookin’ for yuh, Jud,” greeted Bud Deal, but Frawley ignored the
greeting until after he had shaken hands with Mrs. Moore and Pat.
“Lookin’ for me?”
“Yes,” said Pat. “We want to see dad and Wild.”
“Shucks!” Frawley looked utterly downcast. “I reckon I’m goin’ to be
about as much use to you as a tack-hammer in a blacksmith shop. Garvin
cut my picket-rope yes’day.”
“Discharge you?” asked Pat, quickly.
“Yes’m—kinda like that. Yuh see, me and him looks out upon the world
with different kind of eyes, and Garvin reckons that he sees a lot
better than I do. Anyway—” Frawley shook his head—“my eyes ain’t like no
spy-glass, the same of which yuh can twist a screw and make the things
fit for anybody.”
“Then we won’t be able to see them?”
Mrs. Moore was very near tears. It was hot in front of that building,
and the dust from a passing wagon drifted into their faces. Frawley
looked sadly at her.
“Mrs. Moore, ma’am—yuh sure got my p’mission. ’F I had a key I’d sure
let yuh in—you and li’l Pat.”
In spite of the situation Pat smiled. Jud Frawley had always called her
little Pat. Bud looked quickly at Frawley. He had only mentioned Mrs.
Moore and Pat.
“I did want to see him,” sighed Mrs. Moore. “It isn’t right, Jud. And
we’ve got some clean clothes for them.”
“I’ll see that they git the clothes,” volunteered Jud quickly. “Leave
’em with me and I’ll hang around till Garvin shows up.”
“Mebbe he won’t let you in,” suggested Bud.
“The —— he won’t!” exploded Frawley. “’F he tries to stop me I’ll nail
the seat of his pants to the floor and leave him there to starve.”
Bud laughed sneeringly, but Frawley merely looked keenly at him.
“You don’t believe dad and Wild held up that train, do you, Jud?” asked
Pat.
“——, no! Ex-cuse my profanity, folks. I ain’t in no way connected with
the law now, and I can talk up in church without havin’ some sneakin’
coyote packin’ the talk to the sheriff. I hope the party what told him
about me will tell Jeff Garvin that I’m doin’ a little investigatin’ on
m’ own hook.
“You folks set easy. I know it ain’t right to keep yuh from seein’ the
old man and the kid; but yuh sure can see ’em at the trial. Folks around
town are wonderin’ what Garvin is holdin’ ’em for. He showed he didn’t
have much brains when he arrested Wild that time; and he knows danged
well that he won’t never git elected again if he gits tangled up and
falls down in this arrest.”
“He likely thinks he is right,” said Bud slowly.
“Yeah!” snapped Frawley. “Mebbe yuh mean, he’s tryin’ to make folks
think he thinks he’s right.”
Bud did not say whether that was his meaning or not. He knew that
Frawley suspected or knew that he, Bud, was the one who warned Garvin
against him, and that Jud was working on a dangerous angle.
“You folks want to go right back?” asked Bud.
“Mother and I are going to do a little shopping,” said Pat. “It will
take us an hour or so. Perhaps by that time Garvin will be back. If he
isn’t, Jud, we’ll leave the clothes with you.”
“I’ll sure see that they get ’em,” nodded Frawley, and walked back
across the street.
Bud walked up the street with the women, but left them at the door of
Colgate’s store, after telling them that he would keep an eye out for
Garvin.
* * * * *
Bud was sincere in that statement. He really did want to see Garvin, but
it was not in connection with the desires of the Moore family. He
circulated around the town, taking a drink here and there, discussing
cattle and getting opinions on the coming court hearing of the Moores.
Oxbow, or rather the majority of Oxbow, did not believe that Flint Moore
was guilty.
Wild had been mixed up in many escapades, and had but recently been
tried for a similar offense; which caused some to utter the old
quotation—where there is so much smoke there must be some fire. Oxbow
knew that Flint and Wild Moore had come to jail, herding their captors
ahead of them. Therefore, Oxbow laughed at Garvin. Jud Frawley laughed
as hard as they, and gave Flint and Wild all the credit for the capture.
Oxbow knew that Jud Frawley was no coward. He had been tried by fire
many times. They resented the fact that Frawley had been discharged.
Crime had become too frequent in Thunder County, and Jeff Garvin was in
a fair way to become greatly disliked by the law-abiding element of the
country.
Bud Deal found some who favored Garvin and hoped for a conviction of the
Moores, but they were greatly in the minority. Bud did not commit
himself. He wandered around until noon and then found Mrs. Moore and
Pat. They were not ready to go home yet. Mrs. Moore wanted to wait
longer and see if the sheriff did not come back; so Bud left them at a
restaurant.
It was about two o’clock when Garvin came back. Bud saw him across the
lower end of the street, heading for his little barn behind the jail.
Bud was careful to see that no one else had observed Garvin, and then
sauntered down an alley and around the rear of some buildings to the
barn. Garvin was unsaddling his horse as Bud came into the doorway.
Garvin turned and looked at Bud, but did not speak.
“How are yuh, Jeff?” greeted Bud.
“I’m all right, I reckon,” grunted Garvin, as he hung up his saddle.
He came closer to the door and peered out, as if thinking that some one
was with Bud.
“I’m alone,” assured Bud grinning, and told Garvin that Mrs. Moore and
Pat were waiting for a chance to get into the jail.
Garvin scowled blackly.
“But they don’t know you’re in town,” stated Bud. “They talked with
Frawley.”
“I fired him!” snapped Garvin. “He talked too much.”
“Yeah? And yuh told him that I said he talked too much,” accused Bud
coldly. “Yuh didn’t need to put me in bad with Frawley.”
“Zasso?” Garvin’s teeth snapped. “Lemme tell yuh somethin’, Bud; you was
in bad with Frawley before I ever mentioned yuh to him. He said he’s
goin’ to find out where you was the mornin’ of that train robbery.”
Bud’s face did not change expression. He prided himself on his
poker-face. Garvin watched him closely. There was evidently no complete
understanding between Deal and Garvin, and both were fishing for a lead
to work on. Bud glanced over at the horse.
“Been in the hills, Jeff?”
“Uh-huh. Took a little _pasear_ over around the Devil’s Pulpit.”
“Yeah?”
Bud’s hand slid from his hip and his fingers softly caressed the silver
studs on his holster. It was a perfectly natural move—yet suggestive.
“See anybody?”
Bud’s voice was pitched low, and his eyes squinted keenly at Garvin.
Garvin nodded quickly.
“Yeah. Talked with a feller.”
Bud’s hand twitched closer to the butt of his gun, but his face did not
change. Garvin was very close to death. His next words meant life or
death to him; but he did not know it.
“That new puncher yuh got, Bud.”
“Oh!” breathed Bud, and relaxed slightly. “Where did yuh find him?”
“Out near the Pulpit. Said he was lookin’ over the stock. I seen him
ride out of the upper end of the big coulée, and went down to see who he
was.”
“What was he ridin’—what kind of a horse?”
“Roan—hammer-headed, with black tail and mane. Didn’t see any brand.”
“The Whistler!” Bud’s eyes opened wide. “Do yuh mean to say he was
ridin’ that outlaw—ridin’ him in the hills?”
“I dunno the bronc—only by reputation. Mebbe it was.”
“The Whistler was in the corral,” stated Bud; “I rounded him up with
some loose stock a few days ago. I kinda thought I might sell him to
some Wild West show or a circus. Mebbe he’d bring some money at a rodeo;
but if this feller, Smith, is ridin’ him——”
“Has anybody ever stayed with him?” asked Garvin.
“‘Bunchgrass’ Billings stayed with him for six jumps,” smiled Bud, “and
Bunchgrass is the best rider West of the Dakota line.”
Garvin rubbed his chin thoughtfully.
“Bud, who in —— is this here Smith feller?”
“Got me guessin’,” admitted Bud. “He can draw a six-gun so —— fast that
yuh can’t see it comin’; and if he can use Whistler for a
ridin’-horse——”
“I’m bettin’ that his name ain’t Smith.”
“Names don’t mean nothin’,” grunted Bud. “What did he have to say?”
“Not much. Said he just came up the big coulée.”
“Anythin’ else?”
“Just some personal remarks.”
Bud grinned. He knew that Garvin had questioned Jimmy and that the
quick-tongued Irishman had given him some very pointed answers. He felt
that Jimmy had not visited the old cabin, but wanted to be sure.
“Wonder if the snow busted in that old cabin in the big coulée?”
“I don’t reckon so. Smith said it wasn’t fit for anybody to live in, but
he didn’t say it was busted in.”
Bud’s eyes narrowed as he looked down at the floor of the stable. Smith
had been at the cabin. This was something he had not looked for. He
looked up suddenly to see Garvin squinting closely at him, as he said—
“Deal, what about that old cabin in the coulée?”
Bud looked away for a moment and back to Garvin.
“What about it?” Bud glanced around outside the door, as if fearful of
being overheard.
“Garvin, what about the money that was cached in that cabin?”
Garvin seemed taken aback at the question, but tried to smile as he
said—
“What money?”
“You know —— well what money, Garvin. The night that Whitey Allen got
drunk and told about finding all that money under the floor of that
cabin, you heard him telling me.”
Bud paused and his hand caressed his holster. Garvin only seemed mildly
curious, although he was trembling inside.
“You arrested Whitey Allen that night and scared him into givin’ you
half of it. I waited until mornin’ to go out there. Wild Moore saw you
arrest Whitey, and went down to the jail——”
“He did not!” denied Garvin.
“No, you didn’t see him,” admitted Bud, “but he heard yuh talkin’, I
reckon. Anyway the money was gone when I got there. You and Whitey
showed up later, and didn’t find it. I reckon that was the money that
Wild was payin’ out so free just before yuh arrested him.”
“Well?” grunted Garvin. “Any harm in that? It must ’a’ been the money
that feller Devlin stole and planted just before the sheriff caught him.
Where is Whitey?”
“I dunno,” lied Bud. “He left the country. Do you think that Flint Moore
and Wild Moore were the ones that held up the train?”
Garvin laughed softly.
“They are if I can cinch it on to ’em. If I only had that —— gun. Where
is it, Bud?”
“—— if I know; but I have an idea. You let things alone out there, Jeff;
and mebbe I can find the thing.”
“Think it’s been hid?”
“That gun,” said Bud slowly, “that gun was in that holster when I left
for town that mornin’.”
“How do you know?”
“I seen it,” declared Bud. “I went to the door to speak to Flint and I
seen the gun there.”
Garvin picked up a straw and chewed thoughtfully on it for a while. He
twisted his head a trifle and looked keenly at Bud as he said:
“Deal, I reckon we understand each other. You find that gun and turn it
over to me before the trial. After that we’ll talk business.”
Bud’s eyes shifted from the sheriff and he turned toward the door.
“You keep out of sight, Garvin. Them —— women won’t help matters none by
talkin’ to Flint and Wild.”
Bud started to go out of the door, but turned.
“Suppose Flint Moore swears that he never had that gun on him that day?”
he asked.
Garvin grinned.
“Can he prove it?”
“Might—by Wild.”
“Fine proof,” laughed Garvin. “Don’tcha worry.”
“So-long,” grunted Bud.
He found Mrs. Moore and Pat ready to go home. He reported that Garvin
had not returned, and Pat gave the clothes to Frawley to give to them.
“I’ll tell ’em all about yuh bein’ in to see ’em,” said Frawley, “and if
they want to send yuh any word, I’ll ride in with it.”
“Jud Frawley, you are a darling,” declared Pat.
“Aw-w-w!” choked Frawley. “I—I—So-long.”
Frawley stood on the sidewalk, hat in hand and watched them drive out of
town. For a long time after they had disappeared he still stared down
the road. As he turned around he saw Garvin walking between the jail and
the office.
Frawley’s first impulse was to follow the buckboard and bring them back;
but he changed his mind, picked up the bundle of clothes and walked down
to the office. Garvin was standing near his desk as Frawley came in. He
glared at Frawley, who walked close to him and said:
“I want to see Flint Moore, Jeff. Got some clothes for him.”
Garvin shook his head.
“No, I reckon yuh can’t.”
“Can’t I?” Frawley let the bundle drop to the floor, which left his
right hand free. “Can’t I? You open up that jail and let me in, or I’ll
make you so —— sick that all the doctors in the country would give yuh
up.”
“Whatcha want in there?” Garvin’s voice was not very strong. He knew
that Frawley was no bluffer. “Lemme search that bundle before yuh go in.
How do I know yuh ain’t got a gun or a file or——”
“Yuh heard what I said, didn’t yuh?” asked Frawley.
“You’ll get in bad with the law,” whined Garvin.
“With you, yuh mean, Garvin. I don’t mind.”
Garvin opened the rear door and they went across the alley-way to the
jail door.
* * * * *
Jimmy spent a bad afternoon at the Box M. He turned the roan back into
the corral and sat down in the shade. Jimmy could understand suffering
and he knew that Whitey Allen must have went through the tortures of
hell during the last fifteen months.
Klooch and her puppy had met him when he arrived, and now the wolf-dog
sat on her haunches beside him, with her muzzle on his knee. The puppy
chased its tail for a while and curled up at Jimmy’s feet. Heat waves
danced and shimmered across the hills. Flying grasshoppers buzzed and
snapped like tiny fire-crackers. A magpie balanced on a tall, leaning
pole, flipping its long tail jerkily and scolding harshly.
A small herd of cattle drifted down a dusty cattle-trail, passing the
ranch on their way to water. Opposite the ranch-house they stopped as
with one accord, looked curiously toward the house for a moment and went
on. They were from far back in the hills, but were drifting down for the
earlier grass in the bottoms.
Jimmy noted all these things subconsciously. He wanted to help Whitey
Allen. There were many things he wanted to do. The fact that Flint
Moore’s cartridge belt held only .41 caliber cartridges gave him food
for thought. Where was the .41 caliber gun? Perhaps Pat knew. She had
hidden the .45.
He shook his head and rubbed Klooch’s muzzle.
“I dunno, do you, Klooch? She’s a fine tangle, dog. I know that eggs and
milk is the proper thing for old Whitey, but I’ve got to pack ’em to him
while no one is lookin’ on.”
Jimmy got to his feet and squinted at the sun. It would be sundown in an
hour or so.
“I can’t find eggs in the dark,” he reflected. “If I make the trip at
night I better collect the hen-fruit in the light of day.”
He walked down to the old barnlike sheds, where chickens scratched in
the loose hay.
“I never was familiar with cackle-berries,” he stated to the hens, “but
I’m hot on the trail of your productions.”
He slid the barn-door back and went inside, leaving Klooch and the puppy
out in the yard. He searched the mangers and the loose hay, but eggs
were scarce. He did not hear the arrival of the buckboard, which brought
Bud Deal and the Moore family back to the ranch.
Bud was anxious to find Jimmy and if possible to learn if he had really
passed the little cabin in the coulée. He unhitched the team and turned
them into the corral. The Whistler was in the corral and Bud noticed the
imprint of a saddle still on its back. Jimmy was back, that was sure. He
went to the bunk-house.
Pat wondered where Jimmy was. Somehow she wanted to get back to the
ranch and see him. She stood on the porch of the ranch-house, looking
around. Suddenly she saw Klooch and the puppy, standing near the door to
the largest shed, and it flashed into her mind that they were waiting
for Jimmy to come out. She went straight down to the door, spoke to
Klooch and slid back the door.
Jimmy had found one egg. He put this into his hat, while he continued
the search. As he emerged from around a stall partition he almost ran
into Pat. He stared at her wonderingly—stared at her as if she had
suddenly materialized out of the dusty sunlight shining through the
cracks of the log barn.
For a moment Jimmy stared and then remembered the egg. He did not want
to explain about the egg, because in explaining about the egg he would
have to tell her about Whitey. He shifted the hat partly behind him.
“Sure, I didn’t know ye was home so soon,” he said nervously. “Did ye
just come?”
“A few minutes ago,” smiled Pat. “I wondered where you were; but when I
saw Klooch and the puppy waiting at the door——”
“Ah, yes, I see. I was just lookin’ around the place, Miss. I—I——” Jimmy
faltered as he noticed that Pat had glanced at the hat, as if trying to
see what was inside.
In desperation he shifted the hat, grasped the top of the tall crown to
try and protect the egg, and put it on his head. The stiff crown,
crushed around the egg, seemed to hold it firmly for a moment, but
Jimmy’s heart sank with a sickening thud, as he heard the egg thwack
against the top of his head.
“Hot in there,” muttered Jimmy weakly. “Mebbe we better go outside.”
But Pat was staring at him closely. From under the sweat-band of his hat
came a trickle of thick moisture. It slid stickily down his forehead,
shifted its course at the bulge of his eyebrow and shot down the bridge
of his long nose.
“Have you been hurt?” asked Pat seriously, although her eyes danced.
“Aye,” muttered Jimmy, looking cross-eyed at the trickle down his nose.
Then he sniffed quickly.
“From the odors of it, I’m thinkin’ the hurt is of long standing, miss.”
Pat tried to suppress her mirth, but the effort did not prevent tears
from gathering in her tawny eyes and trickling down her cheeks. Jimmy
looked at her with unutterable sadness and chagrin, as he said—
“Sure, now, I ask you to please not weep over the misfortunes of an
undeserving divil like meself, miss.”
Jimmy took off his hat, turned it inside out and slapped it against the
partition of the stall, while the bulk of the egg, released from the
confines of the sweat-band, cascaded down over his forehead in a shower
of yellow yolk.
Pat fairly shrieked at the sight, but Jimmy calmly mopped his head with
a handkerchief until it was as free of egg as possible, and then he,
too, leaned against the partition and shook with laughter.
“Jimmy, you’re a sight for the gods,” laughed Jimmy.
“Jimmy, you’re a sight for any one,” corrected Pat. “Tell me why you put
that egg in your hat, will you?”
Jimmy sobered. He had forgotten that it might require an explanation. He
walked slowly to the half-open door and went outside. Pat came out
behind him and the two of them leaned against the door and looked at
each other.
“I don’t want to lie to you,” said Jimmy sadly. “I don’t mind lyin’ to
some folks, but——”
“I don’t want you to lie,” replied Pat. “If you can’t tell me the
truth——”
She broke off as Bud Deal came from in front of the bunk-house and
crossed over toward the corral. He saw them, but did not stop.
When he was almost to the corral gate he stooped down and picked up a
paper, which had been half-ground into the dirt under a horse’s hoof.
Bud was not over a hundred feet from them. He opened the trampled paper.
Jimmy’s hand flashed to his vest pocket and his heart skipped a beat.
His mind went back to the bucking roan and he realized that the parole
paper had fallen from his pocket during the ride.
Bud did not turn and look toward Jimmy, but put the paper in his pocket
and walked to the corral fence, where he looked at the horses, turned
and went to the ranch-house.
Pat turned and looked at Jimmy. The lines of his face were deeper than
ever and his eyes were squinted as if from deep suffering.
“Jimmy, what is the matter?” asked Pat.
It was the first time she had called him Jimmy, except in jest. He
looked at her and shook his head:
“I can’t tell ye, Pat. It ain’t no hurt that any one can help. I—I kinda
forgot meself, I reckon.”
“Is it something about Bud Deal?” anxiously.
Jimmy shook his head.
“No—not yet. Aw-w-w, it’s nothin’ to worry about.” Jimmy forced a smile.
“Sure, I’ve got egg smell all over me.”
Pat shook her head.
“Jimmy, can’t you tell me your troubles? Sometimes it helps to share
misery.”
“Bless your heart!” exclaimed Jimmy, taking a deep breath. “I’ve a soul
full of misery, but I can’t burden your shoulders with it.”
“Jimmy, what did you want that egg for?”
Jimmy looked closely at her. He wanted to tell some one. He felt that he
could trust Pat to help him and to keep his secret.
Somehow he felt as if he had known her for years.
“Pat,” he said softly, “I’m tellin’ you a secret. Within ten miles of
here is an old bunkie of mine, who is dyin’ from tuberculosis. He’s like
an animal, which gets hurted bad and crawls away to die. He don’t want
me to tell anybody about him, Pat. There’s nobody but a drunken Injun to
take care of him. I stole that egg to take to him. It—it was the only
egg I could find.”
“Oh, Jimmy, I’m sorry.” Pat’s eyes filled with ready tears. “Can’t I
help you? We’ll take him eggs and milk and——”
Pat stopped. Jud Frawley had ridden in past the bunk-house and swung
toward them. He took off his hat before he dismounted.
“Jud Frawley, what are you doing out here?” asked Pat.
Frawley half-smiled and glanced from one to the other.
“Jud,” said Pat, “this is Mr. Smith. Jimmy, meet Jud Frawley.”
They shook hands and Frawley turned to Pat.
“I saw your dad and Wild. They’re fine. Shall I put my horse in the
corral?”
“Going to stay all night?” asked Pat eagerly.
“I am, if somebody don’t run me away,” grinned Frawley. “I’m workin’ for
the Box M now. Flint Moore hired me today. Now I’ll put up my horse.”
Frawley nodded to Jimmy and led his horse towards the corral gate.
“You’ll like him,” said Pat. “He was Garvin’s deputy, but Garvin fired
him. I don’t think that Bud is going to like it much though. Jud is just
like one of the family. He calls me little Pat, because he used to hold
me on his knee.”
“Lucky divil,” muttered Jimmy.
Pat laughed.
“That was when I was a tiny girl.”
“It would be a sweet memory just the same—and after all—” Jimmy shook
his head—“I have no memories worth lookin’ back at, Pat. I will
have—now.”
“When you busted an egg on your head, Jimmy?”
“Aye—and talkin’ with you about it.”
There was silence between them for a few moments and then Pat said—
“Jimmy, when did you discover this old bunkie of yours?”
“Today. I saddled that hammer-headed roan and happened to run across
this feller.”
“You rode the Whistler horse?”
“I dunno. Sure, I believe he did whistle. Good horse, after he got tired
of buckin’.”
“No one has ever ridden the Whistler, Jimmy.”
Jimmy led the way to the corral and pointed out the roan. Pat nodded
slowly.
“First it’s Klooch and then the Whistler. Do you love wild things,
Jimmy?”
“Aye.”
“Will you sing for me tonight?”
Jimmy looked at her and then away across the hills, where the sunset
tinted the western curves of the Thunder Range. His eyes drifted back to
her face and he said:
“Would ye hold it against me if I didn’t, Pat? I’ve no heart for a song
this night.”
“Then some other time, Jimmy?”
“Aye—if there is some other time.”
They walked silently to the house. Bud Deal stood in the kitchen door
and watched them, a sneer on his lips. He knew that Pat was deeply
interested in this wild Irishman; but he knew he could kill that
interest very easily now. He was willing to sit back and look on, like a
player in a poker game who holds a royal flush, feeling sorry for the
puny efforts of his opponents.
Frawley followed them up to the house. Bud scowled at Frawley and
wondered what he was doing there. He had not seen Frawley ride in. Mrs.
Moore was cooking supper as Jimmy and Pat came in, with Frawley close
behind them. Bud sauntered in, nodding curtly to Frawley. Mrs. Moore
looked at Frawley, and he grinned widely.
“Another boarder, Mrs. Moore,” boomed Frawley. “I’m a hired cowpuncher
now—hired out to the Box M.”
“Well, bless my soul!” exclaimed Mrs. Moore. “Now, that’s fine, Jud. You
got into the jail and——”
“I sure did,” nodded Frawley. “Both feelin’ fine, but dog-goned sorry
that yuh didn’t get to see ’em.”
“Who hired you, Frawley?” asked Bud.
“Flint Moore.”
Bud bit the edge of his lips, staring down at the floor. When Wild Moore
had been arrested the first time Bud had been made foreman of the ranch.
Since then nothing had been said to change his standing. Flint Moore had
told him to discharge Whitey Allen, because there was not enough work
for an extra man. Now, Flint Moore had hired Frawley, without consulting
Bud, and Frawley was the last man Bud would ever have hired.
Bud glanced up at Frawley and turned to look at Jimmy.
“Well, I don’t _sabe_ the idea, Frawley. There ain’t work for so many
punchers around here. Flint told me to hire Smith; but I reckon I’ll
have to let him go now.”
Frawley’s eyes were upon Pat, while Bud was talking, and a quizzical
expression flashed across his face. Frawley could read emotion, and he
knew that Pat did not want this Smith person to leave the Box M.
* * * * *
He glanced at Jimmy, who was leaning against the side of the doorway,
slowly rolling a cigaret. There was a bit of sadness about his homely
face. Frawley noted the heavy gun hanging at his thigh; the easy pose of
his muscular body. Frawley knew men, and he knew that this man was a
born fighter. He looked at Bud, whose swarthy face was undeniably
handsome; his body as lithe as the frame of a greyhound. Frawley
half-shook his head as he turned from Bud, as if discarding him in his
mental choice.
“I don’t reckon that anybody will have to go,” said Frawley slowly.
“Flint Moore knowed that Smith was here.”
“The business can’t stand it!” Bud’s voice snapped.
Frawley rubbed his chin thoughtfully.
“Well, Bud, you can use yore own judgment. Smith stays, if he wants to.”
“Yeah?” Bud looked quickly at Frawley. “Well, whatcha know about that?
How long you been runnin’ this ranch?”
Frawley slowly drew out a massive silver watch and peered at the dial.
“Lemme see. About four or five hours.”
“What do yuh mean?”
“Flint Moore asked me to take charge of the ranch until he got back.”
Bud did not say a word; but his heart sank within him. What did this
mean? Had there been a leak somewhere that had caused Flint Moore to
hire a man over him? Bud glanced at Pat and saw her half-smiling at
Jimmy.
Bud’s temper flashed hot in his black eyes, but he shut his teeth hard.
In his pocket he had the evidence that would disrate Jimmy in the eyes
of Patricia Moore. For a moment he struggled against his temper,
fighting back the impulse to unmask Jimmy Devlin. No, he would wait and
see what the law did with Flint and Wild Moore. If there were not
sufficient evidence to hold them he would turn the parole over to
Garvin. It would show that Devlin had lied about his name, and Devlin
would have to prove his whereabouts at the time of the robbery. Bud
forced a smile and sat down at the table.
“I talked with Flint about that pearl-handled six-gun,” said Frawley.
No one made any comment and Frawley did not continue.
Pat went out on the front porch. No one could see her from the
dining-room, as she went softly down the porch steps and down to the
bunk-house, where she quickly threw aside the boards of the little
lumber-pile. The gun was not there.
She went back to the porch, where she sat down and tried to think. Who
had seen her put the gun under that lumber? Bud had not been there.
Jimmy and Garvin were the only two who could have taken it. But perhaps
someone had found it later. She wondered dully whether Garvin had the
gun and would exhibit it as evidence at the hearing.
She wondered why Jimmy had suddenly seemed hurt. One moment he had been
light-hearted, with a laugh on his lips, and the next moment he had
seemed to grow old with suffering.
She could hear the rattling of dishes in the dining-room as the men ate
their dinner, but there was little or no conversation. In a little while
Bud Deal came out carrying his hat. Pat glanced up at him, but he was
busy with his own thoughts. Frawley drifted to the doorway, filling his
pipe, and Bud glanced back at him.
“Reckon I’ll ride to town tonight,” observed Bud and walked down the
steps, going straight to the corral.
He seemed to walk very straight, holding his head high.
“Kinda knocked the starch out of Bud, I reckon,” observed Frawley
slowly. “But it’ll all come out in the wash.”
Jimmy came out and stood at the edge of the porch, looking down toward
the corral, where Bud was saddling his sorrel. Pat glanced up at Jimmy.
There was nothing of the devil-may-care expression left to his features.
His eyes were narrowed to mere slits and the lines of his homely face
were like carved flint.
Suddenly he jerked away from the railing, walked down the steps and went
straight toward Bud Deal.
Pat got to her feet as if to follow him, but Frawley spoke softly and
she stopped.
“Easy, little Pat. I dunno what it’s about, but——”
Bud Deal turned as Jimmy came up to him and they looked into each
other’s eyes at close range. Pat and Frawley could see that Bud was
speaking, but no words came to them.
Suddenly Bud seemed to jerk away and reach for his gun. Bud was the
fastest man in the Thunder Range with a gun. But Jimmy’s move was as
quick as Bud’s—quicker, because his left fist caught Bud under the chin,
while Bud’s gun was only half-way out of its holster.
Bud dropped in a heap. The sorrel whirled sidewise against the side of
the corral, snorting and trying to break away. Jimmy seemed to drop
almost as quickly as Bud, and to the two people on the porch he seemed
to be holding Bud against further action. But he got to his feet and
backed away from Bud, as he removed the cartridges from Bud’s gun and
replaced it in its holster.
Bud rolled over, got slowly to his feet and looked at Jimmy, who handed
him the cartridges. Pat and Frawley were unable to hear what either of
them were saying. Bud got to his feet, rubbed his chin, as if it pained
him greatly, and untied his horse. Without a backward glance he rode out
of the ranch-house gate and headed for town.
Jimmy had asked Bud for the parole paper, which he had found; but Bud
refused even to admit that he had found such a paper. Bud had said that
it was kind of Jimmy to admit that he was a paroled thief, and that Pat
would love to know it.
Anyway, Jimmy had the paper in his possession again. He walked slowly
back to the porch, where Pat and Frawley waited for him.
“Sure, I’m sorry there had to be an audience,” said Jimmy sadly, and
then to Frawley: “I’m thinkin’ I’d better be goin’ along, Mr. Frawley.
The Box M don’t owe me any salary.”
“Go away?” asked Pat quickly.
Frawley sucked on his pipe and his eyes twinkled as he looked at them.
“Aye. There’s good reasons, ma’am.”
“My name is Pat—Jimmy.”
Jimmy smiled at her.
“And there’s no better on earth.”
“I don’t reckon there’s any need of yuh leavin’ us,” observed Frawley.
“Stay a while, anyway.”
Frawley yawned and went back into the house, where he started a
conversation with Mrs. Moore. Jimmy seemed to be smiling at his own
thoughts and looked to see Pat looking at him.
“Feel better now, Jimmy?”
“Aye. But I have no right to be here—to talk with ye, Pat. It ain’t
right, except within me heart, which only knows about me. Ye wonder why
I clouted Bud Deal, and I don’t want to tell ye. For the life of me I
can’t, Pat. It won’t be long until ye know. Sure, it’s been like Heaven
to me—this knowin’ all of ye; givin’ me somethin’ to look back at in the
years to come.”
“But you are not going away, Jimmy.”
“Not tonight, at any rate,” smiled Jimmy.
Pat nodded as she looked down at the big gun in Jimmy’s holster. Jimmy
looked down at the gun and up at her.
“Did you have that gun when you came here?” asked Pat.
Jimmy smiled softly.
“I never lie to my friends, Pat. Never hide anythin’ and let a pup see
you hide it. It arouses their curiosity.”
“But—” faltered Pat.
“Aye,” nodded Jimmy. “I am at this moment sittin’ on two pieces of
pearl, which repose serenely in me hip-pockets.”
Mrs. Moore came to the door and called:
“You folks had better come in the house. It’s getting chilly out there.
Maybe Mr. Smith will sing for us.”
Pat smiled at him and repeated her mother’s question, with her eyes.
Jimmy got slowly to his feet.
“I have it in me heart to sing—now.”
VIII
Bud Deal rode away from the Box M in a daze. He was unable to explain
things to himself. Jimmy’s blow had come like a flash of bright lights.
He had expected Jimmy to reach for a gun, and his eyes had flashed to
Jimmy’s right hand, leaving Jimmy the chance he needed to send over a
knock-out punch.
Bud realized before he got to his feet that Jimmy had taken that paper
from his pocket; but now he searched his pockets to be sure. It was
gone. He drew up his horse and looked back toward the Box M, already
blotted out in the shadows of night.
Pat and Frawley had both seen what happened, and the humiliation burned
deeply in Bud’s soul. He had the reputation of being the fastest gunman
in the country. Bud had whipped bigger men than Smith with bare hands.
Now this soft-spoken Irishman had ignored his swift gun-play and knocked
him down with his fist, taken away his gun and given it back—empty. All
in the presence of the girl he meant to marry.
Instead of going toward Oxbow he swung off the road and headed toward
the Devil’s Pulpit. It was dark now, but he needed no light, and the
sure-footed sorrel picked its own trail.
Far off in a cañon an owl hooted, like a distant railroad engine
whistling for a clear signal. A wild-cat padded its way across an open
space, a gray shadow which snarled and was gone. A coyote silhouetted
for a moment against the sky-line of a butte and faded out.
The Devil’s Pulpit showed black against the sky-line, its eastern side a
sheer drop of a hundred feet into the brushy coulée. Bud rode in at the
top of the coulée and went down into the brush, following a
cattle-trail, until he came in at the rear of the tiny cabin. A faint
glow of a candle through the chinks between the logs showed him that the
occupants were awake, although there were no voices to be heard.
The door was open, which emitted a faint glow of light. Bud dismounted
near the door.
“This is Bud,” he called softly, and a voice inside said, “Come in.”
Whitey was propped up in bed, his face gray and drawn in the flickering
light from the one candle on the table. The Indian was not there. On the
bed beside Whitey lay a Winchester rifle and a Colt pistol.
“How yuh feelin’?” asked Bud.
“How in —— do yuh expect a feller to feel?” asked Whitey hoarsely.
“Nothin’ to eat, —— little to drink and a Injun for a nurse. I suppose
yo’re sorry I’m alive.”
“Cut out that kinda talk!” snapped Bud. “I’ve done all I could, Whitey.
Yuh got to figure that I couldn’t sneak over here every day. Pretty near
able to get up?”
“I dunno how able I am,” grunted Whitey, “but I know —— well I’m goin’
to get up pretty soon. That bullet busted a rib, and I don’t think
there’s any lead in my lung. Must ’a’ kinda horned in and out, bustin’
the rib. Rib stuck in me, I reckon. Now, tell me what’s new.”
Bud told him of the arrest of Flint and Wild Moore for the robbery of
the train.
“Aw, ——!” grunted Whitey. “Why didn’t Garvin pick on somebody else. It’s
a cinch they can’t convict Flint Moore.”
“It saves further investigation,” grinned Bud. “By the time they’re
cleared, the trail will be cold. Somethin’ else, Whitey. The money you
found under the floor of this shack was the money Devlin was sent up for
stealin’.”
Whitey looked keenly at Bud. The flickering candle light made a
grotesque shadow behind him on the wall. A huge moth fluttered in out of
the dark and almost extinguished the candle.
“You remember hearin’ about Devlin, don’t yuh?” asked Bud.
“Yeah. It was his money, eh? Well, what of it?”
“He’s near here, Whitey. I gave him a job on the Box M. Said his name
was Smith. He’ll be lookin’ for the money, I reckon. Mebbe he forgot
just where he put it, ’cause he was ridin’ this way, lookin’ around, I
reckon.”
“He was sent up for three years, wasn’t he?” asked Whitey.
“Paroled,” grunted Bud, rubbing his sore chin. “He’s my ace-in-the-hole.
If they don’t cinch Flint and Wild Moore, I’ll bet I can lay the
deadwood on Devlin.”
“Why lay it on anybody?” croaked Whitey. “You better keep out of it,
Bud. You git too —— anxious and folks will be wonderin’ why. You keep
your mouth shut.”
Bud grunted. He did not like Whitey’s tone. Anyway, Bud was getting
nervous.
“The engineer recognized that pearl-handled gun,” said Bud, but added
quickly, “I mean he got a good look at it, and that’s the evidence that
Garvin is lookin’ for.”
“Where is it, Bud?”
“—— if I know. The sheriff had taken ’em to jail when I got back that
night; so I hooked Flint’s .41 and slipped the .45 in its place. When
Garvin tried to find it, the danged thing was gone.”
“Looks kinda funny,” observed Whitey. “Who’d take it, do yuh suppose?”
Bud shook his head slowly, deep in thought. Suddenly he rubbed his hand
across his face.
“By ——! I wonder if that could be it? Whitey, that Devlin is packin’
a .45 and he only had six shells. No, that one has plain wood handles.”
“What’s the idea?” croaked Whitey.
“He wanted more shells,” mused Bud aloud. “Pat got the old man’s
belt—the one he wore that day—and it was full of .41 cartridges. They
can prove that the old man was packin’ a .41.”
“The fireman was killed with a .45?” queried Whitey.
Bud nodded.
“That’s why we need that pearl-handled .45.”
“Well, I’m —— glad his blood ain’t on my hands,” said Whitey thankfully.
“Shut up!” snapped Bud nervously. “You’re as much to blame as I am.
Anyway, he shot you, didn’t he? I didn’t think he’d be able to do
anything, after the clout I gave him with that gun-barrel.”
“I’m glad I didn’t kill him,” repeated Whitey. “I’ve never killed
anybody, Bud. I thought I was goin’ to die here alone, and I was afraid
I had killed him. He fell back into the gangway of that engine——”
Came a slight sound at the doorway, and the figure of a man bulked
grotesquely in the dim light. Bud Deal seemed to sway sidewise and from
his hip flashed a stream of orange flame, followed by the crash of a
pistol.
The candle swayed in its insecure foundation of melted wax and fell to
the floor from the concussion of the heavy pistol and the crash of a
falling body.
For a moment or two there was silence, broken only by the labored
breathing of the two men.
“Light a—a match!” breathed Whitey jerkily.
Bud broke several matches, trying to scratch one. The yellow flame
seemed weak and nearly flickered out again as Bud recovered the candle
and applied the match. Both men looked toward the door, where the man
sprawled flat on his face, just inside.
Bud went slowly over to him and held the candle closer.
“That —— Injun!” he grunted. “The Injun, Whitey.”
“Killed him?” croaked Whitey.
Bud examined him closely by the candlelight and got to his feet.
“Almost between the eyes, Whitey. He never knowed what hit him.”
“More blood,” muttered Whitey weakly. “More blood. What did yuh shoot
him for, Bud?”
“—— him, he came sneakin’ in. Didn’t he? I didn’t know who he was. It
was his own fault, Whitey—wasn’t it?”
“You shot too quick,” complained Whitey. “Now, what will yuh do?”
“Quit your croakin’!” ordered Bud. “Let me think, can’t yuh?”
Bud sat down on the edge of the bunk, half-turned from Whitey, who slid
down lower on his bunk, with one hand over the butt of his six-shooter.
Somehow, Whitey had the feeling that Bud wanted him out of the way, too.
* * * * *
But Whitey and Bud were not the only ones to hear the report of Bud’s
pistol. Sheriff Garvin was doing a little night prowling on his own
account. His talk with Bud had showed him that Bud had guilty knowledge
of who had robbed that train and where the money was hid.
There had been considerable mention of the little cabin in the brushy
coulée below the Devil’s Pulpit. While Garvin was very willing to arrest
the guilty parties, he was also more than willing to get in on the
plunder—if he could do it in a way which would not cause trouble for
him.
He had been perfectly willing to take his share of the money, which
Whitey was purported to have found under the floor of that cabin. In
fact, he had coerced Whitey into a promise of a fifty-fifty split. But
Whitey had talked too much, and some one had lifted the cache ahead of
them. There was no question that this some one was Wild Moore.
Now, he was on a little tour of investigation. He had ridden to the top
of the ridge on the east side of the Pulpit and was gazing down into the
coulée, a dark mass in the dim light, when the report of Bud’s pistol
came floating up to him.
But for this shot, Garvin would have probably spent the night in the
shelter of the Pulpit, where he could watch any early morning action in
the coulée. He listened closely for a while and then rode slowly down
the side of the coulée, picking his way carefully, until he reached the
heavy brush of the bottom.
He dismounted and stood beside his horse for a while. It was very dark
down there, and Garvin was not entirely sure just where the cabin was
located. It was very still in the thick brush. Garvin was not always a
coward; but he recognized his limitations. He could not move silently in
this brush, and he could not afford to make a noise.
He heard the nicker of a horse and grasped the muzzle of his own mount
just in time to stop it from making a reply. This nicker came from
further up the coulée and to the left.
Garvin spent an anxious half-hour, listening for more sounds; but none
came. Then he left his horse and began moving slowly up the coulée,
taking a few steps and waiting silently for a full minute. Garvin was
cautious.
Suddenly he touched a fence. His hand moved along the horizontal pole
until he reached a post. He knew that he was at the little corral, and
by following this fence a short distance he could reach the cabin. Going
to the left would bring him to the front of the cabin, so he decided to
travel to the right and make his approach from the rear.
He went carefully until he reached the corner of the cabin. He could see
no lights nor hear any sounds, but his nostrils could detect the faint
odors of recent cooking. He moved about half-way of the rear of the
cabin, when he heard the sounds of some one coming from up the coulée.
Whoever it was, they were not moving cautiously. He could hear the swish
and breaking of brush and the heavy footfalls of a horse, and suddenly
the bulk of a horse and rider seemed almost to move into him.
Garvin flattened himself against the cabin, gun in hand, as the horse
and rider passed him and went to the front of the cabin.
He could hear the man dismount and go into the cabin.
The cabin had been chinked with the usual pieces of split wood and mud,
which had fallen away in places, but Garvin seemed unable to find an
opening large enough to give him a view of the interior, even after the
occupant had lit the candle. He could hear their conversation, which was
worth as much to Garvin as a view of the men.
“Well, that’s fixed.” Garvin recognized Bud Deal’s voice. “Nobody can
hang that on to us, Whitey.”
Garvin grinned to himself when Bud called Whitey by name, and listened
closely for a reply.
“Mebbe not,” croaked Whitey. “Who’s goin’ to take care of me now?”
“I dunno,” grunted Bud, “but it’s a cinch you’ve got to get out of here.
Yuh can’t let Devlin find yuh here.”
Garvin’s left ear suffered from compression, as he leaned closer to the
rough log. His mind flashed to the notice of parole and he wondered
where Devlin figured in on this deal—and where he was now.
“Where’ll I go?” asked Whitey weakly. “Yuh can’t get a hole shot in yore
lung and keep changin’ yore residence every little while, Bud.”
For a while there was silence, broken by Whitey’s question.
“Bud, you ain’t touched that sack, have yuh?”
“Naw! You know —— well I ain’t. What chance have I had to touch it?”
“I dunno, Bud. All I ask is that yuh shoot square with me. We’re
fifty-fifty on this, yuh remember. I git to wonderin’ about it
and—— Bud, yuh don’t suppose anybody is liable to find it, do yuh?”
Bud snorted his disgust at Whitey’s fears.
“Find it? Who in —— would ever climb to the point of the Devil’s Pulpit?
Do yuh think anybody would cross all that slide-rock and pick that one
little spot?”
“You done the hidin’,” said Whitey slowly. “I didn’t see yuh put it
away, Bud.”
“Well, it’s where I said it was. Right where the point comes down in the
coulée, where the solid rock goes into the ground at the edge of the
slide. There’s a hollow kinda underneath that point. ——! That money
could stay there a million years and nobody would ever find it.”
Garvin smiled to himself, and listened for more disclosures, which did
not come. Finally Bud got to his feet.
“I dunno just what we’re goin’ to do, Whitey. You get along as well as
yuh can and I’ll see yuh tomorrow night. Flint Moore hired Jud
Frawley, —— him! Made him foreman. He suspects somethin’, I think; so
I’ve got to be careful. I’m supposed to be in town now, so I reckon I
better go there to be able to prove where I was. Can’t take a chance on
a —— thing now. Just as soon as yo’re able—we’ll drift.”
Garvin was unable to get Whitey’s reply. He heard Bud mount his horse
and a moment later he rode past the rear of the cabin, passing close to
Garvin, and disappeared in the night. Garvin moved away from the cabin,
circled the corral and went back to his horse.
Garvin had learned a lot of things. He knew that Bud and Whitey had held
up the train and killed the fireman and that Whitey had been wounded. He
knew where the money was concealed, unless, of course, Bud had lied to
Whitey.
He knew that Smith was Devlin. Garvin grinned to himself as he felt his
way back to his horse. There was only one thing that he did not know,
and that was the cause of the shot he had heard. From the conversation,
he would deduct that Bud had been there a short time previous, and for
some reason had come back.
Garvin reached his horse and swung into the saddle. He could look almost
straight up at the rim of the Devil’s Pulpit, an inky blot against the
sparkle of the stars. At the foot of this, where the angle of the cliff
broke at right angles, like the corner of a sky-scraper, was twenty
thousand dollars.
“Twenty thousand!” grunted Garvin aloud, trying to visualize that great
amount. “Why worry about re-election?”
He spurred his horse down the coulée, where he could strike the gentle
slope, leading back to the top. He wanted to get his hands on that
treasure sack; but he had no desire to grope his way over treacherous
slide-rock and brush-tangle in the dark. Tomorrow would be another day.
* * * * *
The following morning at breakfast, Jud Frawley lost no time in assuming
command of the Box M.
“Mrs. Moore wants to go to town today and see if she can see the folks,
and I’ll take her in. Bud, you make a circle in the Squaw Creek country
and kinda estimate what’s in there. Lot of cattle wintered in there last
year, and Flint’s kinda anxious to find out how many of the Box M are
scattered in there.”
Frawley turned to Jimmy.
“Smith, there’s a lot of work here to do. Yuh might look over the
corrals, for one thing. Lot of posts need resettin’. Bunk-house needs
cleanin’. Dump the straw out of them ticks and fill ’em up again. Danged
if I like to sleep on a hard straw-tick.”
“Pat goin’ in with yuh?” asked Bud.
“No.”
Frawley gave no reasons for Pat staying at the ranch. Bud got up from
the table, and without a word to any one, went straight to the corral.
Mrs. Moore and Pat were in another part of the house, when Bud rode back
and dismounted at the porch.
“Want the field-glasses,” he grunted, as he lifted them from the wall,
where they hung in their leather case.
Frawley and Jimmy came out on the porch as Bud rode away. The butt of a
rifle protruded from the scabbard under his right knee.
“Mebbe he thinks he might run across a bear up there,” observed Frawley.
“Wild country up there, Smith.”
Jimmy nodded over his cigaret. Frawley looked curiously at him and said—
“I don’t reckon that Bud Deal’s got a great lot of use for either one of
us, Smith.”
“I’m thinkin’ there’s a world of truth in that,” said Jimmy seriously.
“Yuh don’t think much of him yourself, do yuh?”
Jimmy lit his cigaret and inhaled deeply.
“Mister Frawley, it takes all kinds of people to make a world, and Bud
is just one of the kinds. I don’t hate him, because—” Jimmy scratched
his chin, as if searching for words to describe his point. “Sure,
there’s only the thickness of a cigaret paper between love and hate; but
ye don’t love any one who means nothin’ to ye. Neither can ye hate a
man, who—who ye never could love. To love or hate, ye must feel that the
person has a soul, which I can’t feel of our _compadre_ Bud.”
“Pat is goin’ to marry him, I hear.”
Jimmy did not look at Frawley, who watched him closely; but there was
only a sudden tightening of the muscles of Jimmy’s mouth, which might
have been caused by holding the cigaret, the smoke of which drifted
unminded into his eyes.
Jimmy slowly removed the cigaret, crushed it carefully between his thumb
and finger and let the contents sift to the floor of the porch.
“I’ll be goin’ to work now,” said Jimmy slowly, and went down the steps.
He found a crowbar and a shovel and selected the far side of the corral
to start operations. He saw Frawley hitch up the team to the buckboard
and drive up to the house; and later he saw them leaving for Oxbow. It
was getting hot; but Jimmy dug savagely at the rocky soil. A number of
the posts were tottering—rotted away at the ground.
“You boomer!” he told himself savagely. “You paroled thief! What right
have ye to care for anybody? Go on away from here and forget such fool
ideas. Bud Deal must be all right, or she wouldn’t think of marryin’
him.”
Jimmy sent the sharp end of the heavy crowbar deep into the gravel,
twisting and turning it as if it weighed only a few ounces.
“Are you going to enlarge the corral, Jimmy?”
He turned his sweat-streaked face and looked at Pat, who had come
unnoticed and was leaning against the fence, watching him curiously. He
glanced down at the post-hole and suddenly realized that he had dug at
least two feet away from the original hole.
“Aye,” he muttered foolishly, and broke into a grin. “Sure, me mind is
not broad enough to handle the north end of a crowbar and play civil
engineer at the same time. Why did ye not go to town?”
“I wanted to help you gather eggs, Jimmy. You haven’t forgotten your
sick friend, have you?”
Jimmy shook his head.
“No, I’ve not; but Mister Frawley mapped out me day’s work and I must be
doin’ it.”
“Suppose,” smiled Pat confidentially, “suppose I was the one who mapped
out the work, Jimmy. Jud won’t expect to find much done when he gets
back, but he won’t mention it.”
“Ye—ye framed it to stay with me?” Jimmy wiped his face with his sleeve.
“Why did ye do that, Pat?”
“I wanted to help you.”
He shook his head slowly.
“Ye shouldn’t ’a’ done it, Pat. Sure, I appreciate it, y’ betcha; but
bein’ here all alone with me, and ridin’ into the hills——”
“What do you mean?” demanded Pat.
“Frawley told me!” Jimmy was closely examining the crowbar—“Frawley told
me about you—and Bud Deal.”
“Oh!” softly. “And you—you respected his rights?”
Jimmy looked up quickly.
“I’d thank him to respect mine.”
Pat stepped over and put her hand on his arm.
“Jimmy, I—I think you are the squarest shooter I ever met. Jud Frawley
is only the foreman of this ranch. If you don’t think I am the boss—ask
Jud or dad. Now, let’s go and find those eggs.”
Jimmy stared at her for a moment and his hand went to the brim of his
sombrero in a half-salute.
“I never dispute me commandin’ officer. We’ll rustle the eggs.”
Pat had already “rustled” the eggs and had made up a compact bundle of
eggs, jam, pickles and fresh bread to take to the sick man. Jimmy
saddled her horse, a brown mare, and put a saddle on the Whistler, while
Pat stood aside, expecting the notorious outlaw to show its true colors
again. But Whistler submitted quietly to the saddle and only acted a
trifle stubborn after Jimmy had settled into the saddle.
They rode out of the main gate, swung a trifle southeast and crossed
Leloo Creek, from where they climbed a sloping hogback ridge.
About a mile from the ranch-house, in almost the same place where Garvin
and Frawley had watched the place on the day of the robbery, sat Bud
Deal, with his field-glasses, watching the ranch. Bud had felt sure that
Devlin had been to that cabin; but Whitey had not intimated a thing that
would corroborate his suspicions. If Devlin had cached that money under
the cabin floor he would most surely search for it, and would find
Whitey.
Bud scowled through the glasses as he watched Jimmy and Pat ride up the
ridge, and as soon as they were out of sight he mounted and rode swiftly
down past the ranch-house and into the hills, following them.
Jimmy and Pat traveled slowly along the ridge and swung around the head
of a draw, which led back to Leloo Creek. This brought them in on the
right-hand side of the big coulée and across the coulée from Devil’s
Pulpit.
A light wind swept the hills, rippling the grass and flowers as it might
ripple a great lake of gaudy colors. Jimmy and Pat had done little
talking, as it was almost impossible to ride side by side; but when they
struck the flat country, Jimmy spurred up beside her and both horses
fell into a slow walk.
“Sure, this is God’s country,” said Jimmy. “Did ye ever see so much
color? ’Tis skies of blue, a breeze like the perfumed breath of the gods
and a flower garden from Paradise.”
“Yes,” nodded Pat, “and in the Winter?”
“Aye. But for every love there’s a hate, Pat.”
“I suppose so, Jimmy. Poor old dad. Hundreds of cows lost in the big
blizzard, which means thousands of dollars. Still he doesn’t complain.
Now, he’s in jail, and the law says he must stay there until—— Jimmy,
what in the world is that?”
Pat pointed at the brushy side of a small coulée, where a weird figure
had appeared. It was the figure of a man, standing with arms
outstretched, as if invoking the gods. His clothes were almost all torn
from his body and his face was an indistinguishable mass, which looked
like blood and dirt.
They rode in closer, but the figure gave them no heed.
“Why, it’s old Indian Jim!” exclaimed Pat. “What in the world is the
matter with him?”
Jimmy spurred in closer and peered at the Indian. His hair and the upper
part of his half-naked body was crusted with blood and dirt, and his
chest and arms had been scratched deeply from mesquite snags.
“What in the divil happened to ye?” asked Jimmy.
The old Indian turned slowly and seemed to see them for the first time.
He moved slowly backward, with arms still outstretched, whirled suddenly
and bounded across the coulée, screeching like a panther. Over the far
side he went, running swiftly, and disappeared into another ravine,
which led into the big coulée at the foot of Devil’s Pulpit.
“Crazy as a March hare!” grunted Jimmy. “He’s been hurt in the head, I’m
thinkin’. What do ye make of it?”
Pat shook her head. “I do not know, Jimmy. Old Jim always seemed sane;
but he would do anything for a drink of liquor. Perhaps he got drunk and
hurt himself.”
“By golly, that’s the Injun who was takin’ care of my sick friend!”
exclaimed Jimmy to himself. “I wonder if somethin’ has happened to him.
Ye never can trust a drunken Injun—nor a drunken white man, for that
matter.”
* * * * *
They rode on toward the rim of the big coulée, watching for another
glimpse of the Indian. A dense patch of brush masked their approach to
the edge. Jimmy tied the horses in the brush and he and Pat walked out
to where they could get almost a bird’s-eye view of the coulée. Across
from them was Devil’s Pulpit, and below, hidden in the brush, was the
little cabin. From their elevation they could see the sweep of open
country at the head of the coulée, and to the right the hills swept off
to the blue haze of Bitter River.
A drifting herd of cattle went slowly along the sky-line to the left and
far behind the Pulpit. An eagle circled high in the air; without visible
movement, like a bird-figure suspended on invisible wires. Far down the
coulée a blue-jay chattered violently at intervals.
“A picture of peace,” muttered Jimmy softly, “but down in that brush is
a half-naked war-whoop, without brains enough to know sic ’em. Mostly
always peace is like that, Pat. Ye never can tell by the label.”
Pat nodded absently, squinting across the coulée.
“Jimmy, look over at the bottom of the Pulpit. Look at the spot near
where the rock comes to the brush. See the place, which looks like the
corner of a building?”
“Aye,” grunted Jimmy. “Now what do ye suppose any man would want there?”
The tiny figure of a man was plainly visible, as he came down along the
side of the Pulpit. For a few moments he disappeared, as he entered a
heavy growth of brush, but reappeared again closer to the corner. At
that distance it was impossible to see just what he was doing, as he
blended with the rocks and foliage. But very soon he was retracing his
steps, going back toward the top of the ridge.
“That wasn’t the Injun,” declared Jimmy. “He could not get there so
soon.”
“Shall we go on down to the cabin?” asked Pat.
“I’ve a hunch to stop here a while,” smiled Jimmy, and added, “and
anyway, I’m goin’ down there alone, Pat.”
“I am going with you,” declared Pat.
“I’ve had little experience with women,” said Jimmy seriously, “but they
do tell me they’re not open to conviction, so I’ll not argue with any of
them.”
Jimmy looked back across the coulée. The figure of a mounted man was
riding down the right-hand side of the ridge, which led from the
pulpit—far enough back to conceal him from any one in the coulée, but
visible to Pat and Jimmy. They watched him finally ride down into the
coulée, far below the little cabin.
At times they could see him through the trees and brush, and it appeared
that he was crossing the coulée and heading toward them. He passed out
of sight into one of the draws on their side.
Jimmy turned and looked toward the head of the coulée. A wild range
steer, like a tiny silhouette, was trotting along the sky-line, and in a
few moments they were able to distinguish a horse and rider coming over
the sky-line behind the steer, but the rider came down the hill instead
of keeping to the sky-line.
“Some one else is comin’,” grunted Jimmy, pointing out the rider to Pat.
“We’ll be havin’ a quorum soon, I’m thinkin’.”
“Is it just a chance, or is there a reason, Jimmy?”
“I dunno, Pat. These two won’t meet. Anyway, it’s interestin’ to sit
here and make bugaboos and bloodthirsty men out of ordinary,
hard-workin’ range riders. Sure, I love to build me own heroes and
villains. It’s the Irish in me which loves to see a bomb behind every
bunch of chin-whiskers or to picture a colored waiter as a head-huntin’
Dyak, sneaking softly down through the steamin’ jungle, instead of a
perfectly harmless hired man, comin’ between tables with a bowl of
steamin’ mulligan.”
“You are a dreamer, Jimmy,” smiled Pat. “And still you whipped Bud
Deal.”
“Is he hard to whip?”
“They say he has never met his match with fists or a gun.”
“Well, now,” smiled Jimmy, “I shall try me best to be afraid of him.
Sure, I didn’t know about him.”
Pat looked at Jimmy and shook her head slowly.
“You will have to try real hard, I think. You had no trouble with Klooch
and you rode Whistler—and knocked Bud Deal down, when he started to draw
his gun.”
“He wasn’t lookin’ for it, Pat. Mebbe we’d make a real pretty fight—I
dunno. I’m sure I don’t—sh-h-h!”
The sound of a walking horse drifted to their ears. It was passing
between them and their horses, from the sound. Then, through an opening
in the brush, they saw Jeff Garvin, riding slowly. He had something in
front of him in the saddle. He passed out of sight, and a moment later
there was no sound from his horse.
Jimmy raised up slowly and motioned to Pat to remain where she was. He
wormed his way around through the brush for about fifty feet, where he
could see Garvin, sitting motionless on his horse and looking toward the
head of the coulée.
Jimmy turned his head. The other rider was coming slowly to the edge of
the coulée, and Jimmy recognized Bud Deal’s sorrel. He glanced back at
Garvin, who turned his horse back into the brush and dismounted. For the
space of a full minute he remained motionless. Just in front of him was
a small ravine, full of rocks and brush, and Garvin seemed to be
considering this spot. Finally he took what looked like a dirty canvas
sack and went over to this little ravine.
It took him some time to select a certain spot, after which he appeared
to conceal the sack. Then he got to his feet, gazed for a few moments
toward the horse and rider far beyond, and then went back to his horse,
where he waited until Bud Deal had disappeared in the brush.
Garvin seemed undecided about which way to go, but finally rode into the
brush, heading toward the spot where Bud had disappeared.
Jimmy slipped back to Pat and motioned for her to follow him. He told
her nothing; but led her to the little ravine, where, from under a pile
of rocks, which looked as if they had been in place for centuries, he
drew out the canvas sack.
“Our friend Garvin hid it,” grinned Jimmy, as he unwound the string and
peered inside. “Holy smoke! Would ye look at this, Pat?”
He opened the sack for her inspection, and she gazed wide-eyed at a
jumble of yellow-backed currency and minted gold. The sack would weigh
about twenty pounds, but the bulk of the money seemed to be in currency.
“What is it?” gasped Pat, staring at Jimmy.
“Unless me thoughts are wanderin’, that’s the money which was stole from
the train. The sheriff has your father and brother in jail for the deed,
while he goes around hidin’ it. Can ye beat that for inconsistency?”
Pat looked blankly at the money and Jimmy grinned up at her.
“I wonder if Garvin was one—sure, that was him at the foot of the
Pulpit. Now, I’m beginnin’ to see a bit clearer.”
“What will we do with it, Jimmy?” nervously.
Jimmy stood up with the sack in his hands, and looked around.
“We’ll shock Mister Garvin, I’m thinkin’. Come on.”
He led the way back to where they had sat, and picked a spot near the
edge, where he placed the sack under the side of a large granite
outcropping and covered it with other rocks. When he had finished the
job, no one would ever suspect that the rocks had been placed there by
human hands.
“Remember this place, Pat,” said Jimmy seriously. “Ye may have to find
it alone. We want that money to go back to its rightful owners.”
“Why will I have to find it alone, Jimmy?”
“I only say that ye may, Pat. Life is uncertain, ye know.”
“But this robbery does not concern you. There is no danger for you,
Jimmy—is there?”
“The good Lord only knows, and He ain’t exposin’ nothin’ to mortal man,
little Pat. Let’s quit arguin’ and do a bit o’ lookin’.”
They moved back to the rim of the coulée, where they could remain
concealed, yet be in a position to watch the whole sweep of country.
IX
Bud Deal was worried. He had intended to keep Pat and Jimmy in sight,
but had missed them; for the reason that they had swung around to the
right of the Pulpit. He had no idea of what he was going to do, but he
wanted to be sure what they did.
Something seemed to be pulling him down to the cabin. A premonition that
all was not well down there annoyed him. He did not want to run into Pat
and Jimmy, because it might be difficult to explain what he was doing
down there, when Frawley had sent him the opposite direction from the
Box M.
Bud’s conscience did not bother him over the shooting of the Indian. He
had loaded him on his horse, taken him back up the coulée and dumped him
in the brush down in a deep, dry water-course. Anyway, thought Bud, old
Jim was worthless, and his demise would save the price of many quarts of
liquor. Old Jim knew too much anyway.
Bud rode slowly down into the coulée, watching closely for any sign of
Pat and Jimmy. It was almost a sure thing that Devlin would not take Pat
with him when he tried to recover the missing money, so Bud felt fairly
safe in going down there. Suddenly he had a curiosity to take a look at
the Indian’s body and see if it was well-enough hidden.
He left his horse on the old cattle-trail and went on foot through the
brush to the edge of the deep wash-out, where he leaned over the edge
and peered down.
The Indian’s body was not there. Bud stepped back from the edge and
glanced quickly around. This was the place. He looked again, leaning
closer and examining the white boulders at the bottom. On one was a dark
stain.
Bud straightened up and leaned back against the trunk of a small tree.
Who had found the Indian? Did some one see the deed and remove the body?
For a moment Bud’s nerve oozed out of his finger-tips; but he snapped
back to normal, dangerous as a tiger.
He walked back to his horse, going softly as an Indian, his eyes
sweeping every inch of the woods. The blow of not finding the body of
his victim had dulled his sensibilities, but had sharpened his caution.
Some one knew.
He rode slowly down through the brush, gun in hand. Just before he came
out into the tiny clearing at the rear of the cabin, he drew up his
horse and watched. A pair of magpies flew from the corral fence and lit
on the peak of the cabin, where they fluffed their feathers and settled
down, as though for a stay.
Bud scowled. Magpies do not ordinarily perch on the top of an occupied
cabin, because the magpie is born with a fear of man—especially men who
carry guns. Bud rode out of the brush and the magpies streaked for the
trees, cackling loudly with fear. Bud dismounted at the door and went
inside through the open door.
The cabin was empty. The old stove had been upset and the box cupboard
had been wrenched from the wall. Blankets were strewn on the floor as if
they had been dragged from the bunk, and left where they fell. On the
floor near the bunk was the barrel and breech of a rifle, with the butt
missing. It had been broken off.
Bud looked foolishly around the room, and backed to the door, as if
afraid some one or something might materialize out of thin air and
confront him in that dim, disordered cabin.
He even backed away from the open door and went to his horse, his mind
in a turmoil. What had become of Whitey? Who had demolished things
inside the cabin? Where was the dead Indian? Bud shut his teeth hard and
tried to think calmly. Who would do this, and why?
His thoughts only ran in circles. He lifted his head and looked up at
the Devil’s Pulpit, where the eagle circled high above the top. Whitey
knew where that money was—and Whitey was gone. Bud spurred his horse
straight through the brush, regardless of thorn or tangle, and climbed
to the edge of the slide-rock, where he dismounted and scrambled on
afoot.
He had lost all sense of caution now, as he panted over the loose, flat
rocks, which slipped and tilted under the soles of his high-heeled
boots. The perspiration beaded his forehead and ran into his eyes, but
he clawed his way up to the apex of the Pulpit like a hunted animal
going to its den.
He flung himself flat against the rock, sank to his knees and clawed
inside the opening, where he had hidden the sack of money. It was not
there.
He shut his eyes and remained for a while, with his hand still within
the empty cavity in the rock. He slowly drew out his hand, turned his
body and slid to a sitting position, facing the coulée. For several
minutes he was as motionless as a figure of stone, his eyes staring
straight ahead, like the eyes of the blind, which are open, but see not.
* * * * *
His hand came up and slowly wiped the perspiration from his brow as he
reacted from the succession of shocks. Then Bud Deal cursed; cursed with
a withering flow of bitter profanity, directed at the unknown who had
done all this. His soul seemed to open and vomit curses, as a
machine-gun vomits bullets. It was not the slow bitter curses of defeat,
but the snappy, biting words, which seemed fairly to sear his lips.
Bud’s soul was at white-heat, and it showed in his half-closed eyes,
which seemed to flash, like tiny points of light.
He heaved himself to his feet and went stumbling and sliding back down
the hill to his horse, where he mounted. As he turned his horse to ride
toward the head of the coulée he saw a man ride into an opening in the
bottom of the coulée. It was Garvin, but Bud was unable to tell just who
it was. The man stopped and seemed to be watching down the coulée. He
did not see Bud up there in the shadow from the Pulpit.
Bud slowly drew his Winchester from the scabbard under his leg. It was
about four hundred yards to the man and horse, and Bud deliberately
screwed up the sight for that elevation. Bud’s sorrel turned its head to
one side, as it felt its rider lift the gun.
The sorrel was too well gun-broke to let its rider fire past its ears.
Bud drew down slowly until the ivory bead centered on the rider, and
pressed the trigger. The heavy report seemed to echo from the Pulpit,
like the double report of two shots, and rattled off through the cañon
like a clap of thunder.
The horse dropped forward, as if its forelegs had been cut from under
it, and the rider pitched forward over its head. Bud realized that he
had shot low, dropping the horse. The rider scrambled to his feet and
sprang for the cover of brush, while Bud shot again and again, until the
magazine of his rifle was empty. He knew that he was missing—that he was
shooting wildly.
He crammed shells into the loading-gate of his gun, whirled his sorrel
and rode through the brush, cutting down the hill to reach the bottom
below the cabin. He was not going to let that man get away alive if he
could help it.
* * * * *
Pat and Jimmy had not seen Bud until he fired the first shot. The cabin
was well screened from them; so they had not seen him ride down there.
His first shot had caused them to look across at the Pulpit, where they
could see him through an opening in the brush. Pat started to her feet
to try to see who he was shooting at; but Jimmy drew her down again.
“Don’t let any one see you,” he cautioned. “Never mind who he’s shootin’
at. From the shells he’s wastin’, I’ve an idea he ain’t doin’ so well as
might be wished for.”
“But what is it all about, Jimmy?” Pat’s eyes were wide with the wonder
of it all. “Who is Bud Deal shooting at?”
“I’ve no idea at all, Pat, unless it might be Mister Garvin, who
imitates a pack-rat by hidin’ stuff.”
“But why should Bud Deal shoot at him, Jimmy?”
Jimmy looked at Pat and she turned her head nervously, peering down into
the coulée.
“Are ye afraid for Bud Deal?” asked Jimmy softly.
She looked at him curiously.
“Afraid for him?”
“Aye.”
“Why, Jimmy.”
“He—he might get hurt, ye know.”
She bit her lip and looked back into the coulée, while Jimmy watched her
closely. Then she turned and looked straight into his eyes, as if trying
to read his thoughts.
“Jimmy, why is Bud Deal over here when he started for Squaw Creek?”
Jimmy grinned.
“Mebbe he lost his way.”
“Don’t joke with me. Why did you take that gun from under that
lumber-pile, where I hid it, and change the handles? What do you know
about that robbery?”
“I—I needed a gun,” stammered Jimmy, “and—and I hate them darned slick
pearl-handles.”
“All right,” said Pat evenly. “Now, what do you know about that
robbery?”
“Quite a lot.”
“How do you know quite a lot?”
“Because I was there,” grinned Jimmy.
“You?”
Pat leaned forward, wide-eyed.
“You were there?”
“Under the car,” nodded Jimmy. “I saw the men who did the job; but they
was masked. I’ll tell ye why I changed them handles, Pat.”
Jimmy reached in his hip-pocket and brought out the two pearl-handles.
From his watch-pocket he took out a small, triangular piece of pearl and
fitted it into the broken corner of one of the pieces of pearl.
“I seen one of ’em drop his gun,” explained Jimmy. “When they left I got
off the train, and I found this piece of pearl. I think the butt of the
gun hit a rock when it fell. I dunno why I picked it up.”
Pat looked dumbly at the piece of pearl and turned away, gazing across
the coulée.
“It was my dad’s gun,” softly. “I—I don’t know what to think.”
“Aye, but he wasn’t carryin’ it, Pat.”
“It was in his holster, hanging on the bedpost, when Garvin came for it
that day.”
“Sure it was; but the shells in that belt are all .41’s. Would he be
packin’ a .45 gun and .41 shells?”
“Jimmy, you say you saw these men? Was one of them a big man—bigger than
Garvin?”
“He was not.”
“Oh, Jimmy, can you swear to this?”
“Aye,” sadly. “But my oath wouldn’t be much good, Pat. The court would
not accept my testimony.”
“Why not?”
Jimmy shook his head slowly.
“Don’t ask me that. I’ll tell ye soon, I’m thinkin’—but not now.”
* * * * *
They both turned back to watching the coulée. There was no sign of Deal
or Garvin. A gust of wind seemed to set the whole coulée into action, as
it rippled the trees. Jimmy glanced up at the sky. Behind the Thunder
Range great clouds were rolling into view, which would soon blot out the
sun.
“We’re in for a wettin’,” declared Jimmy, pointing at the thunder-heads.
“She’s goin’ to pop things wide open in a short time, I’m thinkin’.”
“We are neither sugar nor salt,” smiled Pat, “and a little water will
not hurt us.”
Another gust of wind whirled down the coulée. The big eagle, which had
been sailing serenely around the Pulpit, suddenly tacked straight into
the wind, dropping lower and lower, until it blended with the rocky
butte.
Jimmy had been watching it. Suddenly he leaned forward and looked
closer. About fifty feet from the summit a figure came into view—the
figure of a man. Jimmy called Pat’s attention.
“That is the crazy Indian!” she exclaimed. “Look at him! He’s going
through the same actions as he was when we first saw him.”
It was true. He seemed to have moved forward a trifle, standing on a
ledge of rock, with arms outstretched, head thrown back, as if invoking
the storm. He was only a tiny figure, far away on the side of that
seemingly sheer cliff; but the clear atmosphere etched every line of him
clearly.
“What in the divil is he standin’ on?” queried Jimmy. “And how did the
poor old war-whoop get up there?”
For a full minute or more the Indian held the pose, while Pat and Jimmy
scanned the place to see how he got up there. Then the Indian seemed to
back into the cliff and disappear.
“Sure, he’s got a cave up there,” grunted Jimmy. “Did ye notice that his
body kinda went down when he backed up? The shelf of rock is tilted,
which masks the entrance to the cave.”
“But how does he get up there?” queried Pat.
“There’s a way, and it’s likely easy,” grinned Jimmy, “only nobody knows
it, except the Injun. Do ye know much of him, Pat?”
She shook her head. “Not much. He has been around here a long time. They
say he was a powerful man before whisky ruined his muscles. They say
that old Jim never broke his word to any one. Dad always said that Jim
was just as honest as a dollar.”
“He was takin’ care of my sick friend,” said Jimmy.
“Old Jim? Taking care—why, he’s insane!”
“Aye. The poor feller is in a little cabin down there in the brush. We
better hunt a shelter, Pat.”
The sun had already been blotted out and a low rumble of thunder seemed
to vibrate the earth. Forked streaks of lightning split the black mass
of storm clouds, which were sweeping swiftly toward them.
“We’ll go down to the little cabin, Pat,” said Jimmy. “It ain’t much,
but mebbe it will stop a bit o’ the downpour.”
They hurried to their horses and untied them. Whistler was terrified at
the storm, which was already flattening the brush around them.
Jimmy managed to mount, after he had helped Pat into her saddle; but
both horses flatly refused to face the storm, which was already into
them. Lightning seemed to play all around them, and the thunder was like
the jarring of mighty guns.
Jimmy pulled his hat low over his eyes and spurred the roan to the edge
of the coulée. Pat’s horse followed closely, almost crowding the roan
off its feet. The side of the coulée was steep and covered with rocks
and brush, with an occasional tree.
Straight down the hill, twisting and turning, went the two horses.
Around them wind howled, though as yet there had been no rain. Up near
the foot of the Pulpit a tall, dead tree snapped off like a match and
fell far down across the slide-rock.
Jimmy and Pat fought their way down the hill and reached the bottom some
distance below the cabin, just as the first gust of rain struck them. It
stung like hail and the horses swung around, with their heads away from
it. Another gust of stinging rain and then the downpour.
The world seemed blotted out in the whirl of the elements. Jimmy crowded
the roan in beside Pat and quickly knotted a rope around her horse’s
neck. He tried to tell her that he was doing that to keep them from
being separated, but the wind snatched the words from his mouth and he
could not even hear his own shouting.
Came a blinding flash of white light, which lighted the world as bright
as sunlight, and then a terrific crash, which fairly staggered the
horses. For a few moments the world seemed stilled. It was as if a giant
cannon had been fired and the gunners were watching for the effects of
the projectile. Then there came a dull roar, like the starting of a
giant engine.
Jimmy turned his head and tried to see what it meant. It sounded like
water now—the roar of a waterfall. He could hear the splash of it. Then
it broke out of the storm pall—a rushing river, white-crested in the dim
light.
“A cloudburst!” yelled Jimmy, spurring into Pat’s horse and swinging the
animal toward the side of the hill. “Ride like the divil, Pat.”
But the water was into them before they could get into action—at least
eight feet of it, compressed within the walls of that coulée and running
like a mill-race. Brush and trees seemed to rise out of it and fall
splashing, like some water animal playing. The horses and riders were
swept along with it. Jimmy swung in close to Pat to steady her in the
saddle. The only thing to do was to try and ride it out or to fight it
until the peak of the flood was past.
There was little left of the storm, which had done its damage and
hurried on. The lightning was almost as bright as before, but the
thunder showed that the main part of the storm was moving away fast. The
water and sky were almost black, and the floating débris made it
difficult for a horse to swim safely.
A bunch of connected logs almost drove into them, and Jimmy knew it was
part of the little cabin. Whitey must be drowned.
“Anyway,” he reflected, “he had to go soon—and time meant little to
him.”
“Jimmy!” cried Pat, leaning closer to him. “We’ve got to get out of
this! This cañon breaks off into a deep gorge down here, and if we go
over that——”
The wind swept away the rest, but Jimmy knew what she meant. It was a
bit lighter now and he could see that they were a little to the right of
the center of the flood, but there was quite a distance between them and
the higher ground of the side.
He managed to turn both horses almost around and start a fight to get
within reach of the bank. They could already hear the heavy roar of
water falling a long way and Jimmy knew they were but a short distance
above where the coulée dropped off into the deep gorge, which was
probably a tributary to Bitter River.
The horses were almost exhausted from their swim and were making little
headway toward the bank. Jimmy managed to take the lariat rope off Pat’s
saddle. He had snubbed the lead-rope of Pat’s horse to his saddle-horn;
and now he quickly knotted the end of the lariat around his own horse’s
neck, leaving the loop and the rest of the rope free.
Inch by inch they fought almost against the swiftly running flood,
working a trifle closer to the bank all the time. The world seemed
filled with roar of falling water. Pat’s wet face showed ashen, but her
jaw was set and she never looked back. Jimmy looked at the bank and back
at Pat.
“When I swing around, hammer the hide off your horse!” he yelled.
He whirled the Whistler toward the bank, but the current sent them
drifting again.
“Swim, ye outlaw divil!” yelped Jimmy, drawing himself up on the saddle,
where he knelt, rope in hand.
Fifty feet—forty feet—thirty! They were beginning to swing out again.
“Hold fast!” yelled Jimmy.
He threw out the coils of rope, slipped the loop around his arm and
sprang as far as possible toward the shore.
He went out of sight, but came up, fighting his way. His feet touched
bottom and he surged forward, half-choked. Out to waist-deep he went
before the horses took up the slack on the rope.
The shock threw him into the water, but he came up in shallower water,
braced taut against the rope. He could see that both horses had whirled
and were trying to face the water again. Foot by foot he fought his way
to the shore, straining every muscle. The looped rope cut his muscles
until his left arm seemed lifeless.
With a last despairing burst of power he ran knee-deep in water,
slackening the pull on the rope, but gaining the shore, where he flung
himself around a small tree, snubbing the rope tight.
Slowly the two horses drifted into the shore, swinging on the rope until
their feet touched bottom. For a few moments they shook and panted from
their efforts.
Jimmy managed to release his numbed arm and tried to stand up; but the
effort was too much, and he sat down beside the tree. Pat spurred the
horses up to him, leading the Whistler.
He looked up at her wearily and smiled foolishly.
“Little Pat, are ye all right?”
“All except one thing, Jimmy.”
“What’s that?”
“The eggs are all smashed.”
“Oh!” Jimmy looked back across the water and wiped his face with the
back of his hand. “Well, it’s just as well they are, Pat. Sure, the poor
divil won’t have any use for eggs now, I’m thinkin’.”
The roar of the falls seemed louder now and they looked at each other,
knowing what it would have meant.
“You saved my life, Jimmy,” said Pat simply.
“Mine, too,” grinned Jimmy. “I think we better go home and get some dry
clothes.”
He unfastened the ropes, climbed stiffly into his saddle and they rode
up the side of the coulée. The sun broke out suddenly and the world
sparkled again. Up above the Devil’s Pulpit the big eagle was soaring
again, and a mist seemed to float out of the depths. They reached the
top of the hill and stopped to rest their horses. Jimmy looked at Pat
and a smile spread over his homely face.
“Ye look like a drowned kitten, and I suppose I look beautiful meself.
There was one unfortunate thing about it, Pat.”
“What was that, Jimmy?”
“It isn’t Saturday night—bad luck to it.”
* * * * *
Garvin hadn’t the slightest idea who had fired the shot that killed his
horse, but he knew where the shots had been fired from. After he had
ducked into the brush he got a glimpse of a mounted man riding into the
brush near the foot of the Pulpit.
He could see that the rider was cutting down the hill, evidently with
the intention of intercepting him, in case he went on down toward the
cabin. Garvin was no such fool. He knew that the other man had a rifle,
and had the odds in his favor.
Garvin crossed back across the coulée, keeping in the deep cover, and
climbed up through the brush toward where the man had done the shooting.
It was slow, difficult going, as he wanted to keep concealed. He could
see the big storm coming and he thought he might stop in the shelter of
the Pulpit until it was over.
But when he had reached a point just beyond where Bud had turned from
firing the shots, he saw the horse and rider about two hundred yards
below him. Bud had dismounted and was working his way farther toward the
cabin, but staying up on the side of the hill. He was getting into a
position where he could command the clearing around the cabin. He had
not tied his horse, but had dropped the reins, which constituted a
tether to a range-broken horse.
Garvin chuckled to himself. By working carefully he could sneak down on
this man. The noise of the storm would cover his approach. A flash of
lightning and a sudden snap of thunder caused Bud’s sorrel to whirl
away, ignoring its training. Another crash, and the frightened horse
came running up the hill, straight for Garvin. A whirl of rain blotted
out the horse for a moment, but Garvin could see it was coming straight
to him. Brush and rocks impeded its progress, but Garvin would never
have been able to stop it, except for the fact that one of its fore-legs
tangled in the reins, almost throwing the animal.
Garvin clutched it by the headstall and succeeded in whirling it around.
Rain and wind tore into them and the horse reared and snorted, but
Garvin managed to get into the saddle and ride into the shelter of the
Pulpit.
A few moments later came the cloudburst. The Pulpit seemed to shake to
its very foundations, and small rocks rained off the ledges like hail.
Garvin spurred out into the open, braving the storm rather than falling
rock, and headed for Oxbow.
He knew this horse belonged to Bud Deal, and that Bud would, in all
probability, have to walk back to the Box M; but he needed the horse as
badly as Bud did. He felt sure that Bud suspected that he, Garvin, had
lifted the cache. He also felt sure that Bud would never dare accuse him
openly.
Flint and Wild Moore would get a hearing tomorrow and Garvin did not
care which way it went. He hated them both, but his suddenly acquired
wealth softened this a trifle. He would serve out his term and quietly
disappear. He could dispose of his holdings easily, which would alibi
him for having money. Taking it all the way around, Jeff Garvin was very
well satisfied with his day’s work.
Bud Deal had not missed his horse until he realized that the storm was
out of the ordinary, and went back to get the animal. Rain was blotting
out the landscape and he could see only a short distance. Luckily for
him he climbed higher, thinking perhaps the horse had gone up the hill,
and when the cloudburst came he was just above the rushing torrent.
He climbed still higher, fighting against the storm, until he reached
the crest of the hill to the right of the Pulpit. He knew that nothing
could live in that mad rush of water, and he laughed aloud to think that
the man who had lifted the cache was probably down there. He had shot
this man’s horse and had every reason to believe that this man was still
down in the bottom of the coulée. He hadn’t the least idea where Whitey
had gone. If Whitey was still in the coulée he would be drowned.
Whitey was physically unable to take the money and make a getaway. Bud
felt sure that the old Indian was dead, which removed him from any part
in the deal. Devlin had not had time to take the money and get away with
it. Frawley didn’t, because he was in Oxbow. There remained one
possibility—Garvin.
Garvin had done this! Bud clenched his teeth. He had divulged too much
to Garvin. Had Garvin found the body of the old Indian and was holding
it as a club over him? Bud waited for the storm to break, but could see
nothing of his horse.
It made things bad for him, because he would have to walk back to the
ranch and lie about the losing of the horse. He looked back toward the
coulée and scanned the dripping hills.
“That —— sorrel must ’a’ got caught in the flood!” he exclaimed aloud.
“I’ll have to invent a cloudburst in the Squaw Creek country, where I
lost my horse and saddle. Then I’ll sneak in here later on, find the
wreck of my saddle and plant the —— thing. If I only knew where Pat and
that danged boomer were I’d feel a heap easier in my mind.”
It might not be so hard to hoodwink the folks at the Box M, after all.
If that was Garvin down there in the coulée, there was a good chance
that he was dead now; but if he wasn’t—— Bud shook his head slowly and
stared into space from under his dripping hat-brim. He was going to kill
Garvin just as soon as possible.
X
Pat and Jimmy reached home several hours before Mrs. Moore and Jud
Frawley came back from town, and found dry clothes. Pat supplied Jimmy
with some of Wild’s clothes, which fitted a trifle snug. The rest she
dried out in a short time beside the bunk-house stove.
Garvin had appointed Pete Havez deputy, and Pete was in charge of the
office and jail when Jud and Mrs. Moore arrived. Pete was a saturnine
young man, who was ambitious to be known as a gunman.
Pete had been kicked from cow-ranch to cow-ranch until he grew too big
to stand for further kicking, and the balance of his education—his
post-graduate course, as it were—consisted of learning how to make a
hair-brand, mark playing-cards and draw a six-shooter.
Physically, Pete was not a marvel. His face was thin and dark, with
close-set black eyes, a nose, which had been classically Roman until a
cowpuncher tested its resiliency with a neck-yoke, and a mouth full of
very bad teeth. He was of medium height, slightly bowed in the legs and
had a peculiar shamble in his walk.
Pete had met them at the office door. Jud Frawley had known Pete for
years, and cared less for him every year. In fact, Jud had predicted
that Pete would be hanged, as soon as his body got heavy enough to break
his neck.
Jud made known their wants. Pete took them under advisement. He was not
a rapid thinker and back in his small brain lurked the feeling that
Garvin might not care to have Frawley talk to Flint Moore.
“Can’t do it, Jud,” he drawled slowly. “Nobody’s goin’ to talk to m’
prisoners.”
Pete gazed lovingly at his nickel-plated insignia of office, which was
placed prominently on his vest. The next instant a strong hand grasped
his collar, while another took up the slack of his overall-seat, and he
fairly looped the loop, landing upside-down in a corner of the office.
His gun flipped out of its holster and skated off across the floor.
“You got the keys to the jail, ain’t yuh?” asked Jud in a conversational
tone of voice.
Pete looked up at him and nodded dumbly. He got to his feet, tested
himself for possible dislocations and let them into the jail.
Pat and Jimmy laughed at Jud’s serious description of how Pete had acted
during the interview. They had told of the missing gun, and both Flint
and Wild declared that neither of them wore that .45 on that day. Wild
wore a .44 and Flint a .41. Neither of them had any idea where that .41
was now, and they also realized that their oath that neither had the
pearl-handled .45 on that day would not help them to any extent, in case
the gun was found and identified.
They found out that the hearing was to be held the next day, and unless
Garvin already had the gun, there would be no evidence to hold them any
longer.
Jimmy had cautioned Pat to make no mention of what they had seen that
day. Jimmy felt sure that Whitey was dead, and with him went all hopes
of establishing his innocence of the crime for which he had served time
in the penitentiary. Jimmy had intended getting a written confession
from Whitey, if possible. Now, there was no one in the world to help him
prove his innocence.
It was supper-time when Bud Deal arrived. He had circled the ranch to
come in from the direction of Squaw Creek. Frawley and Jimmy were
sitting on the ranch-house porch, when Bud showed up, limping from
blistered heels, a figure of dejection.
“What happened to you?” asked Frawley.
Bud sat down on the porch and eased his aching feet.
“Cloudburst. Caught me in one of them narrow Squaw Creek cañons and
drowned my sorrel. Dang near drowned me, too. Had to walk all the way
home.”
“Ain’t you been on the range long enough to keep out of cañons when a
storm is comin’?” asked Frawley.
“Aw, ——!” snorted Bud, getting to his feet. “How’d I know it was goin’
to bust so quick? Think I went down there to try and drown myself?”
Frawley continued to draw on his pipe, indifferently to Bud’s outburst.
Pat came to the door to call the men to supper. Bud stared at her, but
she turned and went back into the house. Jimmy was paying no attention
to Bud, who noticed that Jimmy was wearing a faded plaid flannel shirt,
which had belonged to Wild. It fit tight over Jimmy’s muscular body and
threatened to burst across the shoulders as Jimmy folded his arms and
looked up at Bud.
“Where did ye say that cloudburst was?”
Bud looked at Jimmy closely. What did this range-boomer know about the
cloudburst? Was he trying to catch him in a lie?
“Squaw Creek,” replied Bud and limped down toward the bunk-house.
Jimmy and Frawley watched him go inside and close the door.
“Where did you and Pat go today?” asked Frawley.
Jimmy grinned slowly.
“Would ye mind if I didn’t tell ye—now, Mister Frawley?”
Frawley squinted at Jimmy for a moment and put his hand on Jimmy’s knee.
“Smith, I reckon yore a square-shooter. Yuh ain’t got the face of a mean
_hombre_.” Frawley jerked his head toward the door and leaned closer. “I
been watchin’ you and little Pat, and I _sabe_ the fact that she cottons
to yuh, Smith—which ain’t yore name, no more than mine’s Goldberg.”
Frawley paused and seemed undecided just how to say what was on his
mind.
“You ain’t far enough removed from Ireland to get the name of Smith, but
that ain’t nothin’ against yuh. I’m Irish, too. Names don’t count. What
I want to know is this: Can yuh come clean to little Pat? Does that
borrowed name mean that yuh done somethin’ yuh hadn’t ought to ’a’
done—somethin’ that might hurt her?”
Jimmy was looking at Frawley, but now he turned and stared off across
the hills. Frawley noticed that his face was tense, his muscles set—like
a man watching a terrific struggle. For a full minute Jimmy did not
move. Then his body relaxed and he turned to Frawley with a smile.
“Mister Frawley, I’ll be goin’ away tonight. Between me and you, I can
say that I’ve done no wrong; but twelve men have said that I sinned
against society. It’s twelve to one, and I—I lose.”
“Can’t yuh prove nothin’?” softly.
“Not now. I’m glad ye spoke as ye did, Mister Frawley. I’ve said no word
to Pat that a brother wouldn’t have spoken to her. Me name is not
Smith—it’s Devlin.”
Frawley slowly took his pipe from between his lips.
“Devlin? The train-robber?”
“Devlin,” said Jimmy slowly, “the man they say robbed a train.”
For a while neither man spoke. Frawley got to his feet, as Pat came to
the door again.
“How many times do I have to call you to supper?” she demanded. “Have
you lost your appetites?”
Jimmy got to his feet as Pat turned back inside. Frawley held out his
hand to him.
“Devlin, I don’t believe them twelve men had the right dope. I’m pleased
to meetcha.”
They shook hands solemnly and went into the house.
* * * * *
Bud did not come to supper until the rest were almost finished. He tried
to make light of the loss of his horse and saddle. He would go back
there in a day or two and try to recover his saddle. He described in
detail the cloudburst and his fight for life, while Pat watched his face
closely. She knew that Bud lied about where the flood had happened, but
she did not know he had not been in the water. Jimmy was silent through
the meal and excused himself before the rest were finished. Frawley and
Mrs. Moore left the room and Bud and Pat were together.
“Were you ridin’ with that range-boomer today?” asked Bud.
Pat looked up quickly.
“What makes you think so?”
“Your horse and the Whistler look it,” grunted Bud just a trifle
sarcastically.
“Well, suppose we were?” challenged Pat.
Bud leaned across the table and lowered his voice.
“Yuh ought to find out a few things about a feller before yuh go ridin’
in the hills with him.”
“Yes?” Pat’s tawny eyes were half-closed as she looked straight at Bud.
“Suppose you tell me about him.”
“Yuh think I can’t?” Bud fingered his mustache nervously. “Mebbe you’d
like to know his name ain’t Smith? How would yuh like to know that
you’ve been ridin’ the hills with a paroled thief?”
Pat sprang to her feet and leaned across the table.
“I think you lie, Bud Deal!”
Bud laughed mockingly and shook his head.
“No, I don’t lie. That’s what we fought over. I found him out; _sabe_?”
Pat knew that Bud was telling the truth; but she did not want to believe
it.
“His right name is Jim Devlin,” said Bud gloatingly, as he got up from
the table. “Ask him if it ain’t.”
Pat had heard of Devlin. She turned slowly and went to her room, passing
Frawley, who had come to the door. Bud looked up at him. Frawley had
heard Bud expose Jimmy, and his blood boiled. He knew that Bud had
deliberately tried to hurt Pat, and that he had succeeded very well.
For a few moments the two men looked at each other. Neither spoke as Bud
walked past Frawley and went outside. Frawley crossed the living-room to
Pat’s door, which was open. Pat was standing beside her dresser, staring
at the wall, but she turned as Frawley came up.
“You heard what Bud said?” asked Pat.
“Uh-huh,” nodded Frawley. “Devlin told me who he was. Bein’ innocent and
bein’ able to prove it is two different things. He’s goin’ away
tonight.”
“Going away?” whispered Pat. “Tonight?”
“Uh-huh. I been thinkin’—kinda. He broke that Whistler horse to ride.
When yuh come right down to it, that horse don’t belong to anybody. My
saddle’s gettin’ kinda old, and I need a new one—kinda.”
Frawley scratched his chin.
“Hate to see a feller walkin’—kinda.”
“Jud Frawley,” said Pat softly, her eyes filling, “when God made you he
broke the mold. Do just as you please. I need a new saddle-blanket and a
bridle—kinda.”
Frawley half-smiled at her imitation of him and patted her on the
shoulder.
“Keep grinnin’, little Pat. Mebbe she’ll all come out in the wash.”
Jimmy was leaning on the corral fence, with Klooch and the puppy beside
him, as Frawley came out of the house. The Whistler, which had moved in
close and was nuzzling at Jimmy, snorted at the approach of Frawley and
walked away.
“Pat knows,” said Frawley. “Bud told her who you are.”
“That’s kind of him,” said Jimmy shortly.
“She said to give yuh that Whistler horse. There’s a saddle, a blanket
and a bridle yuh can have, Devlin.”
Jimmy looked quickly at Frawley.
“What’s the idea?”
Frawley lit his pipe and puffed violently for a moment.
“I think she expects yuh to come back—kinda. And she don’t want to have
yuh walk and get yore feet sore.”
“I hope she’s right,” Jimmy smiled sadly and patted Klooch. “It don’t
look very good right now, but ye never can tell. Anyway I’ve a memory of
two fine women and one square-shootin’ man. I’ll be goin’ now, I think.”
“Better wait until mornin’.”
“Why prolong it? Deal knows who I am, and if I stay I may not forgive
him for the tellin’ of it to—her.”
“Won’t yuh go and tell Pat good-by?”
“I’m thinkin’ it’s better this way, Mister Frawley. I’ll wait and say
hello, instead.”
XI
Whitey Allen painfully raised his head and looked at the figure huddled
at a tiny fire just beyond the mouth of the short cave. Beyond he could
see that twinkle of stars. He sank back and gazed up at the rock roof,
as he tried to connect up the events of the day. He knew he was in a
cave, but he had no idea where that cave was located.
He remembered that old Indian Jim had returned to the cabin, coming in
softly, like a hunting animal. Whitey was powerless for a minute. He
felt that Bud had killed the old Indian, but after the shock of seeing
him had passed he realized that the bullet had only shocked.
Old Jim was a horrible object. The bullet had struck him almost between
the eyes and had plowed its way around the side of his skull. The
Indian’s face and upper body was clotted with blood, his clothes nearly
all gone. Whitey spoke to him, but the Indian did not hear him. His eyes
were wild and he mouthed a language which Whitey had never heard.
He appeared to be hunting for some one. He would go to the door, look
out, and come back, searching the room. Suddenly he saw Whitey and
pounced upon him like a wild beast. Whitey was weak, but fought
desperately to break the clutch of the Indian. They crashed into the
wall, knocking down the cupboard and falling into the stove. Whitey
remembered little after this.
The Indian had taken him to a cave—but for what? Whitey realized that
his wound had broken open again and that he was much weaker than before
his fight in the cabin. He called to the Indian, who did not lift his
head. Whitey crawled painfully to the mouth of the cave and tried to get
to his feet.
“_Kopet!_” hissed the Indian. Whitey knew that kopet meant “stop!”
“What’s the matter with yuh, Jim?” asked Whitey.
“_Mesika_ sick—_Nika kloshe nanitsh._”
“I’m sick, eh?” muttered Whitey. “You take care of me?”
“_Kloshe!_” grunted the old Indian.
Whitey studied the silent figure for a while. He felt sure that old Jim
was crazy from the shock of the bullet. He had known old Jim slightly,
but Bud had known him for years. Bud had told him that old Jim never
broke his word. Bud had told old Jim to take care of Whitey—told him to
stay with him all the time.
Now, the old fellow had been knocked silly from the pistol shot, and the
only remaining instinct in his brain was to guard Whitey. This did not
please Whitey, who had no desire to live in a cave with a crazy
aborigine. He was too weak to stand, so he tried to crawl out and see
where he was.
Old Jim pounced upon him like a flash and dragged him back into the
cave.
“_Kopet!_” hissed the old buck.
Whitey was willing to stop. Old Jim was far from gentle in his handling.
He went back to hump over his fire, while Whitey sprawled on the floor
of the cave and watched the tiny flicker of the fire on the rocky points
of the cave roof.
Whitey had gotten to a point where he hardly cared what happened to him.
Many things he had forgotten. It took him some time to remember where
that money had been hid, and he wondered if it was still there. Somehow,
he did not care so much. He was glad that Bud, instead of himself, had
killed the fireman. Whitey did not want to die a murderer.
While Whitey dozed and the Old Indian sat humped up over his tiny fire,
Jimmy Devlin came across the hills toward the Devil’s Pulpit. It was his
intention to cut across into Silverbend County, probably to Cottonwood.
He followed the route taken by Pat and himself and came out to the edge
of the coulée almost at the place where they had remained concealed. For
a long time he sat on his horse, living over the events of the day. Just
a short distance to his left was the hiding-place of enough money to
enable him to live comfortably, but he did not want it.
He knew that Pat would see that it was returned to its rightful owners.
The Devil’s Pulpit loomed blackly against the stars. Suddenly there came
a tiny gleam of light against the side of the cliff, like the light of a
candle. Several times it flared up, only to die down again, leaving the
side of the cliff a wall of darkness.
“It’s that old Injun’s light,” muttered Jimmy aloud. “I wonder what he’s
doin’ up there.”
Whistler moved uneasily, trying to look back. Jimmy turned in his
saddle. Between him and the brush a pair of eyes seemed to glow like
yellow fire. Jimmy stared at them for quite a while, but they did not
move.
“Klooch!” breathed Jimmy softly, and the shape of the wolf-dog trotted
out of the dark and up beside the horse, where it stood and peered
across the coulée.
“Klooch, why did ye come?” asked Jimmy. “Will I have to take ye back, I
wonder?”
He dismounted and sat down on a rock beside Klooch, running his hand
through her ruff and over her muzzle.
“I’m thinkin’ I’ll keep ye, Klooch. They’ve no use for you back there.
We’ll be a fine three, I’m thinkin’. A wild horse, a wolf-dog and a
paroled thief.”
Klooch pulled away from him and looked at the Pulpit, where the light
sparkled again. She growled deep in her throat and lay down beside him.
“Ye don’t like it, eh?” grunted Jimmy. “Well, we’ll wait for mornin’ and
see about it. None of us three are in any hurry, ’cause we ain’t goin’
no place.”
He loosened the saddle-cinch, tied the Whistler to a scrub snag and sat
down to wait for daylight.
At intervals the light flared, as old Jim placed fresh fuel on the
flames. When the first hint of dawn came he looked at Whitey, sprawled
on the rocks, and slipped silently away.
Whitey had been waiting his chance and as soon as the Indian disappeared
he crept to the ledge. He realized that he was over half-way up the
Pulpit. Apparently the rock broke sheer below him, and there was no way
of going up to the top of the Pulpit. Beyond him, to the left, was a
narrow ledge.
He crawled out on this and peered down. Suddenly the old Indian appeared
at the foot of the cliff and shambled away into the brush. Whitey
crawled around this ledge and in behind a spire of rock, where he found
another cavelike place—a sort of chimney, angling downward. It was a
place of easy descent for a normal person, but Whitey was far from
normal. Every move was torture.
There was a strong possibility that he would fall and perhaps kill
himself; but he reasoned that even that was better than being cooped up
in a cave with a crazy Indian. He slid his legs over the opening and
started down.
It seemed hours until he came to the lower opening, where he came out
into daylight. A series of ledges, like giant steps, seemed to lead down
a wide crevice, masked with brush and scrubs. Utterly exhausted, he
dragged himself over the slide-rock and into the brush just before the
old Indian came through the small opening and back up the route to the
cave.
Whitey saw old Jim disappear into the crevice, and he knew it would only
be a short time until he would be hunted. Whitey’s one idea was to
escape the Indian, but he also wanted to take that money—or at least his
half of it.
Dragging himself as a wounded animal might, he got to the point of the
rock, where Bud had told him the money had been cached. The place was
there, as described, but the money was gone. Whitey turned, his back to
the rock, and huddled down while the insane Indian, like a hunting-dog,
followed him unerringly.
Whitey made no effort to escape. He was half-conscious when the Indian
picked him up, as a man might pick up a child, and started back to the
cave with him.
* * * * *
Jimmy had seen the Indian leave the cave and go the length of the narrow
ledge, where he disappeared. Later he had seen him appear at the foot of
the cliff and go into the brush. He had not seen Whitey, because Whitey
had crawled instead of walking.
Jimmy was curious to know why the Indian was living up there and keeping
a fire burning through the night. He rode down the hill and into the
coulée with Klooch leading the way. The cloudburst had swept the coulée
clean of down-timber, and not a stick was left of the little cabin. The
brush was flattened and mud-filled, which made it look like the bed of a
river.
Jimmy rode to the edge of the slide-rock and tied the Whistler to a
tree. He climbed up to the clearing where he had seen the Indian. Klooch
cast about with her nose to the rocks and growled deep in her throat.
The Indian scent was strong, and Klooch hated Indians. Straight to the
foot of the broken ledges led the wolf-dog, with Jimmy sliding and
slipping behind her.
Klooch stopped only long enough to see Jimmy was coming and started on
up the rock. Where an ordinary dog would have balked, Klooch sprang and
clawed her way up. She stopped at the mouth of the chimney and sniffed
inside, hackles erect. Jimmy panted up to her and they both investigated
the thing.
“Sure, we’ve got to play Santa Claus,” grinned Jimmy. “Can ye climb a
stovepipe, Klooch?”
Jimmy made a move to go inside, but Klooch sprang in ahead and began
clawing her way upward. Jimmy helped her at times, but she needed little
help. Twisting and turning they came to the opening behind the spire and
beheld the ledge, which extended around the corner. An odor of fire and
roasting meat came to their nostrils.
Jimmy tried to make Klooch follow him, but she moved out ahead, where he
could not pass her.
“Then take it easy,” whispered Jimmy. “Go slow.”
Klooch seemed to sense the need of caution, for she crept lower along
the ledge, ears back as if ready for a rush.
“You’re a he-man’s dog, so ye are,” reflected Jimmy, loosening the gun
in his holster. “I’d rather be backed by the likes of you than by many
men I know.”
Straight ahead they went, slowly. Klooch fairly crawled on her belly
now, and Jimmy hugged the narrow ledge. He could look straight down into
the big coulée and it seemed a mile down to the tips of the trees. The
circling eagle cast a shadow across the ledge, and Jimmy glanced up at
it, high above him.
Suddenly the ledge widened a trifle and Jimmy turned his back from the
wall. Just in front of him was the wider part of the ledge in front of
the cave, and standing almost within reach of him was the insane Indian.
He was looking at Jimmy, and apparently oblivious of the wolf-dog
between them. He had a heavy hunting-knife in his hand, with which he
had been cutting up a rabbit, which was sizzling on the small fire.
There was little about the old Indian to make any one believe he was
even part human, except his shape. His face seemed entirely animal, and
had not been washed since Bud had shot him. The upper part of his body
was nude and was streaked with dried blood and yellow dirt from the
muddy coulée. His hair seemed to stick out like a roach, except where it
was plastered tight to his head.
Only for a moment did he stare at Jimmy, and then, with a grunt, like an
enraged animal, he sprang toward him. As the Indian leaped Klooch shot
straight into him, fangs bared and without a sound. They seemed to meet
in mid-air and lock together. Into them came Jimmy with a rush, grasping
the Indian’s knife-hand in time to save the dog, and the three of them
went down in a heap, almost off the edge.
The Indian’s head struck the rock and fairly rebounded; but it took all
of Jimmy’s strength to hold him down, even after he was knocked
half-unconscious. Jimmy managed to turn him over on his face and to tie
his hands with the short rope that the Indian used in place of a belt.
Klooch watched the operation closely and only moved back when the Indian
was rolled over on his back, helpless. Jimmy stood up and wiped the
perspiration from his brow. Klooch was moving into the cave, growling
deep in her throat, and Jimmy followed her in to where Whitey lay on his
back, looking blankly up at him.
“Whitey!” exclaimed Jimmy wonderingly. “Whitey, I thought ye was dead!”
Whitey’s eyes told him that he was not dead, but his lips barely moved
and an unintelligible mumble came from his throat. Jimmy picked him up
and carried him to the ledge, where he laid him down near the old
Indian.
Whitey revived enough to turn his head and look at the Indian, and a
sigh of relief came when he could see that the old man was a captive.
Jimmy sat down and rolled a smoke, which he lighted and gave to Whitey,
who thanked him with his eyes as he puffed slowly.
The Indian glared at Jimmy like a trapped animal as he strained at his
bonds. Klooch watched the Indian closely, ready to throttle him if he
attempted to get up. Whitey shifted to an easier position and looked at
Jimmy.
“How did yuh find me?” he whispered weakly.
“Trailin’ the Injun,” smiled Jimmy.
“Oh, that —— Injun!” Whitey’s voice seemed thin and querulous, as if he
had suffered much. “Jimmy, he’s as crazy as a loon. Picks me up and
slams me all around. He carried me up here.”
“How do ye feel, Whitey?”
“I’m all through, Jimmy. Blood poison, I think.”
“Blood poison?” echoed Jimmy. “Did ye get cut?”
“Shot,” whispered Whitey. “Shot in the lungs.”
“The divil ye are! Well, now ye need a doctor, old-timer; but how am I
to——”
Whitey shook his head.
“No use, Jimmy. I’m numb all over and I wouldn’t last that long. I want
to see the sheriff, though.”
Whitey’s jaw set and he tried to shift his body, but the pain was too
great.
“Jimmy, I’ve been double-crossed, and I want to save a man who was awful
good to me. I’m afraid—I—can’t—make—it—though.”
“Whitey, I—I want ye to square me with the world, if ye can. It can’t
harm ye to let the world know that I did not hold up that train, and it
will do me a lot of good.”
“God knows I want to, Jimmy,” whispered Whitey eagerly. “You’re the
squarest man I ever knowed. You gave me a chance, pardner—a chance that
a saint would never have given me, and—and I lied to you. Jimmy, I
lied!”
“Lied to me?”
“Yes. I wasn’t dying from consumption, Jimmy. I lied to yuh, because I
knowed you’d help me. You always helped others. I went to work for the
Box M outfit, while you was in jail.
“I was afraid to touch that money I had hid under the floor of the old
cabin. I heard that you had died in prison, and it almost drove me crazy
thinkin’ about it. I—I got drunk and bragged about finding money under
the cabin floor.”
Whitey’s voice croaked to a stop and he shut his eyes. Jimmy thought for
a moment that Whitey had passed on, but he recovered.
“Wild Moore got the money, Jimmy. He didn’t know who it belonged to. He
went to Cottonwood, where he made a killin’ at roulette. I knew he got
it, and I told him so. Wild was square about it, and gave me back the
original money. It’s cached under the bunk-house floor at the Box M.”
Whitey’s voice drifted to a weak whisper again. “Bud Deal and I stole
the cattle that Wild was arrested for. We knew they couldn’t cinch him.
Bud Deal shot the Injun and cached the body, but I reckon the bullet was
too soft or the old buck’s head was too hard. Gawd, I wish he’d let me
alone, Jimmy.”
“Who double-crossed ye, Whitey?” asked Jimmy.
“Bud Deal. We—” Whitey seemed to be groping for words. “We robbed a
train. I—I got shot—Bud—shot—fireman. I—I—Jimmy, Bud lifted the
cache, —— his sneakin’ soul! Have yuh got a pencil and paper, Jimmy? I—I
can’t live long and I—want—to—write—it—out.”
Jimmy searched his pockets, but he knew it was useless. He had paper,
but no pencil.
“Have ye no pencil, Whitey?”
Whitey shook his head weakly.
“No, Jimmy.”
He seemed to slide lower in the rocks and his eyes closed wearily. Jimmy
shook him, but there was no response. Klooch sniffed at him and turned
away.
Jimmy sat down on his heels and considered his next move. Whitey was
dying, and with his death would go all hope of clearing the Devlin name.
He realized that he could not carry Whitey around that cliff and down to
the horse. The old Indian had twisted on his side and was staring at
Jimmy, with flat, lack-luster eyes.
“What you talk?” asked Jimmy. “_Sabe_ English?”
The Indian did not even blink. Jimmy was not familiar with the different
Indian tongues, but he did know a little of Chinook, the trade-language.
“_Kumtuks Chinook?_” he asked.
The Indian blinked and hissed—
“_Kwish!_”
“Ah-ha!” grunted Jimmy. “_Kwish_, eh? If I ain’t mistaken, that means ye
refuse to have anythin’ to do with me. Now, me high-toned laddie-buck,
I’m bossin’ this perch, and if ye don’t do me biddin’ ye’ll be shakin’
hands with some of your happy-huntin’ ancestors.”
Jimmy stepped over, picked up the Indian’s knife and cut his bonds. The
Indian sat up and flexed his arms, while Jimmy leaned against the rock
wall, his .45 set at his hip. He was taking no chances this time. The
Indian got to his feet and looked around. Klooch crouched a few feet
away, blocking the Indian from the exit.
“_Lolo!_” snapped Jimmy, pointing at the unconscious Whitey. The Indian
stared at Jimmy and at Whitey.
“_Lolo,_” he clucked. “_Lolo?_”
Jimmy nodded.
“That means ‘to carry,’ don’t it? Well, go ahead and carry him down out
of this.”
“_Hyak lolo!_” snapped Jimmy impatiently.
Without a word the old Indian picked Whitey up in his arms, slung him
across his shoulder and started along the ledge, with Klooch going ahead
and Jimmy carefully bringing up the rear.
It was a strange procession around the narrow ledges and down the
chimney. Klooch never failed to watch the Indian, who, even with his
burden, was able to travel faster than Jimmy. The Indian blocked the
light from below so completely that Jimmy was forced almost to feel his
way down the chimney, and he had barely got into it before the Indian
and Whitey disappeared out the bottom.
Jimmy knew that the Indian had the start of him, and he skinned knee and
elbow in his rapid descent. He landed at the bottom in a shower of
rubble and jumped out onto a ledge, where he could look down.
The Indian had reached the bottom of the cliff, with Whitey, and now he
started to run for the brush, going straight toward Whistler, who was
tied in plain sight.
But the Indian made a great mistake when he started running. If he had
walked he might have reached the horse, but the minute he started
running Klooch knew that something was wrong. She had been undecided
what to do, but now she ran angling with the Indian, flashed between his
legs and threw him spinning. Before he could get up she was on him,
pinning him down, her fangs at his throat.
Whitey was almost flung into the brush and seemed to collapse, like a
dummy figure, cast aside. Jimmy hurried down over the stone steps and
went to Whitey. He was still alive. In the fall his forehead had come in
contact with a sharp rock, which did not improve his condition to any
great extent. He was still unconscious.
Jimmy went over to the Indian. Being thrown into the slide-rock had not
helped him physically but the sullen glare seemed to have left his eyes
and a look of half-intelligence had taken its place.
“Whisky!” he grunted.
Klooch surged forward at the sound of his voice, but Jimmy drew her
aside. The Indian got to his feet and felt tenderly of a skinned elbow.
He looked at Jimmy and at Whitey and mumbled something under his breath.
“What did ye say?” asked Jimmy.
“_Halo kumtuks_,” he replied slowly, shaking his head.
“You don’t understand, eh?” grunted Jimmy. “Well, me red-corpuscled
friend, I’m glad ye’ve got to a point where ye’ll admit it. Bud Deal
came near knockin’ the _kumtuks_ out of ye for good. You _sabe_ Bud Deal
_mamook poh mesika_?”
The old Indian stared at Jimmy for a moment and then slowly touched his
hand to his forehead.
“Bud Deal?” he asked, half-clucking, half-hissing the English name.
“Sure he shot ye,” nodded Jimmy, and pointed at the horse and at Whitey.
“Put him on the horse. You _sabe_? _Lolo kiuatan_.”
The Indian limped over to Whitey, picked him up in his arms and
approached Whistler. Jimmy soothed the animal, while the Indian placed
Whitey on the saddle.
“Now, that’s the —— of it all!” grunted Jimmy. “He won’t stay on and
I’ve no rope.” Jimmy scratched his head for a moment. “The Whistler will
likely pitch like the divil, with two on his back; but mebbe I can hold
him down until he gets used to it.
“_Mesika klatawa kopa kiuatan_.” This to the Indian, ordering him to
ride on the horse.
Jimmy held Whistler tight while the Indian crawled on behind the saddle,
steadying Whitey as he got on. The half-broke outlaw surged and humped
its back wickedly, but Jimmy held its head tight, talking soothingly.
The nature of the ground precluded any chance for Whistler to buck, and
cause serious injury to himself, and after a few moments, Jimmy led the
way around the base of the Devil’s Pulpit, leading the horse by the
reins, while the old Indian rode behind the saddle with both arms around
the unconscious Whitey. Beside the horse paced the wolf-dog. Straight
across the hills they went, heading for Oxbow—twelve miles away.
XII
Bud Deal knew nothing about Jimmy’s departure from the Box M, as no one
had taken him into his confidence regarding the matter. Bud wondered why
Jimmy was not sleeping in the bunk-house. He thought perhaps it was
because he had been exposed as a thief and preferred to sleep elsewhere.
The next morning Bud discovered that Whistler was not in the corral and
that Jimmy did not show up for breakfast. Pat did not eat breakfast with
the rest. Mrs. Moore seemed preoccupied and Frawley ate silently, except
to ask Bud to harness the buggy team for them.
Bud’s nerves were getting frayed. He finished his meal and looked up to
find Frawley staring at him rather quizzically.
“Where’s Smith?” asked Bud.
Frawley’s eyes did not shift from Bud’s face as he replied.
“Yuh mean Devlin, don’t yuh?”
Bud glanced up at Mrs. Moore. She was not looking at him. He looked back
at Frawley.
“Well?”
“Devlin,” said Frawley slowly. “Devlin went away last night.”
“Where to?”
“He didn’t say where he was goin’.”
“Rode Whistler, didn’t he?”
Frawley nodded and shoved back from the table.
“You hitch up the team for the women. Me and you will ride horseback.
That hearin’ is today and they’ll likely want us both there. —— shame to
keep folks in jail until some poker-playin’ judge gets time to decide
whether they’re guilty enough to be tried or not.”
“Aw, they’ll likely get loose,” grunted Bud, as he got up from the
table. “If Jeff Garvin had twice as much sense he’d be half-witted.”
Bud went down to the corral and Frawley turned to see Pat standing in
the doorway. She was dressed for the trip.
“Did he say anything?” asked Pat, and then added, “Devlin?”
Frawley shook his head.
“No, he said it was better not to, little Pat. Did yuh notice that
Klooch is gone?”
“I wonder if she followed him?” mused Pat aloud. “He was the only human
being she ever showed affection for, and I—I hope she did go with him,
Jud.”
Frawley nodded.
“I sure hope she did. Bud will be here with the team in a minute.”
The ride to Oxbow was uneventful. Pat drove the buggy team, while
Frawley and Bud rode behind them over the rough road. Frawley noticed
that Bud was wearing a shoulder-holstered gun in addition to the one in
the holster at his hip. It looked to Frawley as if Bud was looking for
or expecting trouble.
Bud was riding a buckskin horse, a short-coupled animal, and a very
plain stock saddle. He missed the feel of his dancing sorrel and the
ornate saddle to which he had been accustomed.
Pat drove the team into the livery-stable, but Bud and Frawley
dismounted at a hitch-rack, where a number of horses were already tied.
There were more than the usual number of saddle-horses and vehicles at
the racks, caused no doubt by the trial. A cowboy rode in behind Bud and
dismounted.
“How are yuh, Bud,” he called, but Bud did not hear him.
“‘Chuck’ Ames yellin’ at yuh,” said Jud Frawley, and Bud turned his
head.
“Howdy, Chuck.”
“Been tradin’ horses with Garvin?” asked Ames.
Bud squinted at the cowboy, who was loosening his saddle-cinch.
“Whatcha mean, Chuck?”
Ames removed his hat and wiped his brow.
“Just wonderin’, thassall. I seen Garvin ridin’ yore sorrel into town
yesterday.”
“My sorrel?” Bud looked at Frawley and back at Ames. “Yuh must ’a’ been
seein’ things, Chuck.”
“Yeah? Reckon I know that sorrel kinda well, don’t I? The danged thing
cost me two months’ wages, when I bet that ‘Blondy’ Woods’ black mare
could beat him. Anyway, I’m bettin’ it was yore sorrel, and yore saddle.
I’d know that dew-dadded saddle anywhere.”
Bud said nothing. Frawley turned and went toward the sidewalk, while
Ames fished out the makings of a cigaret and rolled a smoke.
“I’d sure know that sorrel and saddle,” repeated Ames as he licked the
edge of the cigaret paper.
“——!” snapped Bud and started across the street.
Ames looked after him, an amused smile on his lean face.
“Whatcha know about that?” he grunted aloud. “Reckon I kinda rubbed the
Box M dude the wrong way. And he’s packin’ two guns, too. Hm-m-m!”
Ames shook his head and turned toward the nearest saloon.
Bud was growing desperate. He had lied about the loss of his horse and
saddle never thinking for a moment that Garvin had taken it. The whole
thing was plain to Bud now. He had killed Garvin’s horse in the coulée,
and Garvin had taken his sorrel. Garvin had taken that money, too.
Bud turned into the nearest saloon and got a drink. He was not a
drinker, but he needed bracing. Pete Havez was in the saloon, idly
fingering a deck of cards. He watched Bud take several drinks alone, and
also got a glimpse of the extra gun inside Bud’s unbuttoned vest. Pete
knew that when a man as well acquainted as Bud Deal was drank straight
whisky silently and alone, it meant that he was priming himself for
trouble.
Therefore Pete slid out of the place and went to find Jeff Garvin. He
found Garvin in the Cheyenne saloon, leaning on a bar, talking with some
cattlemen. Garvin was slightly intoxicated and in very good spirits. He
caught Pete’s signal from the doorway and came out as soon as he could
get away.
“Bud Deal’s in town,” said Pete. “He’s drinkin’ whisky all alone and
he’s got two guns on him. Got a shoulder-holster on under his vest.”
“Yeah?” Garvin shoved his sombrero back on his head and looked
quizzically at his new deputy. “Did he say anythin’, Pete?”
“He ain’t talkin’ to nobody,” declared Pete. “Kinda makes yuh feel that
he’s a rattler, without rattles.”
Garvin grinned widely. He had drunk just enough to make him reckless.
“Suppose he’s huntin’ trouble with me, Pete?”
“I dunno, Jeff; what do you reckon?”
“I reckon,” said Garvin, pulling his hat down over his brow, “I reckon I
better find out.”
“Better do some thinkin’ first,” advised Pete; “Bud Deal’s —— fast with
a gun.”
Garvin seemed to consider this worthwhile advice. He was not sure that
Bud knew of the lifted cache or not; but the chances were good that he
did. He did not doubt that Bud knew he had taken the sorrel. Taking it
all in all, Bud had reasons to hunt trouble with him.
“Deal ain’t gittin’ drunk, but he’s likely gittin’ plum bad,” offered
Pete.
“Cinch,” grunted Garvin. “You watch him, Pete. Kinda move around with
him, if yuh can, and if he gets too danged ornery we’ll snub him up
tight.”
Pete grinned and nodded. He loved a task of this kind. It savored of
real detective work, and also might offer him a chance to prove that he
was some adept with the short gun himself. Pete got a drink at the next
saloon and went hunting for Bud Deal.
He had no desire to face Bud in battle, but—if he could down Bud in a
fight it would be the makings of him as a gunman. The “if” loomed large
in front of Pete, and he decided to take things easy.
Bud Deal came out of the saloon door as Pete came down the sidewalk.
Bud’s hat was pulled low over his eyes and he stood in the middle of the
sidewalk, hands on his hips. Pete’s rapid walk slowed down as he neared
Bud, and he turned to go into the door. But Bud stepped in front of him.
“Yuh found Garvin, did yuh?” rasped Bud.
“Gug-Garvin?” stammered Pete nervously.
“Yuh went out to find him,” declared Bud, “and yuh wouldn’t ’a’ come
back unless yuh found him.”
Pete’s eyes glittered dangerously, but he made no move. They were so
close together that the first shot would not save its shooter unless it
was instant death.
Suddenly Bud’s left hand shot out and caught Pete by the shoulder,
yanking him sidewise, and a fraction of a second later Bud’s right fist
hooked into Pete’s jaw, knocking him backward against the building.
Bud stepped into him, yanked Pete’s gun from its holster and tossed it
into the middle of the street. Before the dazed deputy knew what was
going on he was kicked into the street, where he fell flat on his face
in the dust.
Bud turned on his heel, settled his hat more securely over his eyes and
went down the street, while Pete sat up in the street and sneezed the
dust out of his nose and mouth. He felt of his holster and looked
foolishly around. Just beyond him lay his six-shooter.
He limped out to it, put it in its holster and went toward the sheriff’s
office, holding his jaw in one hand and caressing the slack of his pants
with the other. He knew that his stealthy getaway from the saloon and
his sudden return had told Bud where he had been. He decided that Bud
was not only a dangerous fighter, but had brains as well.
Whisky seemed to have no effect on Bud, except to make him more cool. He
had made up his mind that he was never going back to the Box M ranch. He
could not explain the loss of his horse to them, without admitting that
he lied. He gazed into an empty glass, eyes half-shut, and pondered the
situation. He felt that there was a decided break between himself and
Pat. There would not be enough evidence to hold Flint and Wild, and when
they got back some one would be let out—and that some one would be he.
He was sure that Whitey was dead, which removed some worry from his
mind. Garvin had taken the money. Who had removed the dead Indian? Bud
filled his glass again and drank it in a single gulp. Should he kill
Garvin? He took out a silver dollar and glanced at both sides. Why not
let the dollar decide?
He flipped the dollar with his thumb. It clattered on the bar and rolled
off the opposite side. The bartender stepped in close and glanced down.
“See which side’s up!” growled Bud.
The bartender grinned widely.
“Can’t be done, pardner; it fell in the wash-tub.”
Bud whirled on his heel and started for the door.
“Yuh got four-bits comin’,” yelled the bartender, but Bud went on out,
while the bartender rolled up his sleeve and searched for the money.
“Every —— thing goes against me!” snarled Bud aloud as he got outside.
“Mebbe I better go easy.”
The click of poker-chips, the call of the dealer lured him into the
Telluride barroom and gambling-parlor, where he appropriated a seat and
bought chips. He lost twenty dollars in two hands and drew out of the
game.
He had began to grow irritable. Bud was not naturally an optimist, and
he fell an easy prey to extreme pessimism. He had a few more drinks, but
whisky only dulled his nerves more and made his outlook a dreary indigo.
He imagined that the whole world was against him and he laid his plans
accordingly.
He would meet Garvin and force him to tell where that money was. Yes, he
would likely kill Garvin after he had all this information, but that was
a mere incident. He could take that money and fade out of the country.
He wondered why he didn’t do that before.
He went into a restaurant and ordered a meal, but his appetite deserted
him and he left after drinking a cup of strong coffee. He met Pat and
Mrs. Moore, but did not speak to them. Pat turned and looked curiously
at him. A little farther on he met Frawley.
“Time to go up to the courtroom, Bud,” said Frawley.
“Court-room?” queried Bud absently. “Oh, yeah. Funny I forgot about it.
When did yuh come in, Jud?”
Frawley half-smiled. He knew that Bud was drunk and had forgotten that
they had ridden in together.
“Goin’ up now?” asked Frawley.
Bud stared vacantly at him and nodded. They walked to the courthouse and
went upstairs.
* * * * *
Quite a crowd had already gathered in the courtroom. Men spoke to
Frawley and Bud, calling them by their first names. Frawley replied to
the greetings, but Bud ignored them all. They went to the front of the
room and took seats inside the railing, where Bud humped over, elbows on
knees, and stared at the blank wall.
The place filled up in a short time. Dave Cleland, the prosecutor, came
in and sat down beside Frawley. Bud merely glanced at him. Mrs. Moore
and Pat arrived and sat down near. Another man came, a stranger. He was
tall and thin, with gray hair and a heavy mustache, and wore “store”
clothes. He sat down inside the railing. Bud lifted his eyes and looked
at him. It was the engineer of that train.
He merely glanced at Bud, but to Bud it was a glance filled with
meaning. Bud set his jaw and humped lower. He reviled himself for being
a fool. He should have known that the engineer would be there. Suddenly
he almost laughed aloud at the thought of the engineer being able to
identify either of the two robbers. They had been heavily masked. Bud
shook his head. He must be losing his reason—getting nerves.
Suddenly there came a stir in the room as the big, gray-haired judge
came out of his chamber and sat down at his desk. Oxbow had no police
judge before whom men might have a hearing; and it required that they be
held until the arrival of the circuit judge.
Bud watched the door through which the prisoners would come, and his
hand unconsciously loosened the pistol in his belt. The room had grown
very quiet. The big clock on the wall tick-tocked loudly. Heavy boots
creaked as men leaned forward to whisper to each other, and from here
and there came the clink of spurs.
The door opened and Pete Havez stepped in and aside to let Flint and
Wild Moore in, followed by Garvin. They took seats at a table. Whether
by chance or design, Garvin sat down at the table, with Flint Moore
between himself and Bud Deal.
The judge lost no time in opening the investigation. The engineer was
sworn and took the stand. His testimony was already known. No, he did
not recognize the prisoners as the men who had held up the train. He did
not observe whether either of them was as large a man as Flint Moore.
The subject of pistols was brought up, and the engineer stated that one
of them had a big pearl-handled Colt pistol, and he was willing to swear
that it was a .45 caliber. He was shown the muzzles of three pistols,
and was able to pick the .45 from a .38, .44 and .45.
Outside of that about the gun, the engineer’s testimony was vague and
useless to the prosecution. Garvin was called to the stand. He seemed
reluctant to leave his place behind Flint Moore but went to the witness
chair slowly, keeping his eyes on Bud, who did not look directly at him.
Garvin’s testimony drew a laugh from the crowd, as the prosecutor drew
out the details of the arrest and what followed. Oxbow knew that Flint
and Wild had come to Oxbow, herding the sheriff and deputy unarmed.
Garvin admitted that he had no evidence against them, other than they
had ridden in from that direction on the day of the hold-up. He said
that he suspected them, from that reason and also from the reason that
he knew that the Box M was in bad shape financially. Later on his
suspicions were strengthened by learning that one of the robbers used a
pearl-handled Colt .45. Flint Moore owned such a gun.
The court asked for the gun as evidence and Garvin stated that the gun
had never been found, and intimated that some one had secured it ahead
of him and concealed it.
Flint Moore took the stand, after Garvin had gone back to his seat, and
told his story. He had no alibi. They had been within a few miles of the
railroad. There was nothing further to tell. Wild was not called.
Frawley was put on the stand and drew a laugh, with his description of
the arrest. He knew nothing about the gun.
“I will put Bud Deal on the stand,” said Cleland.
Bud looked up foolishly. He had not expected to be put on the stand. He
got slowly to his feet and walked to the chair, where he took the oath.
Cleland’s voice seemed miles away, as Bud looked into the sea of faces.
Cleland was saying something about the gun, and Bud heard himself saying
that the gun had been hanging at the head of Flint Moore’s bed after the
hold-up. He could see Garvin leering at him; but his tongue ran on.
“Somebody stole the gun. Mebbe it was Devlin. He had a .45.”
“What Devlin?” asked Cleland.
“The Devlin, who was sent to the pen. He’s out again. Been working on
the Box M, under the name of Smith.”
The courtroom buzzed.
“Who hired him?” asked Cleland.
Bud pointed at Flint Moore.
“He did. I told him——”
Flint Moore surged to his feet.
“I’ve never seen this Devlin. Deal told me that——”
“Order in the court!” roared the judge. “There is only one witness
chair!”
“When did this Devlin come to the Box M?” asked Cleland.
“The night of the robbery,” replied Bud.
“Where is he now?”
Bud looked down at Mrs. Moore and Pat, and shook his head.
“I dunno. Frawley gave him an outfit last night and started him out of
the country, I reckon.”
Cleland turned and looked at Garvin.
“Did you know that Devlin was in the country?”
Garvin smiled and shook his head.
“I think he’s a —— liar!” snapped Bud, leaning forward in his chair.
Some cowboy in the back of the room cheered and the crowd laughed
heartily, while the judge pounded on his desk and roared for order.
“Another outburst like that and I shall clear the court!” roared the
judge, and turned to Bud. “You are not up there to give opinions, young
man!”
Garvin’s lips were white with wrath and his right hand was clenched
around the butt of his gun under the table.
“Where were you on the day of the robbery?” asked Cleland.
Bud jerked up his head at the question and stared at the prosecutor.
“Me? Why, I—I was out on the range.”
“Down near Snake Creek?”
“Say, you can’t put no deadwood on me!” snarled Bud. “I don’t know
anythin’ about the robbery.”
Cleland grinned. He was making Bud angry, and an angry witness is easy
to tangle.
“What kind of a gun did you carry that day?”
Bud’s face paled and he half-closed his eyes, as he stared at Cleland.
This was getting too personal for Bud and he set his nerves to carry it
off right.
Suddenly there came a commotion at the door and everyone turned. A voice
swore openly, wonderingly, and the crowd at the back of the room parted
to let a strange party through.
It was the old Indian, a ghastly caricature of blood, dirt and matted
hair, carrying the half-conscious form of Whitey Allen on his back. At
the Indian’s heels came the wolf-dog, and limping behind them came Jimmy
Devlin.
Every one in the courtroom stared at them as they came up the aisle,
straight toward the judge. Bud Deal, white-faced, his eyes wide and
staring, got out of his chair like a sleep-walker and moved aside as the
Indian came slowly up and placed Whitey in the witness chair. Then the
Indian slumped down on the edge of the platform, while Devlin stepped
in, facing the court.
Pat started to her feet, but Frawley grasped her arm, drawing her back.
Garvin half-sprawled across the table, gawping at them.
“Sure, I think I’ve come to the right place,” said Jimmy slowly. “We had
a divil’s own trip, and all for the lack of a pencil.”
Whitey had opened his eyes and looked around. He was so weak that it was
only with the greatest effort that he could remain erect in the chair.
“We made it, Whitey,” said Jimmy triumphantly. “This is the place to
talk.”
“What is the meaning of this?” demanded the judge.
Bud’s eyes blinked rapidly as he stared at the Indian he thought he had
killed and at Whitey, who must have perished in the cloudburst. His arms
twitched and he tried to make himself believe that it was only a
nightmare.
“Can ye talk, Whitey?” asked Jimmy. “Try it, pardner.”
Whitey moistened his lips and swallowed with difficulty. After a few
attempts he said weakly, hoarsely:
“Jimmy Devlin wasn’t guilty. I—robbed—that—train—last—year.
He—he—gave—me—a—chance.”
“Eh? What’s that?” questioned Cleland, while every one leaned forward to
hear what Whitey was saying.
Pat had gotten out of her chair and was standing with her hands clenched
in front of her as she stared at Jimmy.
“Devlin—wasn’t—guilty,” said Whitey weakly. “Don’t—you—believe—me?”
“What does this all mean?” questioned the judge.
Men were getting out of their seats and crowding forward. Bud’s eyes
shifted as he tried to see a way out of the room, but all exits were
blocked by the curious crowd.
Cleland turned to the judge.
“He means that Devlin wasn’t guilty of the crime he was convicted of,
judge.”
Whitey nodded and tried to smile, but the smile faded as his eyes turned
and he saw Bud Deal. Whitey did not have an ounce of strength left, but
every bit of hate in his dying body flashed to his face and his weak
voice shrilled:
“Bud Deal, you’re a dirty thief! You lifted that cache! You——” Whitey
slumped, exhausted—arms falling on either side of the chair.
Bud leaned back against the railing, as if bracing himself, one hand
clutching the lapel of his unbuttoned vest and the thumb of the other
hand hooked over his belt above the holster. Men moved silently and
swiftly from behind him. Garvin got half-way to his feet, one hand on
the table. Jimmy stood easily beside Whitey’s chair, but his
good-natured smile was not in evidence. The big Colt rested in its
holster, just in front of his thigh. He was looking at Bud Deal as he
spoke directly to him.
“Deal, ye made a bad mistake, when ye didn’t be sure ye killed the
Injun.”
Bud’s body tensed, but he made no reply.
“Whitey told me all about it, Bud Deal. The old buck had a hard head and
the bullet played ring-around-the-rosie.”
Jimmy looked at Garvin.
“Sheriff, ye may as well turn them folks loose and quit tryin’ to fool
the law.”
“Whatcha mean?” snarled Garvin, but his heart sank within him.
Pete Havez had moved out of his chair and was backed against the
railing, ready to draw.
“Judge, the Moores are innocent,” stated Jimmy, keeping his eyes on
Garvin and Bud. “There’s a showdown comin’ real soon and I want ye to
know things. Deal, don’t ye move a finger. Garvin, you’re too nervous to
shoot straight. Deputy, ye better keep out of this, ’cause it don’t
concern ye.”
Jimmy’s voice seemed to sing-song, without any particular inflexion.
“Will somebody get a doctor for Whitey Allen? He’s got a lot of things
to tell yet, and they’re worth hearin’. He was one of the men who held
up that train and he got shot. His pardner double-crossed him by liftin’
the cache, and now Whitey wants to clear the Moores and put the deadwood
where it belongs.”
“What cache did Bud lift?” asked Frawley.
“That’s a lie!” Bud fairly screamed. “I didn’t lift any cache!”
Jimmy held up his hand for silence as he shook his head in confirmation
of Bud’s denial.
“Whitey Allen was wrong there. He thought that Bud had double-crossed
him and taken the money, but Bud did not take it.”
Jimmy turned his head slightly and looked at Garvin.
“Do ye want me to tell who did take that money?”
Garvin’s lips barely moved as he said—
“What do yuh mean?”
Jimmy leaned forward a little and his right hand came up a trifle higher
than his waist, fingers spread. Bud Deal had seen Jimmy do that before.
“Ye know what I mean!” Jimmy’s voice snapped in the silent room.
Whitey Allen seemed to regain consciousness for a moment at the sound of
Jimmy’s voice and his eyes opened.
“I—I’m glad,” he croaked, “I’m glad it was Bud Deal instead of me that
killed the fireman. He shot——”
Bud Deal’s move was too swift to follow and Whitey’s confession was
never finished. The windows of the little courtroom shook with the
concussion of Bud’s heavy pistol and Whitey pitched forward out of his
chair.
Garvin’s hand swung up, clutching a pistol, but he was too late.
Jimmy’s hand flashed up holding the big gun, but Frawley had flung
himself into Bud and Jimmy could not shoot without danger of hitting
Frawley, who seemed to have missed his tackle and was clawing
desperately to clutch Bud’s gun.
Bud whirled toward Garvin, whose hand had swung up from beside the
table, and the fact that Garvin shot wide-armed and cramped by the table
caused him to miss Jimmy by scant inches.
A fraction of a second later Jimmy shot—so close to the report of
Garvin’s gun that few people knew that both men had fired. Garvin
crumpled back in his chair and his pistol thudded to the floor.
Pete Havez, ignorant of Garvin’s reasons, but thinking it was his duty,
was shooting at Jimmy—shooting wildly. Jimmy whirled and shot once
more—shot almost over Flint Moore’s head, and Pete Havez spun on his
heel, fired a wild shot at the ceiling and draped himself across the
railing.
Bud Deal had torn away from Frawley, tripping him as he got away, and
had fired twice at Jimmy—twice at a distance of ten feet, and
missed—missed because the old Indian was diving at him, arms
outstretched.
He swung his pistol and struck the Indian over the head, kicked at him
as he fell, and then whirled, vaulted the railing and tore for the rear
door, with his two guns driving back the crowd.
But the crowd was willing to get back. Many of them had slid down
between the seats, flat on the floor to be safe from flying lead. Bud
raced for the door, where he whirled and shot the length of the room at
Jimmy, who was vaulting the railing, and the bullet splintered a window
back of the jury-box.
Klooch darted past Jimmy as he went out of the door and down the stairs.
Bud raced for the hitch-rack, which was across the street from the
courtroom, and was half-way to the horses, when Jimmy came out the lower
door.
Bud whirled, as the wolf-dog ran into him, and shot almost into her
face. The bullet ripped along her head and the flash of powder blinded
her; but she had stopped him in his flight.
The crowd had rushed to the windows of the courtroom. Some one threw a
chair through one of them, to view the street better, and the chair
crashed into the dust near Jimmy.
Bud was standing about half-way across the street, with his feet braced
far apart, gun held hip-high. His hat was gone. He had dropped one gun
in his flight, and now he had only one cartridge left in that gun, with
which he had done all his shooting—five shots.
Klooch was groveling in the street, trying to paw the pain from her
burned head. Jimmy was moving slowly toward Bud, his gun swinging easily
in his hand, when out of the lower door appeared the Indian, coming in
behind Jimmy.
His face was a welter of fresh blood from the blow, which Bud had dealt
him with a gun-barrel; but he did not waver, as he came into the street,
head held low, his back bent, arms held wide, as if to grasp something.
A voice from one of the windows called a hoarse warning to Jimmy; but
the Indian walked past him, giving Jimmy no heed, going straight toward
Bud.
Bud lifted his gun and took deliberate aim at the advancing Indian, but
the Indian came on unfaltering. Bud’s arm shook with the strain of
holding the gun. He could not pull the trigger.
He had only one shot left. The Indian was unarmed. It flashed through
Bud’s mind that Jimmy was the one to shoot. He could use the empty gun
on the unarmed Indian.
Now the Indian was between Bud and Jimmy, coming slower. Bud sprang
aside to fire his last shot, but he had forgotten the wolf-dog. His feet
tangled in a squirming snapping bulk and he fell heavily, his gun
slipping from his hand as he fell.
As he sprawled in the dust, the Indian dived into him. For a moment they
seemed to tangle in a whirl of arms and legs, and then the Indian
staggered to his feet, with his arms locked around Bud’s body. They
swayed for a moment. Like a flash the Indian shifted his hold, lifted
Bud off his feet and threw him upside-down; and before any one could
anticipate his next move he picked Bud up in his arms, slung him across
his shoulder and ran up the street toward another hitch-rack. Bud was as
limp as Whitey had been.
Jimmy watched them go, but made no effort to stop the Indian. He caught
Klooch by the scruff of the neck and drew her to him, while he knelt in
the street and tried to examine her burns and bruises. The crowd poured
out of the courtroom and filled the street. Frawley and Pat were the
first ones to reach Jimmy. Men were yelling at each other, running for
their horses.
“My ——!” exclaimed Frawley. “Look at the Indian! He’s on Whistler and
he’s got Bud in his arms!”
Jimmy glanced up the street. The Indian had mounted the roan outlaw and
had Bud draped across the saddle in front of him. Men ran out from
across the street and tried to stop them, but the Whistler whirled and
came straight down the street, running hog-wild, with reins flying. More
men tried to stop them, but Whistler never wavered, while the Indian
leaned forward, both arms holding Bud’s limp body, riding out of town
like a tornado.
“The Injun wants to pay Bud for that shot in the dark,” panted Jimmy.
“The old boy got a nasty bump on the head out at the Pulpit and it kinda
cleared his mind. Whitey told him that Bud shot him.”
Men were mounting to give chase, yelling orders, asking questions. Pat
turned to Jimmy, her face gray with the horror of it all, and took hold
of his arm. Flint Moore came up to them, staring at Jimmy and Pat, who
were looking into each other’s faces. Mrs. Moore and Wild came to them.
Horses were passing them, showering the dust and gravel of the street as
they started out to follow the Indian and his burden. Klooch sniffed at
Jimmy and stood up, putting her paws on his chest, while her burned eyes
blinked open and she gave a short bark.
“Glory be!” exclaimed Jimmy. “Look, Pat! The wolf-dog’s eyes are open
again. Oh, ye blessed wild divil! Ye came to me in the night, so ye
did.”
“A lot of eyes have been opened today, Jimmy,” answered Pat slowly, as
she turned to her father and said, “Dad, meet Jimmy Devlin.”
Flint Moore squinted into Jimmy’s eyes, as they gripped hands.
“Son,” said Flint Moore softly, “why didn’t you kill Bud Deal?”
Jimmy shook his head slowly.
“Sure, I’m not clear in me own mind yet. Mister Frawley got before me in
the courtroom and I could not shoot. Out here—” Jimmy glanced across the
street—“out here I had no fear of his gun. Bedad, I believe I thought it
was empty, and—and—” Jimmy smiled wistfully—“and who am I to be shootin’
up train-robbers?”
Wild Moore stepped in and held out his hand just as Dave Cleland bustled
into them breathlessly.
“Garvin got it through the shoulder!” he exclaimed. “Pete Havez wasn’t
so lucky, but he’ll get well. Whitey Allen must have been almost dead
before Bud shot him. Now, I want to shake hands with Devlin. I’ll see
that you get complete exoneration, Devlin.”
Cleland bustled away, spilling half a package of flake-cut tobacco over
the edge of his pipe-bowl and trying to light the empty pipe.
Frawley turned to Flint Moore.
“I reckon I’ll get my horse and follow the chase, Flint. I’ll drop in to
see yuh in a few days.”
“Why—why—” faltered Flint.
“No, I’ve resigned,” grinned Frawley. “The Box M can’t afford to pay
wages to more than one man, and I reckon Devlin’s goin’ to quit bein’ a
boomer.”
Frawley walked swiftly toward the hitch-rack. Jimmy looked at Pat slyly
and a sober expression crossed his homely face as she asked, “Are you,
Jimmy?”
“I’m thinkin’,” said Jimmy slowly, “that I’d kinda like to be able to
answer folks, when they ask me where I came from—and the Box M is easy
to say.”
XIII
It was twilight again at the Box M, and the Thunder Range had flung its
long shadows across valley and hill. Questions had been asked and
answered, until every one at the ranch understood the things that had
come to pass during the past few days. Flint Moore and his wife sat in
the little living-room, facing each other across the table in silent
contemplation of the future.
Wild stood in the lighted doorway, leaning against the door-sill,
looking at Pat, who was sitting on the porch steps. A string of shadowy
cattle figures drifted down past the fence, going to water. From
somewhere a calf bawled plaintively. High overhead a number of night
hawks skirled as they circled swiftly in search of food.
From down at the bunk-house came the voice of Jimmy Devlin singing “The
Holy City.” It was a new song to the range-land—sung in a slurring
tenor, which seemed to melt away into the night.
“Jerusalem, Jerusalem, lift up your voice and sing.”
“That is he,” said Mrs. Moore, leaning across the table toward her
husband. “Could a man who sings like that be bad, Flint?”
Flint Moore shook his head:
“No, mother. If Pat wants to marry him—he can’t be very bad. Listen,
Mary.”
Jimmy’s voice came clearly to them—
“The world grew dark with mystery and all around was still, when
the shadow of a cross arose upon a lonely hill.”
Pat lifted her head. A man was riding in from down by the gate. He drew
rein and listened to the song until it was finished and rode up to the
porch. It was Frawley. He dismounted and came up to the porch, calling a
soft greeting to Pat and Wild.
Flint Moore and his wife heard him and came outside.
“I just stopped for a minute,” said Frawley. “The rest of the posse went
straight back to Oxbow.”
“Did you catch the Indian?” asked Flint.
Frawley shook his head.
“No. We trailed them to the foot of the Devil’s Pulpit, where we found
the horse; and a little later we found them both, lying at the foot of
the Pulpit—dead. I think the Indian tried to climb the rock with Bud and
slipped, or they fought up there.”
“Well,” said Flint Moore softly, “maybe it was best that way, Frawley.”
“Yeah, I reckon. Well, I’ll be goin’ on, folks. Good-night.”
Frawley rode away into the night. The rest of the family went into the
house, leaving Pat alone on the porch, as a shadowy figure came from the
bunk-house and walked slowly toward her, with the wolf-dog beside him.
He stopped a short distance away and appeared to hesitate.
“Who goes there?” challenged Pat softly.
Jimmy chuckled, and replied—
“The ex-range-boomer.”
“Where are you from?”
“The Box M,” said Jimmy quickly, “where I hope to stay so long they’ll
assess me as personal property.”
“If they do,” said Pat softly, “I’ll be willing to pay the taxes.”
Then Klooch blinked her sore eyes and wondered in her own dumb way
whether she wasn’t a bit fooled into thinking that Jimmy was a one-dog
man. He seemed to forget her for so long.
[Transcriber’s Note: This story appeared in Adventure Magazine,
July 30, 1922. It is believed to be in the public domain in the
United States; copyright status may differ in other countries.]
*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE RANGE-BOOMER ***
Updated editions will replace the previous one—the old editions will
be renamed.
Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright
law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works,
so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United
States without permission and without paying copyright
royalties. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part
of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project
Gutenberg™ electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG™
concept and trademark. Project Gutenberg is a registered trademark,
and may not be used if you charge for an eBook, except by following
the terms of the trademark license, including paying royalties for use
of the Project Gutenberg trademark. If you do not charge anything for
copies of this eBook, complying with the trademark license is very
easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose such as creation
of derivative works, reports, performances and research. Project
Gutenberg eBooks may be modified and printed and given away—you may
do practically ANYTHING in the United States with eBooks not protected
by U.S. copyright law. Redistribution is subject to the trademark
license, especially commercial redistribution.
START: FULL LICENSE
THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG™ LICENSE
PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK
To protect the Project Gutenberg™ mission of promoting the free
distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work
(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase “Project
Gutenberg”), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full
Project Gutenberg License available with this file or online at
www.gutenberg.org/license.
Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg
electronic works
1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg
electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to
and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property
(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all
the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or
destroy all copies of Project Gutenberg electronic works in your
possession. If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a
Project Gutenberg electronic work and you do not agree to be bound
by the terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person
or entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8.
1.B. “Project Gutenberg” is a registered trademark. It may only be
used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who
agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few
things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg electronic works
even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See
paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project
Gutenberg electronic works if you follow the terms of this
agreement and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg
electronic works. See paragraph 1.E below.
1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation (“the
Foundation” or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection
of Project Gutenberg electronic works. Nearly all the individual
works in the collection are in the public domain in the United
States. If an individual work is unprotected by copyright law in the
United States and you are located in the United States, we do not
claim a right to prevent you from copying, distributing, performing,
displaying or creating derivative works based on the work as long as
all references to Project Gutenberg are removed. Of course, we hope
that you will support the Project Gutenberg mission of promoting
free access to electronic works by freely sharing Project Gutenberg
works in compliance with the terms of this agreement for keeping the
Project Gutenberg name associated with the work. You can easily
comply with the terms of this agreement by keeping this work in the
same format with its attached full Project Gutenberg License when
you share it without charge with others.
1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern
what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are
in a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States,
check the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this
agreement before downloading, copying, displaying, performing,
distributing or creating derivative works based on this work or any
other Project Gutenberg work. The Foundation makes no
representations concerning the copyright status of any work in any
country other than the United States.
1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg:
1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other
immediate access to, the full Project Gutenberg License must appear
prominently whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg work (any work
on which the phrase “Project Gutenberg” appears, or with which the
phrase “Project Gutenberg” is associated) is accessed, displayed,
performed, viewed, copied or distributed:
This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most
other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions
whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms
of the Project Gutenberg™ License included with this eBook or online
at www.gutenberg.org. If you
are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws
of the country where you are located before using this eBook.
1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg electronic work is
derived from texts not protected by U.S. copyright law (does not
contain a notice indicating that it is posted with permission of the
copyright holder), the work can be copied and distributed to anyone in
the United States without paying any fees or charges. If you are
redistributing or providing access to a work with the phrase “Project
Gutenberg” associated with or appearing on the work, you must comply
either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 or
obtain permission for the use of the work and the Project Gutenberg
trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or 1.E.9.
1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg electronic work is posted
with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution
must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any
additional terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms
will be linked to the Project Gutenberg License for all works
posted with the permission of the copyright holder found at the
beginning of this work.
1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg
License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this
work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg.
1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this
electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without
prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with
active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project
Gutenberg License.
1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary,
compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including
any word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access
to or distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg work in a format
other than “Plain Vanilla ASCII” or other format used in the official
version posted on the official Project Gutenberg website
(www.gutenberg.org), you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense
to the user, provide a copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means
of obtaining a copy upon request, of the work in its original “Plain
Vanilla ASCII” or other form. Any alternate format must include the
full Project Gutenberg License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1.
1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying,
performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg works
unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9.
1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing
access to or distributing Project Gutenberg electronic works
provided that:
• You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from
the use of Project Gutenberg works calculated using the method
you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is owed
to the owner of the Project Gutenberg trademark, but he has
agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the Project
Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments must be paid
within 60 days following each date on which you prepare (or are
legally required to prepare) your periodic tax returns. Royalty
payments should be clearly marked as such and sent to the Project
Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the address specified in
Section 4, “Information about donations to the Project Gutenberg
Literary Archive Foundation.”
• You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies
you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he
does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg™
License. You must require such a user to return or destroy all
copies of the works possessed in a physical medium and discontinue
all use of and all access to other copies of Project Gutenberg™
works.
• You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of
any money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the
electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days of
receipt of the work.
• You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free
distribution of Project Gutenberg™ works.
1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project
Gutenberg™ electronic work or group of works on different terms than
are set forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing
from the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the manager of
the Project Gutenberg™ trademark. Contact the Foundation as set
forth in Section 3 below.
1.F.
1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable
effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread
works not protected by U.S. copyright law in creating the Project
Gutenberg™ collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg™
electronic works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may
contain “Defects,” such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate
or corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other
intellectual property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or
other medium, a computer virus, or computer codes that damage or
cannot be read by your equipment.
1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the “Right
of Replacement or Refund” described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project
Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project
Gutenberg™ trademark, and any other party distributing a Project
Gutenberg™ electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all
liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal
fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT
LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE
PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH 1.F.3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE
TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE
LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR
INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH
DAMAGE.
1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a
defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can
receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a
written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you
received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium
with your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you
with the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in
lieu of a refund. If you received the work electronically, the person
or entity providing it to you may choose to give you a second
opportunity to receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If
the second copy is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing
without further opportunities to fix the problem.
1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth
in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you ‘AS-IS’, WITH NO
OTHER WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT
LIMITED TO WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE.
1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied
warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of
damages. If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement
violates the law of the state applicable to this agreement, the
agreement shall be interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or
limitation permitted by the applicable state law. The invalidity or
unenforceability of any provision of this agreement shall not void the
remaining provisions.
1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the
trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone
providing copies of Project Gutenberg™ electronic works in
accordance with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the
production, promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg™
electronic works, harmless from all liability, costs and expenses,
including legal fees, that arise directly or indirectly from any of
the following which you do or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this
or any Project Gutenberg work, (b) alteration, modification, or
additions or deletions to any Project Gutenberg work, and (c) any
Defect you cause.
Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg
Project Gutenberg is synonymous with the free distribution of
electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of
computers including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It
exists because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations
from people in all walks of life.
Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the
assistance they need are critical to reaching Project Gutenberg’s
goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg collection will
remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project
Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure
and permanent future for Project Gutenberg and future
generations. To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary
Archive Foundation and how your efforts and donations can help, see
Sections 3 and 4 and the Foundation information page at www.gutenberg.org.
Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation
The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non-profit
501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the
state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal
Revenue Service. The Foundation’s EIN or federal tax identification
number is 64-6221541. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg Literary
Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent permitted by
U.S. federal laws and your state’s laws.
The Foundation’s business office is located at 41 Watchung Plaza #516,
Montclair NJ 07042, USA, +1 (862) 621-9288. Email contact links and up
to date contact information can be found at the Foundation’s website
and official page at www.gutenberg.org/contact
Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg
Literary Archive Foundation
Project Gutenberg™ depends upon and cannot survive without widespread
public support and donations to carry out its mission of
increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be
freely distributed in machine-readable form accessible by the widest
array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations
($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt
status with the IRS.
The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating
charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United
States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a
considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up
with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations
where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To SEND
DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any particular state
visit www.gutenberg.org/donate.
While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we
have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition
against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who
approach us with offers to donate.
International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make
any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from
outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff.
Please check the Project Gutenberg web pages for current donation
methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other
ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. To
donate, please visit: www.gutenberg.org/donate.
Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg electronic works
Professor Michael S. Hart was the originator of the Project
Gutenberg concept of a library of electronic works that could be
freely shared with anyone. For forty years, he produced and
distributed Project Gutenberg eBooks with only a loose network of
volunteer support.
Project Gutenberg eBooks are often created from several printed
editions, all of which are confirmed as not protected by copyright in
the U.S. unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not
necessarily keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper
edition.
Most people start at our website which has the main PG search
facility: www.gutenberg.org.
This website includes information about Project Gutenberg,
including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary
Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to
subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks.
