by Max Brand
Now there were some wise heads in Yeoville who said that well enough should be let alone, and that enough had been done in driving Single Jack from their midst without the loss of a single life—since Cranston seemed likely to live. They refrained from listening to the great clamors that Shodress raised, as he urged his followers to take the trail and instantly erase this man-killer from the landscape.
But there were younger and hotter bloods who did listen to Shodress. They had seen Deems flee, and just as little house dogs will chase a great, ranging wolf, so these youths tumbled into their saddles and rushed out of Yeoville and down the road along which they had seen him disappear.
Six abreast, whipping up their horses, driving their spurs deeply, swinging their hats, filled with joy by the night wind in their faces, and braced by a sense of the power of numbers and the invincibility of their charge, the first of them tore around the bend of the road out of Yeoville, and there they saw a solitary horseman seated with a steady rifle at his shoulder, and a head of starlight sitting like a dim diamond upon the rifle’s upper edge.
Each youngster in that procession could honestly swear that he had seen that deadly rifle aimed straight at his heart. They did not wait for the explosion of the gun. With wild yells, they piled to the right and to the left away from the path of that fatal weapon, and sheltered themselves in a tangled, swarming, cursing, shouting mass among the trees.
Single Jack had not fired, and he did not fire now. Sliding the lucky rifle back into the long holster, he turned the head of the bay and jogged up the road in a leisurely fashion. Much noise still arose behind him, but they did not venture any farther. They let him journey along unmolested, quite unaware that they were making Yeoville a laughingstock to all the towns in the mountains. For it would be many a day before the rest of the range would forget how Yeoville, so bold and so famous for its hardy badness, had allowed its beard to be not only twitched but literally jerked by a single man—and a tenderfoot, at that.
Single Jack, you may be sure, had no thought of that. All of his heart was now bent before him down the trail, and he rode with his mind filled with doubts.
Had he been in the cities of the East, among the myriads of alleys and by-lanes, he would have known well enough how to conduct himself, and what clues to look for, but here it was all different.
He came to a forking of the road, about three miles out from the edge of the town. There he dismounted, and with a lighted match he examined the hoof prints on the forking, with little hope that he might be able to know the right way. That which held straight forward, indeed, he discovered to be blurred by the sign of a score or more of horses, but that which turned to the right carried the tracks of only three.
He waited to see no more. His heart told him at once that these were the three men he wanted, and, as he swung into the saddle again, the wolf dog darted ahead and began to follow the road, head pitched well forward and a little down, as though he were really reading the news of the trails with his nose. Here was a matchless leader, to be sure; here was a trailer born and bred in the wilderness, and the heart of the master leaped with satisfaction and with confidence.
Another brace of miles, and they struck across a broad road deeply scored with wheels, and covered with the sign of cattle and horses. The wolf dog did not hesitate, but turned instantly down the road, and, in half a mile, darted to the side and leaped through the wires of a fence.
Deems was no expert horseman, but he did not hesitate to follow such a leader. He gave his fine bay the spurs, and the splendid animal soared suddenly into the air. Single Jack felt as though his back were jerked in two, and as though a strong hand had caught him by the shoulders and tried to jerk him out of the saddle, but he managed to stick in his place and come down on the farther side of the fence without so much as losing a stirrup. Then he was streaking away across the field with the wolf dog hot at his work in the lead. Clever the quarry that escaped such a trailer.
Now and then the big creature would turn and make a little circle back toward the rider, then scurry off again to show the way, as though he were trying with all his might to hurry the avenger along this freshening trail.
Very gladly Deems rode by that guidance as though following a light from heaven, and so they worked hard across the country, with the bay horse now laboring and gasping like a dog for breath, but sticking valiantly to its work.
Then, between a dark-headed wood and a curve of gleaming water, where a stream ran around the shoulder of a hill, Single Jack saw first a long ray of light, and next, behind this, the pointed roof of a little shack. To the very door of this shack, the wolf dog slunk, and Single Jack knew, as he saw the monster crouching there, that he had come to the end of his quest.
Chapter Twenty-Four
He dismounted at the edge of the trees and left the horse there, with the reins hanging, for he knew that a well-trained cow pony would not stir from the spot if the reins were left in this fashion. After that, he paused an instant to pat the sleek, sweat-polished neck of the pony. The little horse tossed its head and pricked its ears under the kind touch. It was a new experience for Deems to find any creature that loved him merely because it had worked for him without hire or reward, and he was looking back over his shoulder with a smile as he left the trees and started toward the house. There was work to be done here.
First, keeping carefully to cover, as though it were broad daylight and faces were watching him from every window of the place, he laid a circle around the house, with Comanche working ahead of him with busy nose, and tail thrust out straight behind. All the ground around the shack was fairly cleared, but to the rear there was a small shed, and, at the entrance to it, the wolf dog came to a stand and then sank to a crouching position.
It was a sufficient advertisement to Single Jack that here he must proceed carefully. He slipped up to the open door, and, peering into the blackness of the interior, he counted five horses. He could smell the rankness of sweat through the little barn, but, to make his assurance doubly sure, he entered and touched the horses one by one. Two were dry and had not worked. Three were dripping. And now he was sure that he had his men. So he turned back to the shack.
The sky above him was patched with clouds that had recently blown over its face. Only here and there the small rain of stars was sprinkled, and he was not displeased to have little light abroad. He took note of that, and then of all the lay of the land, so that he could tell where the fences stood, and where it would be best to ride in case of any emergency.
After that, he slipped up to the unshuttered window. Merely by rising to his tiptoes he could look through, and he saw five men seated around a table at the eternal game of poker. Each man of the five, loaded with weapons, looked fit to fight for his life against any champion. He regarded them with an infinite satisfaction. In two minutes he had their names in order. Westover, McGruder, and Mandell were the three on the right side of the table, and Pete and Sam Wallis sat on the other side. They were the hosts, and the game flourished until McGruder tossed down his cards, exclaiming: “That breaks me the second time today. I’m done!”
He pushed back his chair and rolled a cigarette.
“I’ve had enough, too,” said Pete Wallis, a large and dignified man. “Now, you fellows unbuckle your guns and make yourselves at home.”
McGruder and the other pair looked at one another and smiled.
“We ain’t parting from our gats,” they informed their hosts.
“Look here,” said Sam Wallis, younger and more eager than his brother, “what sort of a game is up?”
“Tell ’em, McGruder,” said Westover.
“We got Dave Apperley,” said McGruder without triumph—for which the listener outside the window gave him a favorable mark—“and now we’re lying low.”
“You got Apperley . . . Andy’s brother? Andy’ll make the range howl until he’s even with you.”
“Even?” said McGruder gloomily. “I dunno that if he killed the whole three of
us, he’d have the worth of a fine young gent like David.”
“Hello! What the deuce, Dan?”
“Leave me be,” growled Dan McGruder.
“This job rides him,” explained Westover, yawning. “But I’m glad that we done the trick. It means something to the old man, you know. Besides, what a crust for a fool tenderfoot to come to Yeoville to run things.”
“‘What about Deems? You mean that you got him, too?”
“No, I don’t mean that. You would’ve heard us shout about that first,” explained Westover. “Fact is, Deems split with Apperley, and that gave us a clean shot.”
“Then what chased you out of town after the job?”
“Not Deems. We seen somebody coming down the street that looked like it might be Deems and his dog, but we didn’t wait to see. I wanted to stay in Yeoville. So did old Mandell, here. But McGruder wouldn’t listen to us. Suppose that Deems was to change his mind and come gunning for us? That was the way he was always putting it.”
“And suppose that he did?” said Sam Wallis. “Can any one man get the three of you?”
“No, but he might get two,” explained McGruder.
Sam Wallis grunted and scowled at the floor, but his older brother put in: “They’re right. You’ll understand that when you get older, kid. Trouble with Sam is that he thinks there’s nothing worthwhile except fighting. He’d fight a bull, if it dared to shake its horns at him. But you got to understand, kid, that it ain’t right to pick trouble, or even to wait for trouble, with a slick hand like this Single Jack. I hear that he’s got a long record behind him that has just showed up.”
“The chief got a detective out to look him over,” said McGruder. “I dunno how it turned out. All I know is that Deems is the kind of poison that I keep away from. Hand me that coffee pot.” He poured out a steaming tin of coffee.
“I’m gonna step out and see how the ponies are cooling out,” said Westover. “We certainly burned up the road.”
“Why?” asked Sam Wallis, still gloomily doubtful of these three.
“Because we had a chill down our backs in the idea that Deems might’ve changed his mind about being no friend of young Apperley. We thought that he might possibly be following down our trail.”
“How would he follow your trail through a dark night?” asked Sam Wallis, more and more aggressive in his doubt.
“Don’t ask how, kid,” said his brother. “It ain’t what a gent is likely to do that counts, it’s what he might do, either by good sense, or help, or chance. That’s the way that you got to figger. Are you going, Westover?”
“Yes.”
“Chuck a forkful of hay to my pinto mare, will you?”
“Sure.”
The door was cast open by Westover, and at the same time the broad, bright hand of the lamplight pushed against the face of Single Jack Deems and glittered green in the eyes of the wolf dog beside him.
“How’s the night turning outside?” asked Dan McGruder from within.
“Deems!” screamed Westover, and tore out his gun.
A slug of lead struck him in the breast and knocked him backward, staggering. The Colt dropped from his extended hand and struck with a crash against the floor. So he reeled, dead on his feet, until he struck the table and sent it down behind him, the lamp toppling with it.
But in the meantime, a shadow crossed the doorway. Four revolvers instantly poured a flood of lead at it, but the shadow had crossed again instantly to the farther side of the door. Only, as the shadow leaped across the opening, a single tongue of flame darted from the mouth of a leveled revolver, and Lefty Mandell curled up on the floor just as the lamp, striking the wall, went out with a tinkling of broken glass.
Blackness had swallowed the interior of the shack, and in that darkness there was groaning.
“Get out of this place!” cried Dan McGruder. “He’ll be in here, and I think that he can see in the dark! I know he can!”
Suddenly feet scratched on the floor of the shack.
“The wolf! God, he’s got me!” shrieked McGruder.
For a great body had loomed against the shadowy black of the place, and McGruder, throwing up his arm in defense, felt it slashed from wrist to elbow.
At the same time, Sam Wallis, quite forgetting all his desire for battle, had burst open the rear door of the shack and all three of the men leaped into the sheltering open of the night, firing at wild random behind them.
They were not safe. Behind them, lying low in the doorway, was Single Jack, eyes glittering, and revolver ready, but he could not distinguish one from the other, now, and, rather than pour his fire into the wrong man, he let them go. They ran wildly for the darkness of the trees, with Comanche bounding behind them.
A call from Single Jack brought the big creature back to him. Then he let the fugitives go, for he saw that it would be the sheerest folly to follow them into the covert of the trees by night. Instead, he turned back, and with the light of a match he saw Westover lying, face up, dead on the floor, while Mandell was curled in a knot, gasping and groaning.
“Are you a goner, man?” asked Single Jack, kneeling without pity at the side of the wounded cowpuncher.
“I’m done,” said Mandell.
“Let me see.” Deems ripped the shirt away. One glance at the wound sufficed. “You could get up and ride a horse now,” said Single Jack coldly. “That slug just glanced around your ribs, instead of ripping through your heart the way that I intended. Keep your head level. Tie a bandage around your body after you wash the cut. You’ll come through all right, and, when you’re back on your feet, I’ll come and call on you again. So long.”
He was gone through the door, and Mandell pushed himself up on his hands and looked after the victor, bewildered. Beyond the door, he could see the far-off glimmer of the stars close to the horizon. A sudden thankfulness that life was still permitted to be in him surged through the heart of the wounded man. Then, far off, he heard a faint sound of hoofs, and after that the wild, long-drawn howl of a wolf on the trail—a dismal sound.
“Is he after the rest of ’em?” gasped Mandell. “Then heaven help ’em.” He waited and listened again, but there was no sound. Then he fumbled for matches, found them, and lighted some dry tinder on the hearth of the open fireplace. By that light he set about following the instructions of Deems to clean and bandage his hurt, and with shaking hands he completed that business. Still, from without, there was no sign of the routed three returning, and Mandell did not wonder.
Utter silence, now. Then, from the far edge of the world, again the smooth, melancholy howl of a wolf, sounding through the night.
Chapter Twenty-Five
After this, things began to happen so rapidly that Yeoville must be looked upon as a sort of storm center rather than as a mere focus for attention. In the first place, there was Andrew Apperley. He heard first a sharp-edged rumor that David was dead. Then he received a letter from David that caused him serious apprehension, and immediately after that there arrived the note that Single Jack had written from the hotel in Yeoville and in which he announced the shooting down of David. Then Andrew Apperley prepared for action.
First of all, he sent out a call through his foreman to all of his lieutenants. He gathered in his cowpunchers, all except a skeleton force who were to remain on the range and take care of the cows that were there. These were the least sure shots, the least dashing riders. At the same time, a hurried call was sent around among the neighboring ranchers and the small squatters who had everywhere experienced his kindness and generosity to a greater or a lesser degree.
There was a general response. While this work of half a day was in progress, a fast rider was cutting south toward the railroad. He carried a very important dispatch to be telegraphed to Washington, asking for protection from one of Apperley’s friends there, should the deeds that he hoped to be about to perform call down some sort of government action upon his head. By noon, the force was mustered and swung into the saddles.
&
nbsp; There were seventy-nine hardy fellows in that band, when Apperley and his foreman, Les Briggs, counted them over. When they themselves were added to the force, it made just one over four score, and, as Andrew Apperley surveyed the column, each man equipped with at least one pair of Colts, and each and every man armed with a good repeating rifle, usually a Winchester, he was fairly sure that the doomsday of Yeoville had arrived.
So they set forward, and they rode at a smart pace through the hills, and followed the winding trail toward the distant domains of Alec Shodress, with Apperley ever in the lead, his face set, and his eye dull, so great was the misery of his inner spirit.
But in the meantime we must look right and left and high and low to see what was happening in Yeoville with Shodress and the rest.
First we see the great Alec Shodress in person calling upon Dr. Myers. This doctor had the case of young Apperley in hand, and he now was the subject of Shodress’s conversation.
“Doc,” said the fat man, “does Apperley live or die?”
“A toss-up,” said the doctor.
“Now listen to me,” said Shodress. “You’ve been getting on fairly well in this town, ain’t you?”
“Getting on fine,” said the other.
“And my friends have been going to you right along?”
“Sure,” said the doctor, “and the men they’ve been shooting up.”
“Right,” said Shodress. “You’re getting prosperous. I’m glad of that. I like to see a friendly young man getting on in the world. Nothing would please me more than to have you keep right on climbing up in the world. Now tell me, in the first place, how is young Apperley getting on? Tell me really.”