"Fine glad day, ain't it?" Yeager opened gayly. "Great the way friends meet in this little old world."
"What are you doing here?" demanded the prizefighter, his chin jutting forward and down.
"Me! I'm losing my wad at stud. Want to stake me?"
Harrison turned to Pasquale. "Know who he is? Know anything about him, general?"
"Only what he has told me, señor."
"And that is?"
"That he worked for the moving-picture company at Los Robles, that he is out of a job, and that he wants to try the revolutionary game, as you Americans say."
"Don't you believe it. Don't believe a word of it," broke out Harrison stormily. "He's a spy. That's what he is."
Smiling, Steve cut in. "What have I come to spy about, Harrison?"
"You told Threewit that you thought General Pasquale had those cattle. You may deny it, but—"
"Why should I deny it?" Yeager turned genially to the insurgent chief. "You don't deny it, do you, general?"
Pasquale laughed. He liked the cheek of this young man. "I deny nothing and I admit nothing." He swept his hand around in a gesture of indifference. "My vaqueros herd cattle I have bought. Possibly rustlers sold them to me. Maybeso. I ask no questions."
"Nor I," added Yeager promptly. "At least, not many. I eat the beef and find it good. You ought to have got a good price for a nice fat bunch like that, Harrison."
"What d'you mean by that?" The man's fists were clenched. The rage was mounting in him.
"Forget it, Harrison! You've quit the company. You're across the line and among friends. No use keeping up the bluff. I know who held me up. If I'm not hos-tile about it, you don't need to be."
The prizefighter flung at him the word of insult that no man in the fighting West brooks. Before Steve could speak or move, Pasquale hammered the table with his heavy, hairy fist.
"Maldito!" he roared. "Is it so you talk to my friends in my own house, Señor Harrison?"
The rustler, furious, turned on him. But even in his rage he knew better than to let his passion go. The insurgent chief was more dangerous than dynamite in a fire. Purple with anger, Harrison choked back the volcanic eruption.
"Friend! I tell you he's a spy, general. This man killed Mendoza. He's here to sell you out."
The sleek black head of Culvera swung quickly round till his black eyes met the blue ones of Yeager. He flung his hand straight out toward the Anglo-Saxon.
"Mil diablos! What a dolt I am. It's the very man, and I've been racking my brain to think where I met him before."
Yeager laughed hardily. "I've got a better memory, señor. Knew you the moment I set eyes on you, though it was some smoky when we last met."
Culvera rose, his knuckles pressing against the table. There was a faint smile of triumph, on his masked, immobile face.
"Farewell, Señor Yeager," he said softly. "After all, it's a world full of hardship and unpleasantness. You're well rid of it."
Steve knew his sole appeal lay in Pasquale. Ochampo was a nonentity. Both Harrison and Culvera had already condemned him to death. He turned quietly to the insurgent leader.
"How about it, general? Do I get a pass to Kingdom Come—because I stood by a half-grown kid when two blacklegs were robbing him?"
"You shot Mendoza, eh?" demanded Pasquale, his heavy brows knit in a frown.
"No; I helped the boy escape who did."
"You were both employed by the enemy to murder him and Culvera—not so?"
"Nothing of the sort. Young Seymour was in a poker game with Culvera and Mendoza. They were cross-lifting him—and playing with a cold deck at that. I warned the kid. They began shooting. I could have killed either of them, but I blew out the lights instead. In self-defense the boy shot Mendoza. We escaped through the door. The trouble was none of our seeking."
Culvera shrugged his shoulders and spread his hands in a gesture of bland denial. "Lies! All lies, general. Have I not already told you the truth?"
Coldly Pasquale pronounced judgment. "What matter which one shot Mendoza. Both were firing. Both escaped together. Both are equally guilty." He clapped his hands. A trooper entered. "'Tonio, get a guard and take this man to prison. See that he is kept safe. To-morrow at dawn he will be shot."
The trooper withdrew. Pasquale continued evenly. "We have one rule, Señor Yeager. He who kills one of us is our enemy. If we capture him, that man dies. Fate has shaken the dice and they fall against you. So be it. You pay forfeit."
Yeager nodded. He wasted no breath in useless protest against the decision of this man of iron. What must be, must. A plea for mercy or for a reversal of judgment would be mere weakness.
"If that's the way you play the game there's no use hollering. I'll take my medicine, because I must. But I'll just take one little flyer of a guess at the future, general. If you don't put friend Culvera out of business, it will presently be, 'Good-night, Pasquale.' He's a right anxious and ambitious little lieutenant, I shouldn't wonder."
Harrison triumphed openly. He followed out of the house the file of soldiers who took his enemy away.
"Told you I'd git even a-plenty, didn't I?" he jeered. "Told you I'd make you sweat blood, Mister Yeager. Good enough. You'll see me in a box right off the stage to-morrow morning when the execution set is pulled off. Adios, my friend!"
The cowpuncher was thrust into a one-room, flat-roofed adobe hut. The door was locked and a guard set outside. The prison had for furniture a three-legged stool and a rough, home-made table. In one corner lay a couple of blankets upon some straw to serve for a bed. The walls of the house, probably a hundred years old at least, were of plain, unplastered adobe. The fireplace was large, but one glance up the narrow chimney proved the futility of any hope of escape in that direction.
He was caught, like a rat in a trap. Yet somehow he did not feel as if it could be true that he was to be taken out at daybreak and shot. It must be some ridiculous joke Fate was playing on him. Something would turn up yet to save him.
But as the hours wore away the grim reality of his position came nearer home to him. He had only a few hours left. From his pocket he took a notebook and a pencil. It was possible that Pasquale would let him send a letter through to Threewit if it gave some natural explanation of his death, one that would relieve him of any responsibility. Steve tore out a page and wrote, standing under the little shaft of moonlight that poured through the small barred window:—
Fifteen minutes ago [so he wrote] I accidentally shot myself while target-practicing here in camp. They say I won't live more than a few hours. By the courtesy of General Pasquale I am getting a letter through to you, which is to be sent after my death. Give bearer ten dollars in gold.
Say good-bye for me to Frank, Daisy, and the rest. Bust up that marriage if you can.
Adios, my friend.
Steve Yeager.
He was searching in his pocket for an envelope when there came a sound that held him rigid. Some one was very carefully unlocking the door of his prison from the outside. Stealthily he drew back into the deep shadow at the farther end of the room, picking up noiselessly by one leg the stool by the table. It was possible that some one had been sent to murder him.
The grinding of the key ceased. Slowly the door opened inch by inch. A man's head was thrust through the opening. After a long time of silence a figure followed the head and the door was closed again.
"You may put down that weapon, Señor Yeager. I have not come to knife you."
The lower half of the man's face was covered by a fold of his serape, the upper part was shaded by his sombrero. Only the glittering eyes could be plainly seen.
"Why have you come?"
"To talk with you—perhaps to save you. Quien sabe?"
Yeager put down the stool and gave it a shove across the floor. "Will you take a seat, general? Sorry I can't offer you refreshments, but the truth is I'm not exactly master in my own house."
Pasquale dropped the serape from his face and moved forward. "So y
ou knew me?"
"Yes."
"How much will you give for your life?" demanded the Mexican abruptly, sitting down on the stool with his back to the table.
"As much as any man."
The general eyed him narrowly. One sinewy brown hand caressed the butt of a revolver hanging at his hip.
"Who paid you to murder Culvera and Mendoza—not Farrugia, surely?" Pasquale shot at him, eyes gleaming under shaggy brows.
Garcia Farrugia was the Federal governor of the province, the general with whom Pasquale had been fighting for a year.
"No—not Farrugia."
The insurrecto chief, sprawling in the moonlight with his back against the table, nodded decisively.
"I thought as much. He's no fool. Garcia knows it would not weaken me to lose both of them, that my grief would not be inconsolable. Who, then, if not Farrugia?"
"Nobody. I'm not an assassin. The story I told you is the truth, general."
"If that is true, Ramon Culvera's lies have brought you to your death."
The Mexican still sprawled with an arm flung across the table. Not a muscle of his lax body had grown more taut. But the eyes of the man—the terrible eyes that condemned men to their graves without a flicker of ruth—were fixed on the range-rider with a steady compulsion filled with hidden significance.
"Yes." Steve waited, alert and watchful. Presently he would understand what this grim, virile old scoundrel was driving at.
"You fought him in the open. You played your cards above the table. He comes back at you with a cold deck. Señor, do you love Ramon like a brother?"
"Of course not. If I could get at him before—"
The rigor of the black eyes boring into those of Yeager did not relax. The impact of them was like steel grinding on steel.
"Yes? If you could get at him? What, then, señor?"
The words were hissed across the room at the American. Pasquale was no longer lounging. He leaned forward, body tense and rigid. His prisoner understood that an offer for his life was being made him. But what kind of an offer? Just what was he to do?
"Say it right out in plain United States talk, general. What is it you want me to do?"
"Would you kill Ramon Culvera—to save your own life?"
After barely an instant's hesitation Steve answered. "Yep. I'll fight him to a finish—any time, any place."
"Bueno! But there will be no risk for you. He will be summoned from his house to-night. You will stand in the darkness outside. One thrust of the knife and—you will be avenged. A saddled horse is waiting for you now in the cottonwood grove opposite. Before we get the pursuit started you will be lost in the darkness miles away."
The heart of Yeager sank. The thing he was being asked to do was plain murder. Even to save his own life he could not set his hand to such a contract.
"I can't do that, general. But I'll pick a quarrel with him. I'll take a chance on even terms."
"No—no!" Pasquale's voice was harsh and imperative. "The dog is plotting my murder. But first he wants to make sure he is strong enough to succeed me. So he waits. But I—Gabriel Pasquale—I wait for no man's knife. I strike first—and sure. You execute the traitor and save your own life which is forfeit. Caramba! Are you afraid?"
"Not afraid, but—"
"You walk out of that door a free man. You give the password for to-night. It is 'Gabriel.' You settle with the traitor and then ride away to safety. Maldito! Why hesitate?"
"Because I'm a white man, general. We don't kill in the dark and run away. When I offer to fight him to a finish I go the limit—and then some. For I don't hate Culvera that bad. But I think a heap of Steve Yeager's life, so I'll stand pat on my proposition."
"Am I a fool, señor?" asked the Mexican harshly. "How do I know you would keep faith, that you would not ride away—what you call laugh in your sleeve at me? No! You will strike under my own eye—with my revolver at your heart. Then I make sure."
"I'll bet you'd make sure. You'd shoot me down and explain it all fine when your men came running. 'The Gringo dog escaped and killed my dear friend Ramon, but by good luck I shot him before he made his getaway.' Nothing doing."
"Then you refuse?" Pasquale's narrowed eyes glittered in the moonshine.
"You're right I do."
The Mexican rose. "Die like a dog, then, you pigheaded Gringo."
"Just a moment, general. I've got a letter here I wish you'd send north for me. It explains that I shot myself accidentally—lets you out fine in case Uncle Sam begins to ask inconvenient whys about my disappearance."
"And why so much care to save me trouble?" inquired the insurgent leader suspiciously.
"I have to put that in to get you to forward the letter, I reckon. What I want is that my friends should know I'm dead."
As a soldier Pasquale could understand that desire. He hesitated. The sudden death of Americans had of late stirred a good deal of resentment across the line. Why not take the alibi Yeager so conveniently offered him?
"Let's see your letter. But remember I promise nothing," said the Mexican roughly.
Steve moved forward and gave it to him. His heart was pounding against his ribs as does that of a frightened rabbit in the hand. If Pasquale looked at the letter now he had a chance. If he put it in his pocket the chance vanished.
The rebel chief glanced at the sheet of paper, opened it, and stepped back into the moonlight. For just an instant his eyes left Yeager and fell upon the paper. That moment belonged to Steve. Like a tiger he leaped for the hairy throat of the man.
Pasquale, with a half-articulate cry, stumbled back. But the American was on top of him, his strong, brown fingers were tightening on the sinewy throat. They went down together, the Mexican underneath. As he fell, the head of the general struck the edge of the table. The steel grip of Steve's hand did not relax, for a single sharp cry would mean death to him.
Just once Pasquale rolled half over before his body went slack and motionless. He had fainted.
The first thing Yeager did was to take the bandanna handkerchief from his neck and use it as a gag for his prisoner. He dragged the blankets from their corner and tore one of them into strips. With these he bound the hands of Pasquale behind him and tied his feet together. He unloosened the revolver belt of the Mexican and strapped it about his own waist. The silver-trimmed sombrero he put on his head and the serape he flung round his shoulders and across the lower part of his face in the same way the garment had been worn by its owner.
Steve glanced around to see that he had everything he needed.
"They's no manner o' doubt but you're taking a big chancet, son," he drawled to himself after the manner of an old range-rider he knew. "But we sure gotta take a long shot and gamble with the lid off. Any man who stops S. Yeager to-night is liable to find him a bad hombre. So-long, general."
He opened the door and stepped out. His heart was jumping queerly. The impulse was on him to cut across to the cottonwood grove on the dead run, but he knew this would never do. Instead, he sauntered easily into the moonlight with the negligence of one who has all night before his casual steps.
The sharp command of the guard outside slackened his stride.
"Gabriel," he called back over his shoulder without stopping.
"Si, señor. Buenos tardes."
"Buenos."
He moved at a leisurely pace down the street until he was opposite the cottonwoods. Here he diverged from the dusty road.
"Hope the old scalawag wasn't lying about that cavallo waiting for Steve. I'm plumb scairt to death till I get out of this here wolf's den. Me, I'm too tender to monkey with any revolutions. I've knowed it happen frequent that a man got his roof blowed off for buttin' in where he wasn't invited." He was still impersonating the old cowman as a vent to his excitement, which found no expression in the cool, deliberate motions of his lithe body.
He found the horse in the cottonwoods as Pasquale had promised. Swinging to the saddle, he cantered down the road to the outskirts of the
village. A sentinel stopped him, and a second time he gave the countersign. He was just moving forward again when some one emerged from the darkness back of the sentry and sharply called to him to stop.
Steve knew that voice, would have known it among a thousand. Since he had no desire at this moment to hold a conversation with Ramon Culvera he drove his heels into the side of the cow pony. The horse leaped forward just as a revolver rang out. So close did the shot come to Yeager that it lifted the sombrero from his head as he dodged.
After he was out of range Yeager laughed. "Pasquale gets his hat back again—ventilated. Oh, well, it's bad enough to be a horse-thief without burglarizing a man's haberdashery. You're sure welcome to it, Gabriel."
He kept the horse at a gallop, for he knew he would be pursued. But his heart was lifted in him, for he was leaving behind him a shameful death. All Sonora lay before him in which to hide, and in front of him stretched a distant line beyond which was the U.S.A. and safety.
The bench upon which he was riding dropped to a long roll of hills stretching to the horizon. The chances were a hundred to one that among these he would be securely hidden from the pursuit inside of an hour.
"Git down in yore collar to it, you buckskin," he urged his pony cheerfully. "This ain't no time to dream. You got to travel some, believe me. Steve played a bum hand for all it was worth and I can see where he's right to hit the grit some lively. Burn the wind, you buzzard-haid."
An hour later he drew his pony to a road gait and lifted his head to the first faint flush of a dawning day. He sang softly, because by a miracle of good fortune that coming sun brought him life and not death. The song he caroled was, "When Gabriel blows his horn in the mawnin'."
* * *
CHAPTER XI
CHAD DECIDES TO GET BUSY
After his failure to stop Yeager's escape, Culvera lost no time before starting a party in pursuit. He knew there was small chance of finding the American in that rolling sea of hills, but there was at least no harm in making the attempt.
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