by Max Brand
They obeyed on the run. Some rushed for the kitchen and secured buckets; two manned the big pump and started a great gush of water; in a moment a steady stream was being flung by the foremost men of the line against the smoking walls and even the ceiling of the dining-room. So far it was the oil itself, which had made most of the flame and smoke, and now, although the big table was on fire, the main structure of the house was hardly touched.
They caught it in time and worked with a cheer, swinging the buckets from hand to hand, shouting as the flames fell little by little until the floor of the room was awash, the walls gave back clouds of steam, and the only fire was that which smouldered along the ruined table. Even this went out, hissing, at last, and they came back with blackened, singed faces to Calamity and Drew.
The rancher had torn away the coat and shirt of the wounded man, and now, with much labour, was twisting a tight bandage around his chest. At every turn Calamity groaned feebly. Kilrain dropped beside his partner, taking the head between his hands.
“Calamity — pal,” he said, “how’d you let a tenderfoot, a damned tenderfoot, do this?”
The other sighed: “I dunno. I had him covered. I should have sent him to hell. But sure shootin’ is better’n fast shootin’. He nailed me fair and square while I was blockin’ him at the door.”
“How d’you feel?”
“Done for, Shorty, but damned glad that — —”
His voice died away in a horrible whisper and bubbles of red foam rose to his lips.
“God!” groaned Shorty, and then called loudly, as if the strength of his voice might recall the other, “Calamity!”
The eyes of Calamity rolled up; the wide lips twisted over formless words; there was no sound from his mouth. Someone was holding a lantern whose light fell full on the silent struggle. It was Nash, his habitual sneer grown more malevolent than ever.
“What of the feller that done it, Shorty?” he suggested.
“So help me God,” said the cattleman, with surprising softness, “the range ain’t big enough to keep him away from me.”
Drew, completing his bandage, said, “That’s enough of such talk, Nash. Let it drop there. Here, Kilrain, take his feet. Help me into the house with him.”
They moved in, the rest trailing behind like sheep after a bell-weather, and it was astonishing to see the care with which big Drew handled his burden, placing it at last on his own four-poster bed.
“The old man’s all busted up,” said little Duffy to Nash. “I’d never of guessed he was so fond of Calamity.”
“You’re a fool,” answered Nash. “It ain’t Calamity he cares about.”
“Then what the devil is it?”
“I dunno. We’re goin’ to see some queer things around here.”
Drew, having disposed of the wounded man, carefully raising his head on a pillow, turned to the others.
“Who saw Ben shot?”
“I did,” said Kilrain, who was making his way to the door.
“Come back here. Are you sure you saw the shot fired?”
“I seen the tenderfoot — damn his eyes! — whip up his gun and take a snap shot while he was runnin’ for the door where Calamity stood.”
Nash raised his lantern high, so that the light fell full on the face of
Drew. The rancher was more grey than ever.
He said, with almost an appeal in his voice: “Mightn’t it have been one of the other boys, shooting at random?”
The tone of Kilrain raised and grew ugly.
“Are you tryin’ to cover the tenderfoot, Drew?”
The big man made a fierce gesture.
“Why should I cover him?”
“Because you been actin’ damned queer,” answered Nash.
“Ah, you’re here again, Nash? I know you hate Bard because he was too much for you.”
“He got the start of me, but I’ll do a lot of finishing.”
“Kilrain,” called Drew, “you’re Calamity’s best friend. Ride for Eldara and bring back Dr. Young. Quick! We’re going to pull Ben through.”
“Jest a waste of time,” said Nash coolly. “He’s got one foot in hell already.”
“You’ve said too much, Nash. Kilrain, are you going?”
“I’ll stop for the doctor at Eldara, but then I’ll keep on riding.”
“What do you mean?”
“Nothin’.”
“I’ll go with you,” said Nash, and turned with the other.
“Stop!” called Drew. “Boys, I know what you have planned; but let the law take care of this. Remember that we were the aggressors against young Bard. He came peaceably into this house and I tried to hold him here. What would you have done in his place?”
“They’s a dozen men know how peaceable he is,” said Nash drily. “Wherever he’s gone on the range he’s raised hell. He’s cut out for a killer, and Glendin in Eldara knows it.”
“I’ll talk to Glendin. In the meantime you fellows keep your hands off Bard. In the first place because if you take the law into your own hands you’ll have me against you — understand?”
Kilrain and Nash glowered at him a moment, and then backed through the door.
As they hurried for the barn Kilrain asked: “What makes the chief act soft to that hell-raiser?”
“If you have a feller cut out for your own meat,” answered Nash, “d’you want to have any one else step in and take your meal away?”
“But you and me, Steve, we’ll get this bird.”
“We’ll get Glendin behind us first.”
“Why him?”
“Play safe. Glendin can swear us in as deputies to— ‘apprehend,’ as he calls it, this Bard. Apprehendin’ a feller like Bard simply means to shoot him down and ask him to come along afterward, see?”
“Nash, you got a great head. You ought to be one of these lawyers. There ain’t nothin’ you can’t find a way out of. But will Glendin do it?”
“He’ll do what I ask him to do.”
“Friend of yours?”
“Better’n a friend.”
“Got something on him?”
“These here questions, they ain’t polite, Shorty,” grinned Nash.
“All right. You do the leadin’ in this game and I’ll jest follow suit. But lay your course with nothin’ but the tops’ls flyin’, because I’ve got an idea we’re goin’ to hit a hell of a storm before we get back to port, Steve.”
“For my part,” answered Nash, “I’m gettin’ used to rough weather.”
They saddled their horses and cut across the hills straight for Eldara.
Kilrain spurred viciously, and the roan had hard work keeping up.
“Hold in,” called Nash after a time. “Save your hoss, Shorty. This ain’t no short trail. D’you notice the hosses when we was in the barn?”
“Nope.”
“Bard took Duffy’s grey, and the grey can go like the devil.
Hoss-liftin’? That’s another little mark on Bard’s score.”
CHAPTER XXXII
TO “APPREHEND” A MAN
AS IF TO make up for its silence of the blast when the two reached it late the night before, Eldara was going full that evening. Kilrain went straight for Doc Young, to bring him later to join Nash at the house of Deputy Glendin.
The front of the deputy’s house was utterly dark, but Nash, unabashed, knocked loudly on the door, and went immediately to the rear of the place. He was in time to see a light wink out at an upper window of the two-story shack. He slipped back, chuckling, among the trees, and waited until the back door slammed and a dark figure ran noiselessly down the steps and out into the night. Then he returned, still chuckling, to the front of the house, and banged again on the door.
A window above him raised at length and a drawling voice, apparently overcome with sleep, called down: “What’s up in Eldara?”
Nash answered: “Everything’s wrong. Deputy Glendin, he sits up in a back room playin’ poker and hittin’ the redeye. No wonder Eldara’
s goin’ to hell!”
A muffled cursing rolled down to the cowpuncher, and then a sharp challenge: “Who’s there?”
“Nash, you blockhead!”
“Nash!” cried a relieved voice, “come in; confound you. I thought — no matter what I thought. Come in!”
Nash opened the door and went up the stairs. The deputy met him, clad in a bathrobe and carrying a lamp. Under the bathrobe he was fully dressed.
“Thought your game was called, eh?” grinned the cattleman.
“Sure. I had a tidy little thing in black-jack running and was pulling in the iron boys, one after another. Why didn’t you tip me off? You could have sat in with us.”
“Nope; I’m here on business.”
“Let’s have it.”
He led the way into a back room and placed the lamp on a table littered with cards and a black bottle looming in the centre.
“Drink?”
“Nope. I said I came on business.”
“What kind?”
“Bard.”
“I thought so.”
“I want a posse.”
“What’s he done?”
“Killed Calamity Ben at Drew’s place, started a fire that near burned the house, and lifted Duffy’s hoss.”
Glendin whistled softly.
“Nice little start.”
“Sure, and it’s just a beginnin’ for this Bard.”
“I’ll go out to Drew’s place and see what he’s done.”
“And then start after him with a gang?”
“Sure.”
“By that time he’ll be a thousand miles away.”
“Well?”
“I’m running this little party. Let me get a gang together. You can swear ’em in and put me in charge. I’ll guarantee to get him before morning.”
Glendin shook his head.
“It ain’t legal, Steve. You know that.”
“The hell with legality.”
“That’s what you say; but I got to hold my job.”
“You’ll do your part by goin’ to Drew’s place with Doc Young. He’ll be here with Shorty Kilrain in a minute.”
“And let you go after Bard?”
“Right.”
“Far’s I know, you may jest shoot him down and then come back and say you done it because he resisted arrest.”
“Well?”
“You admit that’s what you want, Steve?”
“Absolute.”
“Well, partner, it can’t be done. That ain’t apprehendin’ a man. It’s jest plain murder.”
“D’you think you could ever catch that bird alive?”
“Dunno, I’d try.”
“Never in a thousand years.”
“He don’t know the country. He’ll travel in a circle and I’ll ride him down.”
“He’s got somebody with him that knows the country better’n you or me.”
“Who?”
The face of Nash twisted into an ugly grimace.
“Sally Fortune.”
“The hell!”
“It is; but it’s true.”
“It ain’t possible. Sally ain’t the kind to make a fool of herself about any man, let alone a gun-fighter.”
“That’s what I thought, but I seen her back up this Bard ag’in’ a roomful of men. And she’ll keep on backin’ him till he’s got his toes turned up.”
“That’s another reason for you to get Bard, eh? Well, I can’t send you after him, Nash. That’s final.”
“Not a bit. I know too much about you, Glendin.”
The glance of the other raised slowly, fixed on Nash, and then lowered to the floor. He produced papers and Durham, rolled and lighted his cigarette, and inhaled a long puff.
“So that’s the game, Steve?”
“I hate to do it.”
“Let that go. You’ll run the limit on this?”
“Listen, Glendin. I’ve got to get this Bard. He’s out-ridden me, out-shot me, out-gamed me, out-lucked me, out-guessed me — and taken Sally. He’s mine. He b’longs all to me. D’you see that?”
“I’m only seein’ one thing just now.”
“I know. You think I’m double-crossin’ you. Maybe I am, but I’m desperate, Glendin.”
“After all,” mused the deputy, “you’d be simply doin’ work I’d have to do later. You’re right about this Bard. He’ll never be taken alive.”
“Good ol’ Glendin. I knew you’d see light. I’ll go out and get the boys I want in ten minutes. Wait here. Shorty and Doc Young will come in a minute. One thing more: when you get to Drew’s place you’ll find him actin’ queer.”
“What about?”
“I dunno why. It’s a bad mess. You see, he’s after this Bard himself, the way I figure it, and he wants him left alone. He’d raise hell if he knew a posse was after the tenderfoot.”
“Drew’s a bad one to get against me.”
“I know. You think I’m double-crossin’?”
“I’ll do it. But this squares all scores between us, Steve?”
“Right. It leaves the debt on my side, and you know I’ve never dodged an I.O.U. Drew may talk queer. He’ll tell you that Bard done all that work in self-defence.”
“Did he?”
“The point is he killed a man and stole a hoss. No matter what comes of it, he’s got to be arrested, don’t he?”
“And shot down while ‘resistin’ arrest’? Steve, I’d hate to have you out for me like this.”
“But you won’t listen to Drew?”
“Not this one time. But, Lord, man, I hate to face him if he’s on the warpath. Who’ll you take with you?”
“Shorty, of course. He was Calamity Ben’s pal. The rest will be — don’t laugh — Butch Conklin and his gang.”
“Butch!”
“Hold yourself together. That’s what I mean — Butch Conklin.”
“After you dropped him the other night?”
“Self-defence, and he knows it. I can find Butch, and I can make him go with me. Besides, he’s out for Bard himself.”
The deputy said with much meaning: “You can do a lot of queer things,
Nash.”
“Forget it, Glendin.”
“I will for a while. D’you really think I can let you take out Butch and his gunmen ag’in’ Bard? Why, they’re ten times worse’n the tenderfoot.”
“Maybe, but there’s nothin’ proved ag’in’ ’em — nothin’ but a bit of cattle-liftin’, maybe, and things like that. The point is, they’re all hard men, and with ’em along I can’t help but get Bard.”
“Murder ain’t proved on Butch and his men, but it will be before long.”
“Wait till it’s proved. In the meantime use em all.”
“You’ve a long head, Nash.”
“Glendin, I’m makin’ the biggest play of my life. I’m off to find Butch.
You’ll stand firm with Drew?”
“I won’t hear a word he says.”
“S’long! Be back in ten minutes. Wait for me.”
He was as good as his word. Even before the ten minutes had elapsed he was back, and behind followed a crew of heavy thumping boots up the stairs of Glendin’s house and into the room where he sat with Dr. Young and Shorty Kilrain. They rose, but not from respect, when Nash entered with Conklin and his four ill-famed followers behind.
The soiled bandage on the head of Butch was far too thick to allow his hat to sit in its normal position. It was perched high on top, and secured in place by a bit of string which passed from side to side under the chin. Behind him came Lovel, an almost albino type with straw-coloured hair and eyes bleached and passionless; the vacuous smile was never gone from his lips.
More feared and more hated than Conklin himself was Isaacs. The latter, always fastidious, wore a blue-striped vest, without a coat to obscure it, and about his throat was knotted a flaming vermilion necktie, fastened in place with a diamond stickpin — obviously the spoil of some recent robbery. Glendin, watching, ground his te
eth.
McNamara followed. He had been a squatter, but his family had died of a fever, and McNamara’s mind had been unsettled ever since; whisky had finished the work of sending him on the downward path with Conklin’s little crew of desperadoes. Men shrank from facing those too-bright, wandering eyes, yet it was from pity almost as much as horror.
Finally came Ufert. He was merely a round-faced boy of nineteen, proud of the distinguished bad company he kept. He was that weak-minded type which is only strong when it becomes wholly evil. With a different leadership he would have become simply a tobacco-chewing hanger-on at cross-roads saloons and general merchandise stores. As it was, feeling dignified by the brotherhood of crime into which he had been admitted as a full member, and eager to prove his qualifications, he was as dangerous as any member of the crew.
The three men who were already in the room had been prepared by Glendin for this new arrival, but the fact was almost too much for their credence. Consequently they rose, and Dr. Young muttered at the ear of Glendin: “Is it possible, Deputy Glendin, that you’re going to use these fellows?”
“A thief to catch a thief,” whispered Glendin in reply.
He said aloud: “Butch, I’ve been looking for you for a long time, but I really never expected to see you quite as close as this.”
“You’ve said it,” grinned Butch, “I ain’t been watchin’ for you real close, but now that I see you, you look more or less like a man should look. H’ware ye, Glendin?”
He held out his hand, but the deputy, shifting his position, seemed to overlook the grimy proffered palm.
“You fellows know that you’re wanted by the law,” he said, frowning on them.
A grim meaning rose in the vacuous eye of Lovel; Isaacs caressed his diamond pin, smiling in a sickly fashion; McNamara’s wandering stare fixed and grew unhumanly bright; Ufert openly dropped his hand on his gun-butt and stood sullenly defiant.
“You know that you’re wanted, and you know why,” went on Glendin, “but I’ve decided to give you a chance to prove that you’re white men and useful citizens. Nash has already told you what we want. It’s work for seven men against one, but that one man is apt to give you all plenty to do. If you are — successful” — he stammered a little over the right word— “what you have done in the past will be forgotten. Hold up your right hands and repeat after me.”