by Max Brand
I heard the stealthy motions of Lucas — then there was the scratch of a match and a sudden fizzing sound. Lucas was suddenly at my side.
“Flat on the floor, kid!” he said.
I had barely time to obey when we heard a thick, stifled sound of thunder. No, it was rather like the exhalation of a gigantic breath that shook the building, rattled the glass, and seemed to make the very earth tremble.
By the time I had risen to my feet, I could see Lucas by the light of his own torch yanking open the drawers of the interior of the safe — and outside, the street seemed to be sleeping as peaceful as before.
No, yonder a light winked on in a window. Yonder, too, was the sound of a slammed door. Had some one come out to listen? Or were they coming to investigate?
I slipped back to Lucas with this information. He did not hear me. He was throwing bundle after bundle of greenbacks into the yawning mouth of a sack.
He talked in a chattering voice like a man with chills. “It’s big! Oh, kid, it’s big! We’re made! We’re fixed for life, I tell you!”
Suddenly a hand began to beat on the front door of the bank. But Lucas was already prepared to leave, or nearly so. In another instant he had scooped up the last of the bundles and thrown it into his bulging sack. Then he sped back through the building as we had come.
We darted through the rear door and flew across the open toward our horses at the same time that a chorus of voices began to rise. Then a crash told us that the door to the bank had been beaten in.
We were already nearing the cottonwoods when half a dozen men, spilling around the back of the bank, sang out, “There they go!” and a gun cracked.
“Send a couple of slugs that way and scatter the fools!” called Lucas.
I whirled around obediently and fired three times into the air. I saw the pursuers scatter right and left. At the same time, I heard the crashing of a horse through shrubbery, and, turning my head, I saw two strange things. The first was that Mr. Lucas had rushed his horse out of sight through the undergrowth and trees toward the ford. The second was that my own chestnut mare was running loose with dangling reins!
One does not need a translator to tell one what has happened in the mind of another man at such a time as this. I saw that the haul had been of such huge proportions that the slender honor of Lucas had buckled under the weight of it. I was to get nothing but the jail for my small share of this adventure. Truly it had been, as he had said, a one-man job.
In the meantime, the scoundrel had slashed the reins of my mare and chased her away with a wave of his hand. Yonder she galloped! Behind came the men of the town with a rush. Aye, there was the roar of the hoofs of half a dozen galloping horses turning out of the street of the village and swinging toward me across the fields.
Nothing could have saved me, then, except the ten days which I had spent with that fine creature in the solitude of the clearing near the house of Lawton. For now, when she heard my voice, in spite of the uproar behind me, and in spite of the hornetlike singing of the bullets which a dozen guns were spitting at us, she wheeled around and literally swung back toward me with her beautiful long mane flying like smoke about her head.
I went into that saddle like a leaping wild cat. I struck somehow, and I stuck somehow. I had her switched around and flying for the creek before I was in the saddle. As I gained the saddle and jammed my feet into the stirrups, I saw that I had rushed upon more trouble.
Lucas had been right in one thing, at least. The creek was not fordable except at the spot between the two willows. It was not even approachable on either side of that spot. There the banks gave down easily on either side. But beyond that favored point, the banks were sheer walls. I had sent the mare forward, however, at such a sprinting gait that I could not check her now. Before me there was what seemed to me a frightful chasm of darkness. But I had no alternative. I drove the spurs in and raised her at that terrible chasm. She, like the great heart that she was, answered with a snort of effort and flung herself high and far.
As we hung in the mid-leap, I was sure that we would crash down in the middle of the glinting water far beneath us, but she had a wonderful carry in her effort. We shot on, and her forefeet struck the solid level beyond. Only her back quarters crushed suddenly in behind me as the crumbling edge of the bank gave way beneath the shock of her weight.
I threw myself out of the saddle and cast back my weight on the reins.
It was enough. With that anchoring weight tugging at her head, scrambling like a cat, she came to her feet. I had the ends of the broken reins in my hand in an instant, and off we went.
I did not flee straightway, because the pursuit was coming up on wings. Instead, I bore to the right, and effectually put a screen of shadowy trees between me and the rifles.
But this maneuver had given me an immense gain in time. The horsemen rushed first at the point where I had attempted to leap across — convinced, no doubt, that they would find my horse and me struggling in the waters.
When they found that they were wrong and that I had escaped by a miracle, they had to ride up to the ford, go down to the stream, walk their horses slowly among the stretch of rapid current and dangerous rocks, climb up the steep, slippery slope beyond, and all this before they could begin to ride at speed.
By that time, when I turned my head as I galloped and looked back, I saw a barely perceptible line of shadows break away from the low wall of trees over the creek. I had a pretty thorough conviction that no horse in the world could catch up with the chestnut once she had such a flying start.
I let her fly. Just as dim before me as the pursuit was behind, I saw the form of Lucas. The rascal was well mounted, but there was such a vast rage in me that I think I could have made my horse overtake a veritable eagle. Let no man tell me that the rider cannot transform his mount! The mare that night was inspired, and it was my transcending passion which lifted her to the heights.
XVIII. CORNERING THE RAT
AT LAST I ranged beside Lucas.
“All right, kid,” said he. “When I saw the mare rear back and break the reins, I thought you were done for. There wasn’t no good in me staying to get caught, too. So I came along.”
I said nothing. I could not have spoken. Something in the ratlike furtiveness with which he jerked his head toward me made me see that he meditated something more than pleasant words.
I ran my thumb over the ends of the reins and made sure, by the glossy smoothness of the leather, that a knife had done the work. No break can possibly take place, of course, without leaving ragged edges.
I decided that it might not be a bad idea to give him a bit of warning.
I said: “I’m keeping an eye on you, Lucas. If you make a queer move, I’ll shoot you through the head.”
Mr. Lucas said not a word in reply. He merely busied himself with the work of getting his horse along as fast as possible. I reined the chestnut half a stride behind him — with my gun always ready — my nerves steady as iron, and my heart as cold as ice with fury.
That sprint across the level seemed to take the heart out of the pursuit. They had lost the sight of me, and when Lucas swung his horse to the right and galloped away to the north behind the screening hills, there was not one chance in a thousand that they would be able to pick up the trail.
Lucas seemed to realize it fully as well as I did. He did not maintain that killing pace for another mile, but checked his gelding to an easy jog trot.
Through all the hours that remained of that night we never stopped our journeying. Sometimes the horses walked. Sometimes they trotted. Now and again we let them roll forward in a canter.
In the meantime, I was thinking hard and fast. Back in my mind the hatred of Lucas was as fixed as ever. But I could suppress it enough to make other conclusions for myself.
A bank was no impersonal thing which could afford to give up a huge sum of cash. My own small fortune was in a bank. Suppose that a pair of rascals like Lucas and myself were to gut the vault of
that bank in Mendez? Then if the bank failed — as it unquestionably would — where would my fortune be? But that was not all. I was a single man. I could bear the loss. What of the sick and the poor whose small savings were pooled in banks? What of the small ranchers by the score who doubtless depended on their loans from that same bank to carry them through the lean winter season?
We were drifting toward the region of Lawton’s home, and it was the nearness to that place that put the first idea into my head.
Now Lucas stopped, dismounted, and kindled a small fire.
“Sit down with me, kid,” said he.
I slipped from the saddle. The good mare followed me and stood over me. On one side of the fire was Lucas. On the other was I, and between us the wind-harried flames leaped and were flattened, and tossed into struggling waves. Lucas dumped the contents of the sack upon the ground and counted the bills in each package one by one — each package secured by a wrapper of stiff brown paper.
The first two packets were one-dollar bills, and he cursed heavily as he counted thema hundred dollars in each. Then came a wad of hundreds. Twenty-five hundred in that little batch! Some fifties were next — and then a hoarse cry from Lucas. He had struck a pack of thousand-dollar bills!
I listened to his chanting, drunken voice in a daze while the sum mounted to twenty thousand, to thirty.
“Fifty thousand dollars!” screamed Lucas. “And we ain’t a third of the way through!”
No, we were hardly a quarter of the way through the pile. For when that count ended, Mr. Steve Lucas had cried out: “A hundred and eighty-nine thousand dollars! Oh, kid, we’re made! Do we take this to Tex? What right has he got to it? Didn’t we turn the trick? Didn’t we? We split this half and half — and then we beat it! Am I right?”
He licked his thin lips, and then looked at me with a gaping grin.
Then the hate in me turned into words. I stood up and said: “I’ve thought it all over and decided where we’re going with that coin. We’re going to go to the house of Lawton. You understand? We’re going to go there, and when we get there, I’m going to leave you and the coin in his hands!”
The eyes of Lucas widened as though he had seen a nightmare.
“D’you mean that?” he gasped.
“I mean it. You tried to double cross me a while back — outside the bank.”
“You’re off your nut. What would Cummins do? He’d never stop till he snagged you!”
“To the devil with Cummins and you and the rest of the slimy crooks!” I said to Lucas. “Get up and get on your horse. Or else grab your gun.”
I wanted him to take his gun. There was nothing in the world that I wanted so much, for I had an inborn surety that I would kill this rat of a man if it came to a fight. He seemed to know it, too. He looked at me through another white-faced moment. Then he stood up without a word and went to his gelding.
He had his left hand raised to the pommel of his saddle and his left foot in the stirrup — certainly a seemingly helpless situation — when he made his play. He flung himself back against the neck and shoulder of his horse and, snatching out his revolver as he whirled, he fired point-blank at me.
His own swinging weight beat him. The shock of his body against the gelding made the horse stagger a little, and that stagger threw the bullet wide. I had snapped out my own gun and fired a split part of a second after him, and Lucas dropped to the ground with a scream. There he lay writhing and twisting and sobbing and shrieking with agony.
I could hardly uncurl his body to see what damage my bullet had done, and then I saw that he was frightfully wounded indeed! The slug had torn through both forearms. It had ripped through his right arm and then, flying up, it had smashed the wrist bones on his left hand against the steel pommel of his saddle.
While he lay there damning me, inviting my soul to the most furious deeps of hell, I made as good a bandage as I could and took a hard twist around each arm halfway between elbow and wrist. That turned his arms numb and stopped the bleeding. Then I took him in my arms and slung him into his saddle.
He sat there crying like a child with the unspeakable agony of those wounds. Then I took the reins of his horse, mounted my chestnut mare, and led him on.
We were half a mile from the house of the sheriff when he began to beg, and the rest of that ride was the most grueling experience in my life. I had to listen to that poor devil tell me that I was taking him to his death — that they would be sure to hang him — that I had ruined him already with my bullet, and that that was punishment enough.
Perhaps it was, but there was a cruel devil in my heart that night. The shock of seeing my mare running loose with dangling reins while the townsmen rushed at me across the field had not left me. It had not left me to this moment. I cannot honestly say that I have the slightest regard for the manner in which I treated the yegg.
Just before the house of Lawton he threw himself out of the saddle. He swore that he would lie there, but I merely paused to tie the horse to a tree. Then I threw him over my shoulder like a sack of wheat and walked on, carrying the bag of money in my other hand.
When I came to the front door of Lawton’s house, I found it unlocked. I suppose it never had come into the brain of that brave and famous fighter that any criminal would dare to invade his very premises! I walked through the big living room and past the dining table and kicked open the door to his room. That noise and the groaning of my prisoner, which began again at that moment, brought the form of Lawton leaping out of his bed.
“It’s Leon Porfilo,” I called to him, “and I’ve brought you a prisoner.”
I added: “I’ve got my gun ready, Lawton, and I’ve got you covered. If you’ll promise to listen to me talk and let me go safe out of your house, we’ll do business.”
He answered me with a torrent of curses; then a bit of silence.
“I’ll talk to you, the devil take your hide!” said Lawton. “Wait till I light that lamp.”
He came out half dressed and lighted the lamp in the living room while I lowered my man into a chair. Lawton gave him one glance and then grinned like a bull terrier seeing trouble ahead.
“My old friend Lucas!” chuckled the sheriff. “Welcome home, son!”
Lucas, seeing the gallows before him, shrank into his chair and forgot the pain of his wounds.
First of all we washed and dressed his arms. Then Lawton locked him in the next room at my request. There was no danger of him attempting to escape. Those shattered arms and hands could not have so much as turned the knob of a door.
After that we sat down in the living room, and the sheriff regarded me with a calm wonder, if I can use such a word.
“I’ve seen queer ones, kid,” said he, “but I’m darned if I ever seen the equal of you. What d’you mean by bringing in that rat? You and him joined company and then had a fight?”
“Are you glad to have him?” I asked.
“He’s better’n a Christmas cake to me,” grinned the sheriff. “What’s in that sack?”
“A hundred and eighty-nine thousand dollars,” said I.
I could not help smiling as the sheriff slumped into a chair and gaped at me.
“Well,” said Lawton at last, “lemme see the inside of it.”
I tossed the sack toward him. The bottom of it struck the floor and spilled about the feet of Lawton a tide of wealth. He fairly turned white at the thought of so much money.
“Where did you get it?” he gasped.
“From the Crockett National Bank,” said I.
“I’m gonna go nutty in another minute,” said the sheriff. “What does it mean, kid?”
“It means that I started to go wrong,” said I, “and that I don’t like the inside lining of that sort of a life. We got this loot, and we started away. Now here it is back again. That’s clear, I guess?”
The sheriff pushed the money reverently back into the sack. “Kid,” said he, “I got nothin’ to say. Except — what are you?”
“A gent
that’s trying to go straight,” said I. “Here’s my first payment. Will it go?”
“I dunno,” sighed the sheriff. “I’ve worked for twenty years grabbing crooks and talking to ’em after they was grabbed. But I never met none of them like you! Tell me what you want me to do, and tell me in words of one syllable, because I can’t understand nothing special hard right now.”
I did as he had asked. I told him that I had brought in Lucas because I had seen, during my ride, exactly what a bank robbery might mean to a thousand poor people.
Besides, I did not like the dirty ways in which crooked money was made. I told him, also, of the way in which Lucas had tried to double cross me in my time of greatest peril, and how I had managed to overtake him.
To all of this the sheriff listened with the greatest attention. The shock of surprise was diminishing, and he was able to follow all that I had to say with a shrewd attention.
“The main point that I see right now,” said Lawton, as I finished, “is that you are square, kid! Besides, I ain’t forgot that after you dropped my two pals the other day, you risked your neck to ride into town and send out the doctor. It saved the life of Jackson. There ain’t any doubt that another ten minutes without a doctor’s help would have been the end of him. But, son, even if I know you’re square, what can be done about it?”
“I don’t know,” said I wretchedly.
“The point is,” said he, “that no matter what you and I know, other folks don’t see nothing except that you been condemned to prison for a murder, that you’ve broke jail, and that you’ve shot three men since — to say nothin’ of this here rat, Lucas. We throw him in for velvet, you might say! What can be done for you?”
“I’ve got to have money if I’m going to live,” said I.
“In a small way, I could give you a hand — when I ain’t hunting you down!” He sighed and shook his head, very much perplexed.
“I have an idea of a manner in which I can make plenty of money from time to time,” said I.
“Well,” said he, “lemme hear you tell the way.”