Judith of Blue Lake Ranch

by Jackson Gregory

  XXIX

  LEE AND OLD MAN CARSON RIDE TOGETHER

  Bud Lee, riding alone toward the Western Lumber Camp, turned in hissaddle to glance back as he heard hoof-beats behind him. It wasCarson, and the old cattleman was riding hard. Lee frowned. Then foran instant a smile softened his stern eyes.

  "Good little old Carson," he muttered.

  Carson came to his side, saying merely in his dry voice:

  "Mind if I come along, Bud? You an' me have rid into one thing an'another more'n just once."

  "This is my fight," said Lee coolly.

  "Who said it wasn't?" demanded the other querulously. "Only you ain'tgot any call to be a hawg, Bud. Besides, I got a right to see ifthere's a fair break, ain't I? Say, look at them cow brutes backyonder! Don't it beat all how silage, when you use it right, shapes'em up?"

  Few enough words were said as the miles were flung behind them; fewwere needed. A swift glance showed Carson that Lee carried a revolverin his shirt; his own gun rode plainly in evidence in front of his hip.What little conversation rose between them was of ranch matters. Theyspoke of success now with confidence. These two foremen alone couldsee the money in late winter and early spring from their cattle andhorses to carry the Blue Lake venture over the rapids. Then there werethe other resources of the diversified undertaking, the hogs, the prizestock, the olives, poultry, dairy products. And soon or late WesternLumber would pay the price for the timber tract, soon, if they saw thatthey had to pay it or lose the forests which they had so long countedupon. Lumber values were mounting every day.

  Neither man, when it chanced that Bayne Trevors's name was casuallymentioned, suggested: "Why not go to the law?" For to them it was veryclear that, once in the courts, the man who had played safe would laughat them. Against Judith's oath that he had kidnapped her would standTrevors's word that he had done nothing of the kind, coupled with hiscarefully established perjured alibi and the lying testimony of thephysician who had visited Judith in the cave. This man and that mightbe rounded up, Shorty and Benny and Poker Face, and if any of themtalked--which perhaps none of them would--at most they would say thatthey had no orders from anybody but Quinnion. And where was Quinnion,who stood as a buckler between Trevors and prosecution? And whatbuckler in all the world can ever stand between one man and another?

  Now and then Carson sent a quick questioning glance toward Lee'sinscrutable face; now and then he sighed, his thoughts his own. BudLee, knowing his companion as he did, shrewdly guessed that Carson washoping that events might so befall that there would be an open,free-for-all fight and that he might not be forced to play the restlesspart of a mere onlooker. Bud Lee hoped otherwise.

  "There's two ways to get a man," said Carson meditatively, out of along silence. "An' both is good ways: with a gun or with your hands."

  "Yes," agreed Bud quietly.

  "If it works out gun way," continued Carson, still with thatthoughtful, half-abstracted look in his eyes, "it don't hurt toremember, Bud, that he shoots left-handed an' from the hip."

  Lee merely nodded. Carson did not look up from the bobbing ears of hishorse as he continued:

  "If it works out the other way an' it's just fists, it don't hurt toremember how Trevors put out Scotty Webb last year in Rocky Bend.Four-footed style, striking with his boot square in Scotty's belly."

  Trevors's name was not again referred to even in the vaguest terms.The road in front of them, at last dropping down into the valley inwhich the lumber-camp was, straightened out into a lane that ranbetween stumps to the clutter of frame buildings.

  "Something doing at the office," offered Carson, as they drew near."Directors' meeting, likely."

  Two automobiles stood in the road ten steps from the closed door of theunpretentious shack which bore the printed legend, "Office, WesternLumber Company." The big red touring-car certainly belonged to Melvin,the company's president. Carson looked curiously at Lee.

  Bud dismounted, dropped his horse's reins, shifted the revolver fromhis shirt to his belt where it was at once unhidden and loosely held,ready for a quick draw. Then he went up the three steps, Carson at hisheels, his gun also unhidden and ready. From within came voices, onein protest, Bayne Trevors's ringing out, filled with mastery followedby a laugh. Lee set his hand to the door. Then, only because it waslocked from within, did he knock sharply.

  "Who is it?" came the sharp inquiry. But the man who made it and whowas standing by the door, threw it open.

  "What do you want?" he demanded again. "We're busy."

  "I want to see Trevors," said Lee coolly.

  "You can't. He----"

  Lee shoved the man aside and strode on. Carson, close at Lee's heels,his eyes glittering, stepped a little aside when once he was within theroom and took his place with his back against the wall close to thedoor.

  It was a big, bare, barn-like room, furnished simply with one longtable and half a dozen chairs. Here were five men besides BayneTrevors. All except Trevors and the man who had opened the door wereseated; Trevors, at the far end of the room, was standing, anoratorical arm slowly dropping to his side.

  His eyes met Lee's, ran quickly to Carson's, came back to Lee's andrested there steadily. Beyond the slow falling of his extended arm, hedid not move. The muscles of his face hardened, the look of triumphwhich just now had stood in his eyes changed slowly and in its placecame an expression that was twin to that in Bud Lee's eyes, just a lookof inscrutability with a hint of watchfulness under it, and thehardness of agate. While a man might have drawn a deep breath into hislungs and expelled it, neither Lee nor Trevor stirred.

  "What the devil is this?" demanded Melvin from across the table."Hold-up or what?" He rapped the table resoundingly.

  "Shut up!" snapped Carson. "It's just a two-man play, Melvin: Lee an'Trevors."

  "Oh," said Melvin, and sank back, making no further protest. He was nostranger to Carson or to Bud Lee, and he sensed what might be betweenLee and a man like Trevors. Then shrugging his shoulders, he saidcarelessly: "I'm not the man to get in other men's way, and you knowit, Carson. But you might tell your friend Bud Lee that Bayne Trevorsis rather a big man influentially to mix things with. I've justresigned this morning and Trevors is our new president."

  "Thanks," returned Carson dryly. "I don't think that'll make muchdifference though, Melvin. Most likely you'll have two presidentsresigning the same day."

  At last Lee spoke.

  "Trevors," he said quietly, "maybe the law can't get you. But I can.For reasons which both you and I understand you are going to clear outof this part of the country."

  "Am I?" asked Trevors. The look of his eyes did not alter, the poiseof his big body did not shift, his hands, both at his sides again,might have been carved in bronze.

  Then suddenly he laughed and threw out his arms in a wide gesture andagain dropped them, saying shortly:

  "You're playing the game the way I thought you would. You've got agun. I am unarmed--begin your shooting and be damned to you!"

  He even stepped forward, his eyes fearlessly upon Lee's, and settledhis big frame comfortably in a chair by the table.

  "Go ahead," he concluded. "I'm ready."

  "That's as it should be!" Lee's voice was vibrant. His hard eyesbrightened. With a quick jerk he drew the revolver from his belt anddropped it to the floor at Carson's feet.

  Carson, though he stooped for it quickly, did not shift his watchfuleyes from Trevors. For Carson had known more fights in his life thanhe had years; he knew men, and looked to Trevor for just the sort ofthing Trevors did.

  As Lee stepped forward, Trevors snatched open the drawer of the tableat his side, quick as light, and whipped out the weapon which lay there.

  "Go slow, Trevors!" came old Carson's dry voice. "I've got you coveredalready, two-gun style."

  Trevors, even with his finger crooking to the trigger, paused and sawthe two guns in Carson's brown hands trained unwaveringly upon him.There was much deadly determinat
ion in Carson's eyes. Again Trevorslaughed, drawing back his empty hand.

  "You yellow dog!" grunted Bud Lee, his tone one of supreme disgust."You damned yellow dog!"

  Trevors shrugged.

  "You see, gentlemen--two to one, with the odds all theirs."

  "You lie!" spat out Carson. "It's one to one an' I see the game goessquare." He stepped forward, removed the weapon from the table underTrevors's now suddenly changeful eyes, and went back to his place withhis back to the wall.

  "For God's sake!" cried the one nervous man in the room, he who hadopened the door. "This is murder!"

  Melvin smiled, a smile as cheerless as the gleam of wintry starlight ona bit of glass.

  "Will you fight him, Trevors?" he asked. "With your hands?"

  "Yes," answered Trevors. "Yes."

  "Move back the table," commanded Melvin, on his feet in an instant."And the chairs. Get them back."

  The table was dragged to the far end of the room; the chairs were piledupon it.

  "Now," and Melvin's watch was in his hand, his voice coming withmetallic coldness, "it's to a finish, is it? Three-minute rounds, fairfighting, no----"

  But now at last Bayne Trevors's blood was up, his slow anger hadkindled, he was moving his feet restlessly.

  "Damn it," he shouted, "whose fight is this but mine and Lee's? If hewants a fight, let him come and get it; a man's fight and rules androunds and time be damned! Am I to dance around here and sidestep andfence just for you to look on? . . . Carson!"

  "Well?" said Carson.

  "Lee challenges me, doesn't he? Then I'm the man to name the sort offight, am I not? Is that fair?"

  "Meaning just what?" asked Carson.

  "Meaning that I am going to get him, get him any way I can! You let usfight this out our way, any way, and no interference!"

  "Talk to Bud there," rejoined the old cattleman calmly. "It ain't myscrap."

  "Then, Lee," snapped Trevors, "come on if you want such a fight asyou'd get if you and I were alone in the mountains, with no man towatch, a fight where a man can use what weapons God gave him, anyweapon he can lay his mind to, his eye to, his hand to! Or," and atlast the sneer came, "do you want a pair of padded gloves and somebodyto fan you?"

  Carson shifted his glance to Bud Lee's face. Lee merely nodded.

  "Then," cried Carson sternly, "go to it! No man steps in, an' you twocan fight it out like coyotes or mountain-lions for all of me."

  "Your word there will be no interference?" asked Trevors. "For you'rejust a fool and not a liar, Carson."

  "My word," was the answer.