by Max Brand
“Friend?” he asked. “Ain’t had the pleasure of meeting him yet, Sheriff.”
“You forget,” said the sheriff. “Think it over. You remember now?”
“Bill, you ought to know that I never forget faces. I never saw this gent before. Wait a minute... no, I never saw him before.”
The sheriff was dumbfounded. There was no doubting the sincerity of Al Rankin unless he were, indeed, a consummate actor.
“It’s a queer case,” said the sheriff gloomily. “I told you what I expected from that rat, Smiley?”
“Sure.”
“Well, Rankin, it looks like you’re coming clean through all this. Smiley swears that Bob Lake, here, met him on the road into town and swiped the gun from him. We searched Lake and his room and found never a trace of it.”
Al Rankin turned his handsome face toward Bob Lake, and a faint smile touched the corners of his mouth. What it might mean the sheriff could never guess, but Bob Lake knew that the smile meant a perfect understanding. There was something even a trifle alarming in that quick apprehension.
“Al,” went on the sheriff, “you’re free. I’m sorry that I had to bust in on you the way I did, but....”
“Business is business,” answered Al Rankin cheerily. “And this ain’t the first time that you’ve showed me attentions. No hard feelings, Sheriff, but you might have picked a better time for jailing me.”
“The wife and all that... ,” returned the sheriff. “That was pretty hard, Al, and I’m the first to admit it. Are we quits?”
“Quits?” asked Al Rankin in an indescribable voice. “Quits?” He smiled, and the sheriff shuddered. He took no care to conceal his emotion.
“All right,” he said, “we’ll have it out then, sooner or later.”
“Sooner or later,” said Rankin, “we sure will.”
“But there’s one thing more, Al. This fellow Smiley is scared to death. Will you shake hands with him before me, and tell him that you don’t bear any malice?”
“Why,” said Al Rankin, “from what I’ve heard, it looks as if he’d ought to be more afraid of this gent” — he indicated Bob Lake— “than he is of me.”
“Maybe. But will you shake hands with him, Al?”
“If that’ll make you any happier, sure I will.”
“I’m glad of that. I don’t want him on my conscience. I told him it would be safe, you see?”
“Very thoughtful of you, but go ahead.”
“I’ll get the keys.”
He left the room, and Al Rankin made a long, light step to the bars; his debonair calm was gone.
“Who are you?” he asked curtly.
“Easy,” murmured Lake. “Maybe they’re listening.”
“Can’t hear a thing through these walls. Come out with it.”
“My name is Lake. The sheriff told you the rest. I got the gun from Smiley and threw it away.”
“What gun?”
Lake smiled. “Still bluffing?” he queried.
“But why?” asked Al Rankin.
“I was on the train in the seat behind you,” replied Lake.
“Ah, I thought I remembered something about your face.”
“When White came and took you....” He paused, finding it difficult to go on. “As a matter of fact, Rankin, it seemed a shame that a girl like your wife should lose her husband... I....”
“You did this for Anne... all this?” asked Al Rankin slowly.
“Rankin, you’ll be thinking me a fool, but I’m talking straight to you. I’ll never see the girl again, and I’ll never see you again. She turned my head, Rankin. I envied you. And for a minute I was almost glad that the sheriff had grabbed you. Then I changed my mind. You know the rest. Now... good bye and good luck to you. But one thing before I go, Rankin. If I ever hear that you haven’t straightened out after marrying a girl like that, I’ll come from the end of the world, if I have to, and skin you alive!”
“You’d do all that?” asked Rankin with a sneer. Then he straightened his face. “Shake on it, Lake.”
Their hands closed, and Bob Lake felt a grip that he had never dreamed possible in a man.
“This ain’t the last time I see you,” said Rankin. “A gent like you is the kind I want for a friend. You’re coming up to Greytown with me, and you’re going to visit at the house. The wife will want to know you.”
But Bob Lake shook his head, and he laughed bitterly. “Never in a thousand years, partner. I don’t trust myself that much. I’d be a fool.”
They had no opportunity to say more. At this moment Bill White returned.
V. THROUGH THE WINDOW
THE SHERIFF SHOOK his little bunch of keys and unlocked the barred door and stepped aside to allow Al Rankin to come out. He was perfectly frank in his attitude. “You know how I stand, Al,” he said. “Sooner or later I’m going to get the goods on you. Long as you stood alone, it was a hard fight. But now you’ve started to play partners.” He indicated Bob Lake with a jerk of his thumb. “The minute a gent starts doing things like that, he’s done for. I’ve seen too many of ’em come and go.”
But the temper of Al Rankin refused to be disturbed. “You’re all wrong, Bill,” he assured the sheriff. “I’m married, and I’m going to lead a life nobody can point a finger at.”
The sheriff met this speech with a cold smile of deep wisdom. “I know you’ll try to get me sooner or later,” he said. “But I’ll try to be ready. Now come along and shake hands with Hugh Smiley. The little chap is half dead with being scared. And I don’t blame him.”
He led the way out of the cell room and into his office. The rest of the little building was already deserted. The crowd had learned that the last hope of the sheriff had failed, when he could establish no proof of past relationship between Al Rankin and Lake. In the office stood only Hugh Smiley. It was plain that he was in the throes of a panic. He would far rather have been outside, flying for his life, but he felt it was hopeless to flee from Al Rankin. Other men had tried it and failed. The only thing for him to do was to stay and face the music and try to effect a reconciliation.
But it was only by dint of clutching the edge of the table that he was able to remain there, facing the door. As it opened and he saw the handsome face of Rankin, the little man shivered violently. He stood like one waiting for the death sentence from the judge.
“Here you are,” said the sheriff. “Al, maybe you think you’ve got reason to be sore at Smiley. But, as far as I can make out, Hugh has reason to be sore at you. Suppose you shake hands, here, and call everything quits.”
The face of Al Rankin, it seemed to Lake, was a study in controlled emotion. The quivering of his eyelids showed the tremor of fierce anger that was passing through him, yet he maintained the calmest of smiles.
“Most generally,” he said, “I aim to square things up with a gent that double-crosses me. However, I let a promise drop to the sheriff, and I like to live up to my promises. Besides, you have a grudge against me, Hugh. D’you think it’s all cleared up, now?”
“All cleared,” said Hugh Smiley. His little rat eyes went restlessly to and fro. “I was wrong, Al. I don’t mind tellin’ you now that I was wrong and... and I want to ask your pardon for it.”
“Why,” said Rankin, “if you feel that way, we will call it quits. Go back home and sleep easy and forget about me, Hugh. I guess that’ll do, Sheriff, eh?”
“I suppose so.” The sheriff was not entirely satisfied.
“If anything goes wrong,” said Hugh Smiley, pointing a trembling finger at White, “remember that it was you that got me into this.”
“I know it,” returned the sheriff, and he made a wry face.
“Wait,” cut in Bob Lake. “I think they ought to shake hands first, eh, Sheriff?”
“Good idea. That’s what they met for in the first place. Go ahead, Al.”
A glance from the corner of Rankin’s eyes fell upon Lake, a glance gleaming with such venom that the big fellow winced. The handshaking was d
uly performed. And the sheriff sighed.
“All right, boys,” he said, “I’ve got to run along. Sit around and talk things over. Here’s your gun, Al. Here’s yours, Lake.”
He hung the cartridge belt and the revolver on the wall, while he put Rankin’s gun before him on the table. Then he left the room.
“All I got to say,” said the rat-faced man, “is that I’m glad you showed some sense, Al.”
Al Rankin looked up from his gun that he was balancing lightly in his long fingers. “By the way,” he said, “I’ve got to say something to the sheriff before he leaves.”
Tossing his weapon back on the table, he left the room hurriedly. They heard a door close outside, and the keen eyes of Smiley turned for the first time upon Bob Lake.
“Why you done it,” he said gloomily, “I dunno. But it was sure a fool play. D’you think Al is grateful? He don’t know what gratitude means, stranger, and you’ll live long enough to find out. Grateful? Right this minute he’s plannin’ something ag’in’ you. For why? Because he knows that you know where that gun was put, and the minute the gun’s found, they’s a noose around his neck. Does that sound reasonable?” He leaned across the table and grinned maliciously into the face of Lake.
“Reasonable enough,” replied the other carelessly, a great deal more carelessly than he felt about the matter.
“And how does he know that you won’t use what you know to squeeze money out of him? He’s got lots of coin, Al has. He got a lot from his father. He’s got a house that’s a regular palace, Al has, and the only reason he’s been around raisin’ trouble is because he likes action. That’s all. He’ll be kind of wishing you was out of the way, maybe, and the minute he does that, you’ll sure cuss the day when you held me up for that hanging evidence. Wait, son, till....”
The evil joy went out of that face. The eyes went past Bob Lake toward the window and fastened there with a sort of horrible fascination. Before Lake could turn, the bark of a gun crowded the room with echoes, and Hugh Smiley slumped forward on the table. At the same time there was a heavy impact on the floor.
Bob Lake reached first for his gun on the wall. The holster was empty! There on the floor lay the heavy object that had been thrown through the window. It was a revolver, and, as Bob Lake caught it up, he knew at once that it was his.
“Rankin,” said a voice behind him.
He whirled to find Smiley propping himself with sagging arms back from the table. His eyes were already glazing. From the outer part of the building Lake heard footsteps coming. There he stood with the gun in his hand from which a bullet had struck the dying man.
The whole devilish scheme dawned on his mind. Al Rankin had left his own weapon, lying on the table. On his way out of the room he had slipped Lake’s gun out of its holster, and then, circling the building on the outside, he had fired through the open window. What could be neater?
It was known that Lake and Smiley were at odds, and there were plenty of grounds for a quarrel between them, whether Lake had actually held up the little man as Smiley had sworn, or whether Smiley had evened the score between them. And the blame of that bullet was thrown upon Bob Lake, removing him from Rankin’s path, just as Smiley had prophesied the gambler and gunfighter would wish to do.
He leaned over Smiley.
“Witnesses!” was all the little man could say. He seemed to be saving his strength for a later moment.
Then the door was burst open by the sheriff. “You murdering idiot!” he shouted and wrenched the gun from Lake’s hand.
But the latter pointed mutely to the dying man.
By this time High Smiley had slumped back in the chair with his arms dangling in odd positions at his side. He was plainly far gone, and only his eyes showed a sign of life as his chin sagged down against his chest.
The sheriff dropped to his knees beside the little man, still covering Bob Lake with his own gun.
“Not him,” whispered Smiley. “Al Rankin... through the window... I seen his face.” He sank limp against the shoulder of the sheriff.
Bob Lake raised the dead body and laid it on the table. Others were coming through the building, shouting to one another. Gunshots in Everett generally had aftermaths.
“Is it clear?” asked Lake.
“Not at all,” said the sheriff. “A minute ago I left you here all chummy as so many partners. Now here I am with the gun that killed Smiley, and that gun is yours, and Smiley gives me a dying declaration that Al Rankin is the man, and there’s Rankin’s gun, lying on the table cold.” He wiped his forehead.
“Rankin went out, Sheriff, and took my gun with him. He fired through the window and then threw my gun inside. His plan was to come running back after the hubbub started and show surprise. But....”
“Then where is he now?” asked the bewildered sheriff.
“He heard Smiley yell his name a minute ago and saw that his whole plan had been spoiled because Smiley had seen his face, when he fired through the window. Where is he now? He’s riding out of Everett on the first horse he found saddled, most like.”
The sheriff’s amazement cleared itself in one tremendous curse, then he bolted from the room. But Bob Lake went back to the dead man and looked down into his face. No doubt Hugh Smiley was a bad one and not worth his salt, but he would have served to apprehend a murderer had Lake not interfered. Now the rôles were reversed, and, as surely as the sun shone, Bob Lake was responsible for the tragedy.
He went out from the jail and back to the hotel a free man, but a very thoughtful one.
VI. MOSTLY ABOUT ANNE
THE RESULT OF his reflections was one clear perception: he had made a terrible mess of things from the start. A worthless gambler and murderer without honor or faith or gratitude had been taken out of the proper hands of the law; a man, innocent of crime in this affair at least, now lay dead. And finally the man to whom he had been a benefactor had come within an ace of saddling the guilt of a murder upon his own shoulders.
It was sufficient, one would say, to make Bob Lake swear himself in as a deputy and join the posse in the pursuit of the renegade, Al Rankin. But there was another residue of Bob Lake’s thought, and that residue was the face of Anne Rankin as he had last looked back to her from the head of the car. His memory of her was astonishingly clear. The few attitudes and expressions that he had seen remained before his mind like so many pictures, and in his leisure he could take them out and examine them in detail, one by one. Long before reaching this point, another man would have taken a train back for Manhattan or some other more distant point. But, when all was said and done, Lake only knew that he must see that girl again — at once.
The next morning he was on the train for Greytown, and early in the afternoon he dismounted at the little station in the heart of the mountains. It was bitterly cold in spite of the spring. An unseasonable snow had fallen several days before, and now it was frozen and packed hard by a stiff northerly wind. Over this the clear sunshine fell, blinding to the eye where the snow fields lay level. The nearer mountains were crystal outlines against the sky. The farther peaks were a bluish white, but here and there, where the snow had slid away, there was a raw, bare, black cliff.
The train pulled away and left another man standing on the platform, a middle-aged man whose eyes were extremely old and whose smile was extremely young. He had dropped his suitcase and was bundling himself into an overcoat, when Bob Lake approached.
“D’you know this layout?” asked Lake.
“Not a thing. I’m a stranger here, and I’m looking for Albert Rankin’s house.”
“Albert Rankin? Oh, Al Rankin, eh? Well, I’m trying to spot the same place.”
He found himself regarded with a new and vital interest. “Friend of Rankin’s?”
The voice was even, but there was no doubt of the hardness that crept into the tone. Plainly this man was not apt to take kindly to the friends of Al Rankin. He might, perhaps, be an officer of the law sent to watch the newly made outlaw’s headq
uarters.
“Nope. Only talked to him once.”
“Where was that, may I ask?”
“In Everett.”
The other started. “When?”
“Last night.”
“The deuce you say,” exclaimed the older man. “You were in Everett last night?”
“I’ll say I was.”
“Then you know about the whole fracas.”
“All there is to be known.”
His companion bundled him off to a corner of the platform for the station agent had come out to watch them.
“I have an unfortunate interest in this matter,” he said. “Let me introduce myself. I am Paul Sumpter. I see that name means nothing to you, but I am the father of Al Rankin’s wife.”
“I’m Bob Lake. Glad to know you.”
“And you, sir. Sheriff White advised me of everything that had happened last night by wire. Of course, it was told in brief. I have come up here to see to my girl, but, above all things, I’d like to find out exactly what happened in Everett last night.”
Bob Lake drew back. He was ordinarily talkative enough, but he was filled with aversion to this man who had allowed his daughter to marry such a fellow as Al Rankin.
“I can tell you what happened in a nutshell... murder, Mister Sumpter.”
The other drew his knuckles across his puckered forehead. “Murder,” he repeated softly. “There were extenuating circumstances?”
“Sure, there was a chance for him to shift the blame on another gent. That was why he took a pot shot at Smiley.”
“And who was the other?”
“Me.”
It was Sumpter’s turn to fall back. “You are the man who... ?”
“Oh, I’m him, all right,” returned Lake. “I’m the fool who stepped in and got messed up.”
They stood regarding one another curiously. “I see,” said the older man quietly. “You’re up here, hunting for Rankin? Well, sir, I hope to heaven that you find him.”
“Don’t start jumping to conclusions. Right now I got an idea that I’m the best friend Rankin has in the world.”