by Max Brand
“Arizona,” he said, “you look sort of underfed today. Bring your stool a bit nearer and let’s talk. I been hungry for a chat with someone.”
In reply Arizona rolled back his head and for a moment glared thoughtfully at Sinclair. He made no answer. Presently his glance fell, like that of a dog. Sinclair shivered. He tried brutality.
“Looks to me, Arizona, as though you’d lost your nerve.”
The other moistened his lips, but said nothing.
“But the point is,” said the tall cowpuncher, “that you’ve given up before you’re beaten.”
Riley Sinclair’s words brought a flash from Arizona, a sudden lifting of the head, as if he had not before thought of hoping. Then he began to slump back into his former position, without a reply. Sinclair followed his opening advantage at once.
“What you in for?”
“Murder!”
“Great guns! Of whom?”
“Sandersen.”
It brought Sinclair stiffly to his feet. Sandersen! His trail was ended; Hal was avenged at last!
“And you done it? Fatty, you took that job out of my hands. I’m thanking you. Besides, it ain’t nothing to be downhearted about. Sandersen was a skunk. Can they prove it on you?”
The need to talk overwhelmed Arizona. It burst out of him, not to Sinclair, but rather at him. His shifting eyes made sure that no one was near.
“Kern is going to send south for the dope. I’m done for. They can hang me three times on what they’ll learn, and—”
“Shut up,” snapped Sinclair. “Don’t talk foolish. The south is a tolerable big place to send to. They don’t know where you come from. Take ’em a month to find out, and by that time, you won’t be at hand.”
“Eh?”
“Because you and me are going to bust out of this paper jail they got!”
He had not the slightest hope of escape. But he tried the experiment of that suggestion merely to see what the fat man’s reaction would be. The result was more than he could have dreamed. Arizona whirled on him with eyes ablaze.
“What d’you mean, Sinclair?”
“Just what I say. D’you think they can keep two like us in here? No, not if you come to your old self.”
The need to confide again fell on Arizona. He dragged his stool nearer.
His voice was a whisper.
“Sinclair, something’s busted in me. When them irons grabbed my arms they took everything out of me. I got no chance. They got me cornered.”
“And you’ll fight like a wildcat to the end of things. Sure you will! Buck up, man! You think you’ve turned yaller. You ain’t. You’re just out of place. Take a gent that’s used to a forty-foot rope and a pony, give him sixty feet on a sixteen-hand hoss, and ain’t he out of place? Sure! He looks like a clumsy fool. And the other way around it works the same way. A trout may be a flash of light in water, but on dry land he ain’t worth a damn. Same way with you, Fatty. While you got a free foot you’re all right, but when they put you behind a wall and say they’re going to keep you there, you darned near bust down. Why? Because it looks to you like you ain’t got a chance to fight back. So you quit altogether. But you’ll come back to yourself, Arizona. You—”
Arizona raised his hand. He was sitting erect now, drinking in the words of Sinclair, as if they were air to a stifling man. His face worked.
“Why are you doing this for me, Sinclair — after I landed you here?”
“Because I made a man out of you once,” answered the tall man evenly, “and I ain’t going to see you backslide. Why, Arizona, you’re one of the fastest-thinkin’, quickest-handed gents that ever buckled on a gun, and here you are lying down like a kid that ain’t never faced trouble before. Come alive, man. You and me are going to bust this ol’ jail to smithereens, and when we get outside I’ll blow your head off if I can!”
Riley’s words had carried Arizona with him. Suddenly an olive-skinned hand shot out and clutched his own bony, strong fingers. The hand was fat and cold, but it gripped that of Riley Sinclair with a desperate energy.
“Sinclair, you mean it? You’ll play in with me?”
“I will — sure!”
He had to drag the words out, but after he had spoken he was glad. New life shone in the face of Arizona.
“A man with you for a partner ain’t done, Sinclair — not if he had a rope around his neck. Listen! D’you know why I come in town?”
“Well?”
“To get you out.”
“I believe you, Arizona,” lied Sinclair.
“Not for your sake — but hers.”
Sinclair’s face suddenly went white.
“Who?”
“The girl!” whispered Arizona. “I cached her away outside of town to wait for — us! Sinclair, she loves you.”
Riley Sinclair sat as one stunned and dragged the hat from his head.
32
THROUGH THE BRANCHES of the copse in which she was hidden, the girl saw the sun descend in the west, a streak of slowly dropping fire. And now she became excited.
“As soon as it’s dark,” Arizona had promised, “I’ll make my start. Have your hoss ready. Be in the saddle, and the minute you see us come down that trail out of Sour Creek, be ready to feed your hoss the spur and join us, because when we come, we’ll come fast. Don’t make no mistake. If you ride too slow we’ll have to ride slow, too, and slow ridin’ means gunplay on both sides, and gunplay means dead men, because the evenin’ is a pile worse nor the dark for fooling a man’s aim. You’ll see me and Sinclair scoot along that there road, with the gang yellin’ behind us!”
Having made this farewell speech, he waved his hand and, with a smile of confidence, jogged away from her. It was the beginning of a dull day of waiting for her, yet a day in which she dared not altogether relax her vigilance, because at any time the break might come, and Arizona might appear flying down the trail with the familiar tall form of Sinclair beside him. Wearily she waited until sundown.
With the coming of dusk she wakened suddenly and became tinglingly alert. The night spread rapidly down out of the mountains. The color faded, and the sudden chill of the high altitude settled about her. Her hands and her feet were cold with the fear of excitement.
Into the gathering gloom she strained her eyes; toward Sour Creek she strained her ears, starting at every faint sound of a man’s shout or the barking of a dog, as if this might be the beginning of the uproar that would announce the escape.
Something swung on to the road out of the end of the main street. She was instantly in the saddle, but, by the time she reached the edge of the copse, she found it to be only a wagon filled with singing men going back to some nearby ranch. Then quiet dropped over the valley, and she became aware that it was the utter dark.
Arizona had failed! That knowledge grew more surely upon her with every moment. His intention must have been guessed, for she could not imagine that slippery and cold-minded fellow being thwarted, if he were left free to work as he pleased toward an object he desired. She could not stay in the grove all night. Besides, this was the critical time for Riley Sinclair. Tomorrow he would be taken to the security of the Woodville jail, and the end would be close. If anything were done for him, it must be before morning.
With this thought in mind she rode boldly out of the trees and took the road into town, where the lights of the early evening had turned from white to yellow, as the night deepened. Sour Creek was hardly a mile away when a rattling in the dark announced the approach of a buckboard. She drew rein at the side of the trail. Suddenly the wagon loomed out at her, with two down-headed horses jogging along and the loose reins swinging above their backs.
“Halloo!” called Jig.
The brakes ground against the wheels, squeaking in protest. The horses came to a halt so willing and sudden that the collars shoved halfway up their necks, and the tongue of the wagon lurched beyond their noses.
“Whoa! Evening, there! You gimme a kind of a start, stranger.”
Parodying the dialect as well as she was able, Jig said: “Sorry, stranger. Might that be Sour Creek?”
“It sure might be,” said the driver, leaning through the dark to make out Jig. “New in these parts?”
“Yep, I’m over from Whiteacre way, and I’m aiming for Woodville.”
“Whiteacre? Doggone me if it ain’t good to meet a Whiteacre boy. I was raised there, son! Joe Lunids is my name.”
“I’m Texas Lou,” said the girl.
There was a subdued chuckle from the darkness.
“You sound kind of young for a name like that, kid. Leastwise, your voice is tolerable young.”
“I’m old enough,” said Jig aggressively.
“Sure, sure,” placated the other. “Sure you are.”
“Besides,” she went on, “I wanted a name that I could grow up to.”
It brought a hearty burst of laughter from the wagon.
“That’s a good one, Texas. Have a drink?”
She set her teeth over the refusal that had come to her lips and, reining near, reached out for the flask. The driver passed over the bottle and at the same time lighted a match for the apparent purpose of starting his cigarette. But Jig nodded her head in time to obscure her face with the flopping brim of her sombrero. The other coughed his disappointment. She raised the bottle after uncorking it, firmly securing the neck with her thumb. After a moment she lowered it and sighed with satisfaction, as she had heard men do.
“Thanks,” said Jig, handing back the flask. “Hot stuff, partner.”
“You got a tough throat,” observed the rancher. “First I ever see that didn’t choke on a swig of that. But you youngsters has the advantage of a sound lining for your innards.”
He helped himself from the flask, coughed heavily, and then pounded home the cork.
“How’s things up Whiteacre way?”
“Fair to middlin’,” said Jig. “They ain’t hollering for rain so much as they was.”
“I reckon not,” agreed the rancher.
“And how’s things down Sour Creek way?” asked Jig.
“Trouble busting every minute,” said the other. “Murder, gun scrapes, brawls in the hotel — to beat anything I ever see. The town is sure going plumb to the dogs at this rate!”
“You don’t say! Well, I heard something about a gent named Quade being plugged.”
“Him? He was just the beginning — just the start! Since then we had a man took away from old Kern, which don’t happen once in a coon’s age. Then we had a fine fresh murder right this morning, and the present minute they’s two in jail on murder charges, and both are sure to swing!”
Jig gasped. “Two!” she exclaimed.
“Yep. They was a skinny schoolteacher named — I forget what. Most general he was called Cold Feet, which fitted. They thought he killed Quade account of a girl. But a gent named Sinclair up and confessed, and he is waiting for the rope. And then a sheriff all by himself grabbed Arizona for the murder of Sandersen. Oh, times is picking up considerable in Sour Creek. Reminds me of twenty years back before Kern come on the job and cleaned up the gunfighters!”
“Two murders!” repeated the girl faintly. “And has Arizona confessed, too?”
“Not him! But the sheriff has enough to give him a hard run. I got to be drifting on, son. Take my advice and head straight for Woodville. You lack five years of being old enough for Sour Creek these days!” He called his farewell, threw off the brake and cursed the span of horses into their former trot.
As for Jig, she waited until the scent of alkali dust died away, and the rattle of the buckboard was faint in the distance. Then she turned her horse back toward Sour Creek and urged it to a steady gallop, bouncing in the saddle.
There seemed a fatality about her. On her account Sinclair had thrown his life in peril, and now Arizona was caught and held in the same danger. Enough of sacrifices for her; her mind was firm to repay some of these services at any cost, and she had thought of a way.
With that gloomy purpose before her, her ordinary timidity disappeared. It was strange to ride into Sour Creek, and she passed in review among the rough men of the town, constantly fearful that they might pierce her disguise. She had trained herself to a long stride and a swaggering demeanor, and by constant practice she had been able to lower the pitch of her voice and roughen its quality. Yet, in spite of the constant practice, she never had been able to gain absolute self-confidence. Tonight, however, there was no fear in her.
She went straight to the hotel, threw the reins, and walked boldly through the door into a cluster of men. They yelled at the sight of her.
“Jig, by guns! He’s come in! Say, kid, the sheriff’s been looking for you.”
They swerved around her, grinning good-naturedly. When a person has been almost lynched for a crime another has committed, he gains a certain standing, no matter what may be the public opinion of his courage. The schoolteacher had become a personage. But Jig met their smiles with a level eye.
“If the sheriff’s looking for me,” she said, “tell him I have a room in the hotel. He can find me here.”
Pop shook hands before he shoved the register toward her. “My kids will sure be glad to see you safe back,” he said. “And I’m glad, too, Jig.”
Nodding, she turned to sign her name in the bold, free hand which she had cultivated. She could feel the crowd staring behind her, and she could hear their murmurs. But she was not nervous. It seemed that all apprehension had left her.
“Where’s Cartwright?” she asked.
“Sitting in a game of poker.”
“Hello, Buddy!” she called to a redheaded youngster. “Go in and tell
Cartwright that I’m waiting for him in my room, will you?”
“Ain’t no use,” said Pop, staring at this new and more masculine Jig. “Cartwright is all heated up about the game. And he’s lost enough to get anybody excited. He won’t come. Better go in there if you want to see him.”
“I’ll try my luck this way,” said Jig coldly. “Run along, Buddy.”
Buddy obeyed, and Jig went up the stairs to her room.
“What come over him?” asked the crowd, the moment Cold Feet was out of sight. “Looks like he’s growed up in a day!”
“He’s gone through enough to make a man of him,” answered Pop. “Never can tell how a kid will turn out.”
But in her room Jig had sunk into a chair, dropped her elbows on the table, and buried her face in her hands, trying to steady her thoughts. She heard the heavy pounding of feet on the stairs, a strong tread in the hall that made the flooring of the old building quiver, and then the door was flung open, slammed shut, and the key turned in the lock. Cartwright set his shoulders against the door, as though he feared she would try to rush past him. He stared at her, with a queer admixture of fear, rage, and astonishment.
“So I’ve got you at last, eh? I’ve got you, after all this?”
Curiously she stared at him. She had dreaded the interview, but now that he was before her she was surprised to find that she felt no fear. She examined him as if from a distance.
“Yes,” she admitted, “you have me. Will you sit down?”
“I need room to talk,” he said, swaggering to the table. He struck his fist on it. “Now, to start with, what in thunder did you mean by running away?”
“We’re leaving the past to bury the past,” she said. “That’s the first concession you have to make.”
He laughed, his laughter ending with a choked sound. “And why should I make concessions?”
Jig watched the veins of fury swell in his forehead, watched calmly, and then threw her sombrero on the bed and smoothed back her hair, still watching without a change of expression. It seemed as if her calm acted to sober him, and the passing of her hand across the bright, silken hair all at once softened him. He sank into the opposite chair, leaning far across the table toward her.
“Honey, take you all in all, you’re prettier right here in this man’s outfit
that I ever see you — a pile prettier!”
For a moment she closed her eyes. The sacrifice which she intended was becoming harder, desperately hard to make.
“I’m going to take you back and forgive you,” said Cartwright, apparently blind to what was going on in her mind. “I ain’t one to carry malice. You keep to the line from now on, and we’ll get along fine. But you step crooked just once more, and I’ll learn you a pile of things you never even dreamed could happen!”
To her it seemed that he stood in a shaft of consuming light that exposed every shadowy nook and cranny of his nature, and the narrow-minded meanness that she saw, startled her.
“What you do afterward with me is your own affair,” she said. “It’s about the present that I’ve come to bargain.”
“Bargain?”
“Exactly! Do what I ask, and I go back and act as your wife. If you refuse, I walk out of your life forever.”
He could not speak for a moment. Then he exploded.
“It’s funny. I could almost laugh hearing you chatter crazy like this. Don’t you think I got a right to make my own wife come home with me, now that I’ve found her? Wouldn’t the law stand behind me?”
“You can force me to come,” she admitted quietly, “but if you do, I’ll let the whole truth be known that I ran away from you. Can your pride stand that, Jude?”
He writhed. “And how’ll you get around that, even if I don’t make you, and you come back of your own free will?”
“Somehow I’ll manage. I’ll find a story of how I was carried away by half a dozen men who had come to loot the upper rooms of the house, while the wedding party was downstairs. I’ll find a story that will wash.”
“Yes, I think you will,” said Cartwright, breathing heavily. “I sure think you will. You was always a clever little devil, I know! But a bargain! I’d ought to—” He checked himself. “But I’m through with the black talk. When I get you back on the ranch I’ll show you that you can be happy up there. And when you get over your fool notions, you’ll be a wife to be proud of. Now, honey, tell me what you want?”