by Max Brand
The sailors looked gravely at one another, as though reading in books. “That’s Davisson,” said Jerry.
“Did he have a scar across his forehead?” asked Bud.
“No. Not a sign of a scar.”
“It’s not Davisson, then. And if it ain’t Davisson, it’s nobody from the Princess Marie.”
“And there you are,” said Lang sourly. “You’ll be helped on your way a long distance by this, Tiny Lew.”
“Shut up!” answered Sherry angrily. “We’ve finally established one point . . . Fennel was not a member of the crew. If not, then he was an outside worker. Is that right?”
“And where does that lead you?”
“I don’t know. But everything that we learn is something that we know,” said Sherry with a rather childish stubbornness. “What I suggest is this. Get these boys on our side of the fence. If we don’t, then when other members of the Princess Marie crew hit this town, as they’re sure to do, they’ll all be waiting for us in a mob, thinking that we have the loot.”
“And how’ll you get ’em on our side?” asked Lang, still skeptical.
“This way. Boys,” he said to the sailors, “I’ll offer you a bargain. It may not suit you, but here it is, the best that I can do. You know that the pair of us are doing what we can to help Miss Wilton out of jail, where she doesn’t belong. But as sure as there’s a heaven, what we do will be no good unless we find this fellow Fennel . . . or whatever his real name is . . . and prove that he committed the murder. Otherwise, there’s nothing to do except smash open the jail, and you know that jail breaking isn’t as easy as opening a can in a town where Sheriff Bert Moon keeps office hours. Are you following me?”
“Like a hound on the trail,” said Bud.
“Then throw in with us. This trail goes to sea, where most landsmen can’t follow it. I think that Fennel’s trail goes to sea, also. Well, perhaps you could follow it where we can’t. Suppose you throw in with us, and Beatrice Wilton is not found guilty . . . then we turn over to you these pearls. That means six or seven thousand dollars for the two of you. Not your full share, I know. But, otherwise, how do you get anything at all?”
Bud said instantly: “Big boy, I’m with you. I like your style fine. I’d sign with you any day. That goes for Jerry, too. Eh?”
“Sure,” said Jerry rather vacantly.
“We being broke, though?” queried Bud.
Sherry drew out the wallet, and gave $250 into the hand of the sailor. “That’s half the price of the pearl,” he said.
Money possesses a peculiar eloquence and emphasis. Now, Bud held the bills in a firm grasp for a moment and stared at them. He had worked most of his life before the mast, and sailors’ wages are not high. Then, with a knotted brow, he made exact division and handed half of the whole to Jerry, who was now plainly agape.
“We’ll see you through this buster,” said Bud quietly. “What do we do first?”
“Go down to Moon and say that you’ve been sailors. That you knew a man who looked like Fennel. The sheriff will let you see his stuff. Maybe that will tell you something. But right now you can perhaps give us an idea of how many of your other shipmates are apt to turn up here at Clayrock.”
Said Jerry: “Three of the boys died in the Sulus before ever they sailed. Budge Sawyer fell from the end of the bridge and busted his back on the way home. Loomis and Cartwright was killed in a dynamite explosion in Frisco right after they landed on shore. Well, that’s six out of twenty. The skipper’s dead, and so is Capper . . . and good riddance! And here’s me and Bud. Well, say there’s ten more that might show up, but will they? I dunno. Some gents are pretty careless. It’s a wild-goose chase, anyway. I never would’ve stayed on the road, except that Bud made me. I dunno. I don’t think that many more of the crew will be showing up this way.”
Bud said with his grave, bulldog manner. “Here’s my hand, big boy. You, too.” He shook with Sherry and Pete Lang. “We’re hitting the grit right now. Whatever we find out, we’ll let you know. So long!”
And, in a moment, they were off down the path.
Lang looked after them with a dubious eye. “Is there six thousand dollars’ worth of brains in that outfit?” he asked. “Is there any chance of getting back what you offer to pay, old son?”
“I don’t know,” answered Sherry. “But if they’re any help at all . . . great Scott, man, won’t it be beyond all price in the world?”
But Pete Lang sighed and looked the other way, like a man dealing with a child.
XXVII
After that, Pete Lang remained at the house, but Sherry, growing nervous with inaction, started into the town to see what he could see, and almost at once encountered the tall form of Dr. Layman, coming along the street with his long, light stride, his trousers brushing together with a whish at the knees. He was white and thin-lipped with anger.
“The sheriff is as full of malice as a mad dog,” declared the doctor. “By heaven, there’s a flaw in the man’s mind. He’s unbalanced.”
“He’s a name for being a square-shooter,” suggested Sherry, in doubt because of the violence of this accusation.
“Square-shooter? He’s going to railroad Beatrice to the hangman’s rope,” declared Layman. “He’s just refused to allow her to see anyone, or even to send out letters. A more high-handed outrage I never heard of.”
“Not even see her lawyers?” asked Sherry.
“And precious lawyers she’ll have,” stormed Layman, “unless we can get at the funds of the estate. And how is that to be done unless she can execute a power of attorney and place it in my hands . . . or in any other hands. I’ve never heard of such illegal tyranny.”
“It is,” Sherry agreed. He thought a moment, and then added: “Some men naturally dislike women. Moon does.”
“You’re right, of course,” acknowledged the doctor. “But there’s this to be considered . . . he never had a chance, before, to put a woman in jail on a heavy charge. And now the tyrant in him is being shown . . . without precedent.”
“Have you appealed to the judge?”
“What use is that? The judge is in Moon’s pocket. Everything that Moon does is inspired, one would think. But, by Jupiter, I’m going to break his reputation to bits like bad wood.” He went on without farewell, only to turn on his heel after a few strides and call back: “You know that Slade . . . the Phantom, or Fannie, or whatever they call him . . . is in town looking for you? Is there any bad blood between you two, or is he a friend? We’ve never crossed,” added the doctor, and hurried on, like a man full of his own thoughts.
It was a double blow that Sherry had received. In the first place, the news that the sheriff had taken such a pronounced stand against Beatrice Wilton was a shock to him, not only because it was sure to make her way to freedom more difficult, but because it showed from the beginning that Herbert Moon was convinced of her guilt. And the reaction of Sherry was unlike that of Layman. The doctor, keen in the pursuit of the girl’s freedom, seemed to have had no feeling except that injustice had been done, but Sherry, looking at the matter in another light, felt the weight of Moon’s condemnation. For the sheriff was not a man to make up his mind lightly, and, before he would take such a vigorous attitude as that which he had adopted toward the girl, it was certain that he had searched the case thoroughly from beginning to end.
In a word, if Herbert Moon felt that Beatrice Wilton was guilty, guilty she undoubtedly was.
The chief work for Sherry, he resolved, as he marched on down the street, was not to prove her innocent, but to devise means of getting her out of the jail. And bitterly, now, he regretted the threats that he had poured upon the quiet little sheriff in the Wilton house, on the day of the coroner’s examination. He had, in gambling parlance, tipped his hand, and the sheriff would be waiting for exactly such an attempt as Sherry now had in mind.
However, for the moment even the girl was thrust to the back of his mind. There was another point of greater importance, for the non
ce. Slade! His name showed the manner in which he had graduated in the school of violence. Fannie Slade they called him now. But in his earlier days, before debauchery and a thousand crimes had lined his face and put iron in his heart, he had been known as Phantom Slade. Because like a ghost he stepped without sound, and his wild rides across country made his presence ubiquitous.
It was not likely that Slade had come to Clayrock for any friendly purpose. If he were asking for Sherry, it meant that he was intent on making trouble—his vocation in life.
It might well be that the fame of Sherry, so foolishly spread abroad by the pages of many newspapers—his fame as a gunfighter—had come to the ears of Slade and wakened the jealousy of the famous killer.
For such was Slade. It was said of him, as of some cut-throats of earlier days, that he killed men merely for the pleasure of seeing them fall. There was no chivalry in Fannie Slade. He would shoot from behind as readily as he would shoot from in front. He was a half-breed, and he had a half-breed’s—or a tiger’s—indifference to honorable methods of warfare. The tales that were told of him chilled the blood. Though still in the prime of life, he was old as a slayer. He had begun in his teens, said rumor. He was now over thirty. And he was said to have killed a man a year.
It was no wonder that Sherry grew cautious and his manner altered as he went down the street. All things had now a different meaning. There was as great a contrast as there is between day and night in the mind of a child—or in the minds of most grown men. All had been open and harmless the instant before, but now every alley mouth yawned at Sherry like a leveled gun, and every open window was a source of careful thought.
For so Slade acted. Like the rattler, he delivered his warning the instant he appeared. And, by so doing, he more or less established that he was to be the hunted as well as the hunter. The warned man would be sure to be upon his guard, might well be expected to deliver a counterattack. But Slade trusted to the superior secrecy and cunning of his own maneuvers to gain the upper hand.
However, it might all be another matter. Some mutual friend might have recommended Sherry to Slade. In hope of that, the big man went on. For he had no desire to risk his life in such an unequal battle. It was true that he had a gift of speed and surety with weapons, but he never had given to fighting for its own sake, the professional attention that Slade had devoted to the game. He had lived by labor; Slade had lived by his Colt.
Sherry went straight to the hotel and sat down on the verandah. It was an empty verandah when he arrived, but quickly it was filled. People turned in from the street in passing; others came out from the building. For everyone was anxious to be in the presence of this temporarily notorious character.
And then his next-door neighbor leaned a little toward him: “You’re in for Slade, I guess?”
“Have you seen Slade?” asked Sherry.
“He’s over in Ratner’s Saloon.”
“Did you see him there?”
“Yep. He lined up everybody and bought a drink.”
“He wants me?”
“That’s what he says.”
“To talk or to shoot?” asked Sherry.
“I dunno. What does he usually want when he sends for a gent?”
Sherry was silent; the answer was too obvious.
“The best way is for you to sit tight,” volunteered Sherry’s neighbor. “You stay put where you are, with plenty of the boys around you. That way, Slade won’t have a chance to get behind you.”
“Will you do me a favor?”
“Proud an’ happy to.”
“Go over to Ratner’s Saloon and ask Slade what he wants of me.”
The other stiffened a little and changed color. But he was a man of courage. “I’ll do it,” he said. “Are you . . . are you gonna make a showdown of it, Sherry?”
“I’ll hear his answer, first,” said Sherry.
The other rose, and walked rapidly down the verandah steps. Once in the street, he paused, tightened his belt, jerked his hat on more firmly, and with all the air of a man going to undertake a really desperate commission, he started for Ratner’s Saloon, the front door of which was visible across the street some distance down.
Through the swinging door went the messenger, and was gone a mortal minute. Then he appeared again, not walking, but literally hurled through the air. He landed in the street, rolled over and over in the dust, then picked himself up and came on the run back to the hotel.
When he arrived, a crowd gathered around him, but he fought his way through them to Sherry and stood before the latter, a battered, tattered specimen. One sleeve of his coat was missing and a great rent went up its back. His hat was gone. One eye was very red, and rapidly beginning to swell and turn purple.
“I done your dirty work for you, Sherry,” he declared angrily. “And a fine reception they gave me. Slade has every ruffian in town around him. When I asked him your question, he said to me . . . ‘Tell the low skunk that I’m here to get him, and that I’m comin’ soon. Tell him to be ready. But what are you doin’ down here, you sneakin’ spy?’
“The rest of them took that up. They dived on me . . . half a dozen of ’em . . . beat me up, and turned me out. And you, Sherry, you . . . what’re you gonna do about it?” He was a young fellow with plenty of fighting spirit, and now, with his fists clenched, he looked as though he were about to throw himself at Sherry’s throat.
“Steady, steady,” said Sherry. “Let me have a minute to think this thing over.”
And think it over he did, and in dead silence. Caution told him to wait where he was or, better still, go home to the assured protection of Pete Lang, rather than trust to the motley crew here, where each man was only for himself. Then he looked at the half-obscured eye and the tattered coat of his emissary, and honest anger cleansed the heart of Lew Sherry.
Wait for Slade here? Even policy forbade that he wait in silence, his nerves wearing thin, while Slade took his ease, and came to strike when he was ready. He rose suddenly to his feet.
“What’re you gonna do?” demanded the messenger again.
“I’m going to get you another coat,” said Sherry, and went down the steps in one stride.
XXVIII
It was not far down the street to Ratner’s place, but it seemed a great distance to Sherry, for he had clothed himself in his wrath as in a garment, and every step that he took increased his anger. For, after all, it was little short of murder that the great Fannie Slade now contemplated. He must know his own superiority over such a common cowpuncher from the range as Sherry was, but, eager to swell his own reputation by destroying that of this newly rising light, he had come to consume Sherry like a tiger on the trail.
And it maddened the big man to think of the gunman leaning at Ratner’s bar, surrounded by his cronies, waiting for nerve to weaken in Sherry. And besides, what strange thoughts, what odd devices, were now rising in the imagination of the destroyer?
A brisk young man jogged a horse up the street and hailed Sherry. “I’ve come over from the sheriff’s office,” he said. “Sheriff Moon knows that Slade is in town. He’s heard that Slade is threatening you.”
“And what is that to him?” asked Sherry, vexed.
“He sent me to tell you not to go near Slade. It’s his business, as sheriff, to handle that man, and he wants no other person to interfere.”
Sherry, truly amazed, looked in wonder at the boy.
The latter continued: “Sheriff Moon is waiting for Slade to come out of Ratner’s Saloon. He’s surrounded by his cronies and his hangers-on, in there, and any of them would as soon shoot a man in the back as look at him in the face. But when Slade comes out, the sheriff will tend to him. He expressly wanted me to tell you this.”
“Young fellow,” said Sherry, “this is darned kind of the sheriff. Tell him so from me. Who are you?”
“Sheriff Moon is my uncle. I am his sister’s son,” said the boy. “My name is Charles Crandall.”
He was as clean a lad, with as st
raight an eye, as ever Sherry had seen.
“I didn’t expect this from the sheriff,” answered Sherry. “I’ve been rather rough on him. Now I thank him from the heart, but it’s too late. I’ve got to go and get Slade.” He strode on down the street.
But presently he was aware of a shadow following him. He jerked suddenly about and saw that the youth had dismounted and was coming from behind, quietly, and straight behind.
“And now what do you want?” asked Sherry.
“My uncle told me to prevent you from meeting Slade,” said the boy.
“Will you prevent me by walking at my heels?” asked Sherry, half annoyed and half wondering.
“No, sir,” answered Charles Crandall. “But at least I can help you when it comes to the pinch.”
Sherry actually gasped. “Do you mean that?”
“Yes, Mister Sherry, of course.”
“That you’d go into Ratner’s place with me?”
“I’m under orders,” said the boy.
“Look here!” exclaimed Sherry. “What are you doing in this town?”
“It’s the school vacation,” said Charles Crandall. “I came out to visit my uncle, you see.”
“And now you’re going to take a chance of breaking your neck for yourself? Crandall, I like you fine. You have as much nerve as any youngster I ever heard of, but now I order you to get away from behind me.”
He stepped on, looking back over his shoulder; young Charles Crandall remained rooted where he was.
So Sherry went on again, turning many thoughts in his confused brain, and always harking back to the strangeness of this day, which had brought him a kindly word and a kindly hand from Herbert Moon.
Bitterly, bitterly he realized what all other men knew, that Herbert Moon was the soul of honor, of courtesy, of human gentleness, and therefore, the case of Beatrice Wilton seemed darker and darker.
And this sorrow, this inner gloom, went to color his anger and make it more savage, until he was cold with rage as he reached the door of Ratner’s Saloon.
He paused for an instant and looked up the street, and down it. At either end the people were flooding from their houses and blocking the road with a solid mass of humanity, and still they poured out, like water from every crevice after the long wave has receded to the sea. He would have spectators for his death, at the least.