by Max Brand
“Gentlemen,” said Andrew, “I am not a bum. I am worth five thousand dollars to the man who turns me over, dead or alive, to the sheriff. My name is Andrew Lanning.”
At that the faces became a terrible rushing and circling flare, and the lights went out with equal suddenness. He was left in total darkness, falling through space, but at his last moment of consciousness, he felt arms going about him, arms through which his bulk kept slipping down, and below him was a black abyss.
Chapter Twenty-Three
It was a very old man who held, or tried to hold, Andrew from falling to the floor. He was, in fact, the same man who had sat under the awning smoking the corncob pipe, some three days before. Now his old shoulders shook under the burden of the outlaw, and the burden, indeed, would have slumped brutally to the floor had not the small, ten-year-old boy, who Andrew had seen on the bay mare, come running in under the arms of the old man. With his meager strength he assisted, and the two managed to lower the body gently. Andrew was struggling to the last, and there was a horror in his wide, blank eyes.
“Hold me,” he kept saying. “Don’t let me slip, or I’m done for. Hold me, and the girl will come and save me. Anne…”
The boy was frightened. He was white at the sight of the wounds, and the freckles stood out in copper patches from his pallor Now he clung to the old man. “What does he mean, Granddad?” he whispered. “What girl is comin’ to save him?”
“When you get a pile older, Jud,” said granddad, “you’ll know what he means. You might even know the girl, or a dead ringer for her. I knew her kind once.”
“Who was she?”
“Your grandma, you little fool. Now don’t ask questions.”
“Granddad, it’s the gent that tried to buy Mary.”
The old man had produced a murderous jackknife with a blade that had been ground away to the disappearing point by years of steady grinding. “Get some wood in the stove,” he commanded. “Fire her up, quick. Put on some water. Easy, lad.”
The room became a place of turmoil with the clatter of the stove lids being raised, the clangor of the kettle filled and put in place. By the time the fire was roaring and the boy had turned, he found the bandages had been taken from the body of the stranger, and his grandfather was studying the smeared, naked torso with a sort of detached, philosophic interest. With the thumb and forefinger of his left hand, he was pressing deeply into the left shoulder of Andrew.
“Now there’s an arm for you, Jud,” said the old man. “See them long, stringy muscles in the forearm? If you grow up and have muscles like them, you can call yourself a man. And you see the way his stomach caves in? Aye, that’s a sign. And the way his ribs sticks out… and just feel them muscles on the point of his shoulder… Oh, Jud, he would’ve made a prime wrestler, this fine bird of ours.”
“It’s like touchin’ somethin’ dead, Granddad,” said the boy. “I dasn’t to do it.”
“Jud, they’s some times when I just about want to give you up. Dead? He ain’t nowhere near dead. Jest bled a bit, that’s all. Two as pretty little wounds as was ever drilled clean by a powerful rifle at short range. Dead? Why, inside two weeks he’ll be fit as a fiddle, and inside a month he’ll be his own self. Dead! Jud, you make me tired. Gimme that water.”
He went to work busily. Out of a sort of first-aid chest he took homemade bandages, and after cleansing the wounds, he began to dress them carefully.
He talked with every movement.
“So this here is the lion, is it?” Granddad nodded. “This here is the ravenin’, tearin’, screechin’ man-eater? Why, he looks mostly plain kid to me.”
“He… he’s been shot, ain’t he, Granddad?” asked the child in a whisper.
“Well, boy, I’d say that the lion had been chawed up considerable… by dogs.” He pointed. “See them holes? The big one in front? That means they sneaked up behind him and shot him while his back was turned.” He sighed. “I’ve heard fine things and brave things about Hal Dozier, but mostly I begin to misdoubt ’em all. These ain’t the days for a man-sized man to go cavortin’ around. When he goes out to take a little exercise, they get a hundred of ’em together and put him in a cage and say he’s broke the law. Oh, Jud, these ain’t no days for a man to be livin’ in.”
“He’s wakin’ up, Granddad,” said Jud, more frightened than before.
The eyes of Andrew were opening, indeed. He smiled up at them. “Uncle Jas,” he said, “I don’t like to fight. It makes me sick inside, to fight.” He closed his eyes again.
“Now, now, now,” murmured Pop. “This boy has a way with him. And he killed Bill Dozier, did he? Son, gimme the whiskey.”
He poured a little down the throat of the wounded man, and Andrew frowned and opened his eyes again. He was conscious at last.
“I think I’ve seen you before,” he said. “Are you one of the posse?”
The old man stiffened a little. A spot of red glowed on his withered cheek and went out like a snuffed light.
“Young feller,” said the old man, “when I go huntin’, I go alone. You write that down in red, and don’t forget it. I ain’t ever been a member of no posse. Look around and see yourself to home.”
Andrew raised his head a little and made out the neat room. It showed, as even his fading senses had perceived, when he saw the house first, a touch of almost-feminine care. The floor was scrubbed to whiteness; the pans hanging on the wall flashed under the lamplight; the very stove was burnished.
“I remember,” said Andrew faintly.
“You did see me before,” said the other, “when you rode into Tomo. I seen you and you seen me. We changed looks, so to speak. And now you’ve dropped in to call on me. I’m goin’ to put you up in the attic. Gimme a hand to straighten him up, Jud.”
With Jud’s help and the last remnant of Andrew’s strength, they managed to get him to his feet, and then he partly climbed, partly was pushed by Jud, and partly was dragged by the old man up a ladder to the loft. It was quite cool there, very dark, and the air came in through two windows.
“Ain’t very sociable to put a guest in the attic,” said Pop, between his panting breaths. “But I’ll be the doctor, and I order quiet and rest. Ain’t apt to have much rest downstairs, ’cause a public character like you, Lanning, will have a consid’able pile of callers askin’ after you. Terrible jarrin’ to the nerves when folks come in and call on a sick man. You lie here and rest easy.”
He went down the ladder and came back dragging a mattress. There, by the light of a lantern, he and Jud made Andrew as comfortable as possible.
“You mean to keep me here?”
“Long as you feel like restin’,” answered the old man.
“You can make about…”
“Stop that fool talk about what I can make out of you. How come it you stayed so close to Tomo? Where was you lyin’ low? In the hills?”
“Not far away.”
“And they smelled you out?”
“A man I thought was my friend…”
“You was sold, eh?”
“I made a mistake.”
“Hmm,” was the other’s comment. “Well, you forget about that and go to sleep. I got a few little attentions to pay to that posse. It’ll be here r’arin’ before tomorrer. Sleep tight, partner.”
He climbed down the ladder and looked around the room. Jud, his freckles still looking like spots of mud or rust, his eyes popping, stood silently.
“I’m glad of that,” said the old man with a sigh.
“What, Granddad?”
“You’re like a girl. Takes a sight to make you reasonable quiet. But look yonder. Them spots look tolerable like red paint, don’t they? Well, we got to get ’em off.”
“I’ll heat some more water,” suggested Jud.
“You do nothing of the kind. You get them two butcher knives out of the table drawer, and we’ll scrape off the wood, because you can’t wash that stain outen a floor.” He looked suddenly at Jud with a glint in his eyes.
“I know, because I’ve tried it.”
For several minutes, they scraped at the floor until the last vestige of the fresh stains was gone. Then the old man went outside and, coming back with a handful of sand, rubbed it in carefully over the scraped places. When this was swept away, the floor presented no suspicious traces.
“But,” he exclaimed suddenly, “I plumb forgot! I plumb forgot. He’s been leakin’ all the way here, and when the sun comes up, they’ll foller him that easy by the sign. Jud, we’re beat.”
They dropped, as at a signal into two opposite chairs, and sat staring gloomily at one another. The old man looked simply sad and weary, but the color came and went in the face of Jud. And then, like a light, an idea dawned in the face of the child. He got up from his chair, lighted a lantern, and went outside. His grandfather observed this without comment or suggestion, but when Jud was gone, he observed to himself: Jud takes after me. He’s got thoughts. And them was things his ma and pa was never bothered with.
Chapter Twenty-Four
The thought of Jud now took him up the back trail of Andrew Lanning. He leaned far over with the lantern, studying with intense interest every place where the wounds of the injured man might have left telltale stains on the rocks or the grass. When he had apparently satisfied himself of this, he turned and ran at full speed back to the house and went up the ladder to Andrew. There he took the boots—they were terribly stained, he saw—and drew them on.
The loose boots and the unaccustomed weights tangled his feet sadly, as he went on down the ladder, but he said not a word to his grandfather, who was far too dignified to make a comment on the borrowed footgear.
Again outside with his lantern, the boy took out his pocket knife and felt the small blade. It was of a razor keenness. Then he went through the yard behind the house to the big henhouse where the chickens sat perched in dense rows. He raised his lantern; at once scores of tiny, bright eyes flashed back at him. It was an uncanny thing to see. But Jud, with a twisted face of determination, kept on with his survey until he saw the red comb and arched tail plumes of a large Plymouth Rock rooster.
It was a familiar sight to Jud. Of all the chickens on the place, this was his peculiar property. He had helped the weakling out of the shell. He had fed him through all the fluffy and gaunt stages of a rooster’s growth. He had watched with enormous pride the appearance of the big spurs. He had accompanied with a beating heart the progress of the rooster, as he fought his way against the older and wiser birds, until at length, by sheer strength of leg and length of spur, the Plymouth Rock was the undisputed cock of the walk. And now Jud had determined to sacrifice this dearest of pets. The bay mare herself was hardly possessed of a larger share of his heart.
The old rooster was so accustomed to his master, indeed, that he allowed himself to be taken from the perch without a single squawk, and there was no sound except the rushing of his wings as he regained his balance on the wrist of Jud. The boy took his captive beyond the pen. Once, when the big rooster canted his head and looked into his face with his courageous, red eyes, the boy had to wink away the tears, but he thought of the man so near death in the attic, he felt the clumsy boots on his feet, and his heart grew strong again.
He went around to the front of the house, and by the steps he fastened on the long neck of his prisoner a grasp strong enough to keep him silent for a moment. Then he cut the rooster’s breast deeply, shuddering as he felt the knife take hold.
Something trickled warmly over his hands. Dropping his knife in his pocket, Jud started walking with steps as long as he could make them. He went, with the spurs chinking to keep time for each stride, straight toward a cliff some hundreds of yards away from the house. The blood ran freely. The old rooster, feeling himself sicken, sank weakly against the breast of the boy, and Jud thought that his heart would break. He reached the sharp edge of the cliff and heard the rush of the little river far below him. At the same time his captive gave one final flutter of the wings, one feeble crow, and was dead.
Jud waited until the tears had cleared from his eyes. Then he took off the boots, and in bare feet that would leave no trace on the rocks, he skirted swiftly back to the house, put the dead body back in the chicken yard, and returned to his grandfather.
There was one great satisfaction for him that evening, one reward for the great sacrifice, and it came immediately. He saw his grandfather, who scorned shows of emotion, come from his chair with a groan.
“Suffering saints, boy, have you been playin’ dead outlaw? Suffering saints, Jud, ain’t you got no sense?”
While the old man stood trembling before him, Jud told his story.
It was a rich feast indeed to see the relief, the astonishment, the pride come in swift turns upon that grim, old face. And yet in the end Pop was able to muster a fairly good imitation of a frown.
“And here you come back with a shirt and a pair of trousers plumb spoiled by all your gallivantin’,” he said, “not speakin’ of a perfectly good chicken killed. Ain’t you never goin’ to get grown up, Jud?”
“He was mine, the chicken I killed,” said Jud, choking.
It brought a pause upon the talk. The other was forced to wink both eyes at once and sigh.
“The big speckled feller?” he asked more gently.
“The Plymouth Rock,” said Jud fiercely. “He wasn’t no speckled feller. He was the finest and the gamest…”
“Have it your own way,” said the old man. “You got your grandma’s tongue when it comes to arguin’ fine points. Now go and skin out of them clothes, and come back and see that you’ve got all that… that stuff offen your face and hands.”
Jud obeyed and presently reappeared in a ragged outfit, his face and hands red from scrubbing.
“I guess maybe it’s all right,” declared the old man. “Only, they’s risks in it. Know what’s apt to happen if they was to find that you’d helped to get a outlaw off free?”
“What would it be?” asked the boy.
“Oh, nothin’ much. Maybe they’d try you, and maybe they wouldn’t. Anyways, they’d sure wind up by hangin’ you by the neck, till you was as dead as the speckled rooster.”
“The Plymouth Rock,” insisted Jud hotly.
“All right, I don’t argue none. But you just done a dangerous thing, Jud. And there’ll be a consid’able pile of men here in the mornin’, most like, to ask you how and why.”
He was astonished to hear Jud break into a careless gale of laughter.
“Hush up,” Pop said. “You’ll be wakin’ him up with all that noise. Besides, what d’you mean by laughin’ at the law?”
“Why, Granddad,” said Jud, “don’t I know you wouldn’t never let no posse take me from you? Don’t I know maybe you’d clean ’em all up?”
“Pshaw,” said Pop, and flushed with delight. “You was always a fool kid, Jud. Now you run along to bed.”
It was a gloomy hour, always, with Jud, and now he regarded his grandfather with a wistful eye.
“Maybe,” he suggested in the face of the other’s frown, “I’d better stay up… in case the posse should come tonight?”
The hint of a smile twitched at the corners of the man’s wide mouth. “Pull up a chair beside the stove, son,” he said. “Next thing I know, you’ll be sittin’ up smokin’ and swappin’ lies with me, eh?”
“Oh,” said Jud cheerily, “maybe it won’t be so long.”
He drew up his chair according to instructions and sat very stiffly and silently, fearful that this new liberty would be soon curtailed. Presently, a long, bony arm went out and rested around his shoulders.
“I been thinkin’,” observed his grandfather, and Jud was as still as a mouse. “I been thinkin’,” went on the old man, “and I got an idea maybe you’d like to hear. They’s a place in Tomo where they sell chickens and roosters and such. And the last time I was in town I seen some of these speckled chickens. I’ll get you one when I go in next time, eh?”
“Oh, Granddad,” said the boy
, hurt, “I don’t never want to see one of ’em again.”
“I thought you liked ’em, Jud?”
“It wasn’t the color. But him and me was pals.”
“Pshaw,” said the man. “Jud, you go for your bed now. Good night.”
Jud went obediently to the corner of the room to his bunk, and his grandfather rose and stood before the open door. The moonlight was softening all the ragged outlines of the hills, as with a great mercy.
Chapter Twenty-Five
In Hal Dozier there was a belief that the end justified the means. When Hank Rainer sent word to Tomo that the outlaw was in his cabin, and if the posse would gather, he, Hank, would come out of his cabin that night and let the posse rush the sleeping man who remained, Hal Dozier was willing and eager to take advantage of the opportunity. A man of action by nature and inclination, Dozier had built a great repute as a hunter of criminals, and he had been known to take single-handed chances against the most desperate, but when it was possible, Hal Dozier played a safe game.
He understood the Napoleonic maxim that the side that puts the greatest number of units at the point of contact will be practically sure to win, and when he could use two men to do the work of one man, Hal did it. And if he could get twenty, so much the better. In a crisis he was willing and able to do his work alone, but by the time he had accumulated half a dozen scars representing half a dozen battles in his early life, he reached the conclusion that sooner or later one of his enemies was bound to kill him. The law of chance itself condemned him. And although the people of the mountain desert considered him invincible, because he had run down some dozen notorious fighters, Hal himself felt that this simply increased the chances that the thirteenth man, by luck or by cunning, would strike him down.
Therefore he played safe always. On this occasion he made surety doubly sure. He could have taken two or three known men, and they would have been ample to do the work. Instead, he picked out half a dozen. For just as Henry Allister had recognized that indescribable element of danger in the new outlaw, so the man hunter himself had felt it. On the one hand, he knew the fighting qualities of the Lanning blood. On the other hand, he had seen Andrew Lanning face-to-face and had watched both his eye and his hand. During that interview in the room of Hal Dozier, if there had been one instant during which both eye and hand had wavered, Andrew would have been a dead man, but although the eye might change, the hand was never relaxed. Thinking of these things, Hal Dozier determined that he would not tempt Providence. He had his commission as marshal, and as such he swore in his men and started for the cabin of Rainer.