"It must have cost the original owner a fortune," he mused. "All this furniture could only be brought by ox-wagons across the plains. Why did he sacrifice it?" Miss Lesurge shrugged her shapely shoulders. "Rillick--that was his name--wanted to get away. Another successful miner offered to play him at poker for the property, he setting up a certain sum in gold against it. Rillick accepted and won almost alt the other possessed, nearly doubling his own wealth in one night. After that, he didn't care if he gave the house away." When the guests had retired to their rooms, Paul turned to his sister. "So Rillick gave you the house?" he said.
With a gesture of impatience she got up, opened a drawer and took out a paper. "I paid him a thousand dollars for it," she replied. "Here is the receipt." Lesurge hardly looked at it. "Only that?" The woman's dark eyes flashed. "Only that," she repeated. "What sort of a fellow was he?"
"Youngish, not bad-looking, and worth half a million."
"Why didn't you go?" She flinched as though he had struck her, and then said coldly: I argued that if a fool--and he was one--could clean up as much as that, we could treble it. The old man seems half mad; is he really her relative?"
"No, but she believes him to be, which is all that matters," Paul said. "He's only crazy about gold."
"Then he doesn't know where the mine is?" Lesurge explained the position and when he had finished, she said rather scornfully, "Fagan appears to have blundered. You seem to be fond of half-wits."
"A blunt instrument is useful at times," he told her. "Why did you warn the girl? Have you had trouble?"
"Two days after I arrived here a man grossly insulted me in the street; he was drunk, and a Mexican at that."
"What happened?"
"I stabbed him," she said coolly, and, noting the frown on his face, added, "Oh, there was no fuss. I paid the funeral expenses and was complimented by leading citizens on my pluck. These boors think I'm wonderful." The contempt in her tone was real enough.
Lesurge nodded his satisfaction. "Excellent," he said. "We'll have them eating out of our hands before we're through."
"So the cowboys followed you here?" she asked.
"Yes, but they'll be too busy scrambling for gold to bother us," Paul assured her. "And anyway, Mason is dumb; Green, the black-haired one, might be dangerous; if he gets into the game we'll have to deal with him."
"The girl is pretty--in a way," she said casually, her eyes upon him.
But Paul Lesurge could play poker. "I suppose she is," he replied carelessly. "The kind of 'wild blossom from the prairie' type that a man with brains would tire of in a month."
"For once, I think you are wrong, Paul," she returned. "What is to happen to her?"
"Haven't thought about it," was the nonchalant reply. There Paul Lesurge was guilty of an error, for the woman was well aware that he always planned ahead, and was therefore lying.
"Who is the man with the most influence here?" he asked.
"Reuben Stark, owner of the Monte, the largest of the gambling saloons. He has a number of miners working for him on grubstake terms and that gives him an obedient following."
"Is he a straight man?"
"Are there any?" she asked cynically. "No, I'd say he's as crooked as a dog's hind-leg, but he'll serve your purpose. He rather admires me," she added.
"Splendid!" Lesurge said. "Anyone else."
"Jean Bizet, who runs the Paris in opposition to Stark. A French-Canadian, reputed to be just--but only just," she smiled. "Has a squaw wife, and, curiously enough, worships her. Hickok too is among our distinguished citizens."
"Wild Bill?" Paul cried. "What the devil is he doing here?"
" `Where the carcase is ...' " the woman quoted.
"Hickok is no vulture; he has the name for being square."
"Possibly, but he's not immortal, is he?" Lesurge looked at her; callous as he was, there were times when her cold-bloodedness amazed him.
"No, but one might be excused for thinking so," he replied. "They say he never misses."
"Someone will get him--from behind--one of these days," she shrugged. "In any case, square folk are easier to fool, being straight themselves they are not so suspicious of others."
"Well, let's hope we don't have to try and fool Hickok," was Paul's sinister reply.
Chapter VII
Two weeks passed and the cowboys' store of gold slowly but steadily increased; it was by no means large, but, as Sudden had said, they were able to go on eating. A day or two had exhausted the natural barrier in the stream and then they worked upwards.
"The dust we found has been washed down," Sudden argued, "an' mebbe there's more to come; we'll save it the trouble." There was more, in no great quantity, but sufficient to be worth while. The task of getting it was arduous in the extreme.
"For real work thls job has a round-up beat to a frazzle," Mason complained. "What's the good o' cash yu got no chance to spend?" For since they usually arrived home too tired to do more than eat and tumble into their blankets, Deadwood had seen nothing of them. This was not the first hint Mason had offered and Sudden knew that a desire for relaxation was not the real reason.
"1 guess we've earned a holiday," he said. "We'll slick up to-night an' give the town a treat." Accordingly, the evening found them mixing with the stream of humanity which thronged the sidewalks, shouting noisy greetings in a medley of tongues, singing raucous songs, jostling one another as they entered or left the various places of entertainment. Again Sudden experienced one of those incidents which he was quite unable to explain. A roistering miner staggered out of a saloon, barged into him and went down. With an oath he picked himself up and was feeling for his gun when a shaft of light from the swinging door lit up the cowboy's countenance. The man stared, his hand fell to his side, and with a mumbled apology, he turned away.
Sudden looked at his companion in bewilderment.
"What do yu know about that?" he asked. "The fella was goin' to perforate me an' the sight of my face scared him cold." This was too good an opening. "What surprises me is that it surprises yu," Mason grinned. "Ain't yu never used a mirror? Yore face would make a grizzly turn tail."
"Yu chatterin' chump," Sudden said. "Let's go in here."
"Pull yore hat well down, we don't want to start a stampede," Gerry retorted.
The Paris Saloon was packed with people. Most of those present were men but there was a sprinkling of the other sex, women of various ages, whose expensive attire displayed their charms with some freedom, who drank and gambled with their male escorts and laughed with their painted lips and never with their eyes.
One half of the floor space in front of the long bar was devoted to games of chance, of which a roulette board attracted most attention. The other half contained the customary tables and chairs. Threading a way through the latter, the cowboys arrived at the bar and at once a dapper little man with twinkling eyes, dark crinkly hair, and a pointed beard, stepped up.
"Gentlemen, I am pleas' to welcome you," he greeted. "I have live wit' de cow, yes, bien sur, I, Jean Bizet, when I cook for de Cross T on de Canadian Border. Ah, dose sacre mule, dey nearly pull de arm out. You dreenk wit' me?" He chattered on, recalling incidents of the range. "Ah, it was de good days," he said. "Sometimes I regret, but a man must move, not so? If he stay one place all de while he get--how you say--ver' rusty." They returned his hospitality and Sudden told him they must get on--they were looking for someone. The little man's face sobered.
"Dat soun' bad," he said. "What he done?" Sudden laughed. "He's just a friend; we ain't on the warpath," he explained.
Bizet laughed too. "I mak' mistake. I am glad. W'en a man look for another it sometime mean trouble. You come again?"
"Shore we will," Sudden said heartily.
They had almost reached the door when it swung back to admit a man who would have attracted attention in any gathering. Over six feet in height, with a perfectly proportioned frame, he moved with the ease and grace of an athlete. The yellowish hair which reached to his shou
lders, pale blue eyes, long drooping moustache, and clean-cut features were offset by a calm confidence and dignity of bearing which stamped their possessor as no ordinary individual.
His attire added to the impression. A tailed cutaway coat of dark cloth, wide trousers narrowing towards the feet, a fancy vest, high-heeled boots, and a "boiled" shirt with a narrow black tie. Buckled round his middle was a leather belt with two white-handled Colt's revolvers.
The hum of conversation ceased at his appearance and every eye followed him as he stepped quietly, with a nod here and there, to where Bizet was standing. The little Frenchman hurried to meet him.
"Who is that?" Sudden asked a bystander.
The man's eyebrows lifted. "Say, friend, where you been hidin'?" he asked. "It's Wild Bill, o' course--thought everybody knowed him."
"I'm a stranger here," Sudden explained, and led the way to the street.
For a while he was silent, his mind full of the man they had just seen. Wild Bill, the most famous gunman in the West. Sudden found himself dwelling on the big man's draw, wondering if he himself could beat it. Then he laughed; Sudden, the gunfighter, had been left behind; here, he was just Jim Green, a cowpuncher and miner. Mason's voice broke in:
"Yu'd never take him for a killer, would yu? Looked just an ordinary fella."
"An' why not? D'yu expect every man who shoots another in self-defence to have the brand o' Cain burned on his forehead?" Sudden retorted, with unusual bitterness.
"I've seen some what didn't need no brand," Mason answered, and changed the subject. "Wonder why that s'loonkeeper hombre was so dern glad to see us?"
"One cattleman is allus pleased to meet up with another," his friend said. "I've a hunch he's white. Here's another big joint; let's go in an' see if we can scare up a Waysider." The Monte--like the opposition establishment--was full and with the same class of customer. It was a replica of the other on a rather larger and more showy scale. Despite the crowded state of the room, they experienced no difficulty in reaching the bar--people seemed almost eager to make way for them--and Sudden again had the uneasy feeling that he was the object of general interest. Mason was grinning.
"Yu might be Wild Bill hisself these toughs is so perlite," he remarked.
"And yu might be King Solomon if yu had any brains a-tall," Sudden told him. "Lesurge an' Angel-face seem to have got themselves some friends." They were sitting at a table in a far corner and with them were several others, notably a fat, blond fellow, flashily dressed, with a heavy watch-guard made of gold nuggets slung across his vest. Interested as he was in the conversation, his pig-like eyes roamed restlessly round the room and he saw all that was taking place.
"Reuben Stark, the owner o' this shebang," Sudden informed. "Dunno the others but I'll gamble they ain't cyphers in this city o' sin. Mister Lesurge don't waste his time an' he's whirlin' a wide loop. I'm goin' to buck the tiger." They strolled over to the roulette table and again they had no trouble in getting near to it though there were plenty of eager speculators. The puncher won about forty dollars in a few careless throws and to the surprise of his companion, cashed in and turned away.
"But, Jim, luck's tannin' yore way," he protested.
"That's when to stop," the other replied.
He had fully expected to hear jeers at his lack of nerve from some of the coarse-faced, half-intoxicated men around him, but not even a shoulder was shrugged.
"You got this town tamed," Mason remarked, and hid a smile. "Yu oughta be in a show, puttin' the lions through their tricks."
"It has me beat," Sudden said. "Wonder where Snowy is?" They met him outside and he greeted them with boisterous expressions of goodwill. He reeked of whisky, but there was no slur in his speech, no unsteadiness in his gait. It was Snowy's boast that he was never drunk until his back teeth were submerged.
"Paul about?" he asked, when he had informed Mason that Miss Ducane was "fighting fit. "
"He's inside, with Stark an' some others," Sudden told him. Snowy nodded. "One smart guy, Paul," he said. "Won't be long afore he's runnin' thisyer burg an' it's shorely time somebody took a holt, the killin's an' robberies is gittin' too mighty prevalent."
"Found yore mine yet, Snowy?" Gerry inquired.
"No, young fella, an' I ain't going to look for it till we got some sort o' protection. It'll keep; I ain't in no hurry."
"Some other jasper may light on it," Gerry persisted. "'Tain't likely, but if it did happen that way I'd get me another; I can allus find gold--I smell it." With a wild laugh he pushed open the door of the saloon, turned and whispered, "Keep handy," and vanished.
"Mad as a loon," Mason decided.
"I ain't so shore," his friend replied. "What I can't savvy is why folks side-step me like I was a rattler?" He got the solution to the problem a few nights later as he was returning from the store where they obtained their supplies. A thin, weedy shrimp of a man, whom he recognized as one of the group with Lesurge in the Monte, stopped him.
"Say, Mister Green, c'n I have a word with you?" he asked. The man shuffled his feet and cast an oblique glance at a nearby dive. Obviously he did not want to talk in the open, and Sudden therefore determined that he should.
"I ain't drinkin'," he said. "Yu can trail along o' me an' sing yore song. I'm shy yore name."
"Berg," the other replied, and then went on with a rush, "You know Bill Hickok? Well, he don't like you."
"No reason why he should, we've never met."
"Mebbe, but he says he's goin' to get you--heard him my own self, an' so did others." The cowpuncher cogitated over this amazing statement and then, "What's he sore about?" he inquired.
"Sore nothin'," was the reply. "You know what these biggunmen are. He's cock o' the walk around here an' he ain't goin' to let anyone else crow, that's what."
"But why pick on me--I ain't let out a chirp?"
"Hell, he's scared--yo're Sudden, ain't you?" The puncher stopped as though one of Wild Bill's bullets had struck him. Then his iron nerve came to his aid. "Sudden?" he sneered. "Where'd yu get that fool notion?"
"Why, all the town knows," Berg retorted. "Yore pard told young Ginger when you stopped him baitin' of Jacob." This cleared the air somewhat but not entirely; how did Gerry know? Sudden had never breathed a word of his past. He turned to the man who had flung this bombshell at him.
"My pard was joshin'--he's a born humorist," he said.
Berg smiled sourly. "He'll be a dead humorist when the boys find out an' if you owed me money I'd be askin' for it now," he said with sinister emphasis.
Sudden knew it was true; the town would never forgive what it must regard as a deliberate imposture.
"So yu are here to warn me, just a kindly act, huh?"
"I came to warn you, yes, an' give you a chance o' pickin' up a nice piece o' change. There's big men in Deadwood who got no use for Hickok. Put him outa business--any way you choose--an' there'll be a thousand bucks for you an' no comeback, see?" The cowboy's fists bunched at this infamous proposal but he controlled his anger and asked coolly, "Who are these big men?"
"I ain't sayin'," was the expected reply. "Put the job over an' the cash will be ready for you at my shack." The cowpuncher glanced round; they were clear of the street and had almost reached Jacob's cabin. With a quick snatch he had the other by the throat.
"Yu dirty rat," he rasped, and shook him till the teeth of the wretch rattled in his jaws. "So yu take me for a hired killer? I'd twist yore rotten neck if I hadn't a use for yu. Go back to the cowards that sent yu an' tell 'em to come along an' I'll kill 'em one after the other--for nothin'." With a powerful thrust he hurled the almost senseless form into the dust and strode away. His frowning face when he entered the cabin apprised his friend that something was wrong.
"Been fightin'?" he asked.
"No," came the snapped answer. "What possessed yu to tell that fool boy I was 'Sudden'?" Gerry started to grin but changed his mind. "It seemed a good jape to put over on him andeg mebbe saved a ruckus," he explain
ed. "I couldn't know he'd chatter but it's goin' to make things easy for us, seemin'ly."
"It's goin' to make things damned difficult. Why did yu pick on Sudden?"
"I'd heard of him; he's a Texas outlaw an' the least likely to show up, I figured. Yu ain't tellin' me he's here?"
"I am--just that," Sudden retorted, grimly gratified at the result the statement produced.
The boy's face became a picture of consternation as he realized that his little comedy was likely to have a tragic ending. "My Gawd, Jim, I'm sorry," he groaned. "By all accounts, he's reckoned the worst hell-raiser in the south-west, a heartless hound who shoots folk just to see 'em kick. I guess yu'd better head for the woods an' let me take the medicine--I got yu in the jam." His perturbed gaze rested on the other. "Yu certain he's here?"
"Dead shore," was the reply, and with a hard smile, "Yo're lookin' at him."
"Quit it, Jim, this ain't no time for foolin',"
"I am givin' it to yu straight," was the harsh answer. "I am the man they call 'Sudden,' outlawed in Texas, an' lied about everywhere else." He waited for the expected look of repulsion, but Gerry's face expressed only astonishment, admiration and relief.
"Then it's all right," he cried, and grinned widely. "No call for yu to run away from yoreself."
"That's what I was tryin' to do when I came here," Sudden said moodily. "'Pears it can't be done. No, Gerry, it ain't all right, it's all wrong--for yu." He hesitated a moment. "We will have to tread different trails."
"Not on yore life," Mason said instantly. "We're pards, an' I'm stick in' to yu like a tick on a cow, that's whatever." Sudden shook his head, but he saw the boy was in earnest and made no further protest. That he could count on one friend dispelled some of the gloom which had enveloped him when he learned his evil reputation had, by a mere chance, dogged him even to far-off Deadwood.
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