Sudden did not need to read it—every word had been branded on his brain as by a hot iron. Nevertheless, he leant forward and scanned it leisurely.
“Them particulars might apply to a hundred others,” he evaded. “An’ my hoss ain’t got a white face.”
“Hasn’t it?” the gambler rapped out. “I’d like to be sure of that. Rollitt, fetch that black.”
Sudden’s face hardened to stone. “Don’t yu—unless yu want to die,” he warned.
“Sometime, when he was a colt, I reckon, that hoss had an adventure with a skunk, an’ he hates ‘em.”
“Never seen the bronc I couldn’t handle,” Rollitt growled. “Go ahead,” Sudden said. “I’m givin’ yu permission, but I won’t promise to bury yu; I don’t like skunks neither.” The wrangler hesitated, and was obviously relieved when the cattleman broke in angrily: “To hell with the hoss. Where’s the need o’ that when Rollitt heard yu referred to as ‘Sudden’ by the outlaws? yu denyin’ it?”
“I’m not denyin’ anythin’,” Sudden said tersely. “An’ now —what?”
“I oughta tell my men to string the pair o’ yu up to the nearest tree.”
The unjust threat stirred the cowboy to anger. “Come alive, Eden,” he said roughly.
“What sort of an outfit would yu have left?”
“Showin’ your true colours now—gunman stuff, eh?” Baudry said scornfully.
“Lettin’ myself be hanged wouldn’t prove my innocence,” the other retorted. He looked at the rancher. “Eden, yo’re followin’ a false trail,” he said quietly. “One o’ these days yu’ll find that out. For now—I’m goin’.”
The old man did not reply at once; doubts were disturbing him. He could not forget that Sudden had saved Carol from the Indians, but—as Baudry had been at pains to point outthe worst outlaw in the wilds would have done no less in like circumstances. His troubled gaze travelled to Sandy. The youth forestalled him.
“Jim’s my friend; if he goes, I do,” he said.
The defiant tone roused the rancher’s quick temper again. “Yo’re damn right there,” he rasped. “But first yu’ll answer a question. What took yu outa camp the night I got this?” He tapped his wounded chest.
The boy’s face flamed at the accusation—for it amounted to that. “yu think I creased yu?” he cried indignantly, and then, “Hell! what’s the good … ?”
“I don’t think—I know,” came the passionate assertion. “yore boss, Rogue, put yu up to bump me off, an’ when yu failed, Lasker had to try.”
“He’d have got yu too, with a second shot, if Jim here hadn’t stopped him,” Sandy savagely reminded. “yu explainin’ that?”
“Simple,” Eden sneered. “Lasker had bungled it an’ might ‘a’ talked. It was a safe play to silence him an’ get solid with me.”
Sandy had no more to say. His world had come crashing about his ears and he could see nothing but the set, pale face of a girl, who, with downcast eyes, had been a witness of his degradation. Baudry, seated next to her, was watching him with an expression of contemptuous amusement. Little did the gambler suspect how near he was to death at that moment. Eden made a violent gesture.
“Punch the breeze, the pair o’ yu,” he said hoarsely. “Jeff, yu go along an’ see they don’t take nothin’ but what belongs to ‘em.”
At this gratuitous insult, Sudden, his thumbs hooked in his belt, shot a scornful look at the speaker. “Don’t overplay yore hand, Eden,” he warned. “As for yore threats, there ain’t a man in yore outfit would pull a gun on me, ‘cept that cardsharp an’ his two friends, an’ they haven’t the guts.” His cold, appraising gaze travelled from Baudry to Dutt and Rollitt. “Like I said,” he added, as they made no move. “Three yeller—dawgs. Adios!”
As he turned away, the gambler’s hand went to his pistol, but the rancher spoke sharply:
“None o’ that, Jethro. Call him back if yu want, but yu should ‘a’ took .him up when he offered.”
The other shrugged his shoulders indifferently, but there was a frozen fury in his voice as he replied, “you’re too squeamish, Sam; you don’t give a rattler an even break—if you’re wise.”
In the rope corral which held the night-horses Sudden and Sandy found their mounts. The foreman watched in silence as they rolled their blankets, and then burst out:
“Jim, I just can’t believe it—the 0I’ Man must be loco. It warn’t no use sayin’ a word—on’y ‘a’ made him wuss.”
“I know, ol’-timer,” Sudden said, with a hard smile. “It’s a queer yarn—too long to tell now—truth an’ lies all snarled up. I ain’t blamin’ the boss—much; he’s sick, an’ with Rogue hangin’ on his heels, it ain’t surprisin’ he’s suspicious. Things look bad, but yu can take it Sandy didn’t fire that shot an’ I’m not as black as Nigger here.”
“Is it true yo’re the fella they call `Sudden,’ Jim?”
“Yeah, but there’s an explanation to that too. Keep a-smilin’, Jeff; there was never a rope so badly tangled it couldn’t be straightened out.”
At this moment Peg-leg stumped up, carrying a small package. “Here’s a bit o’ grub an’ a skillet my ol’gal has sent,” he began. “Said she didn’t care what yu’d done but she’d be teetotally damned if she let yu be turned loose without the means o’ makin’ a mouthful o’ coffee. She’s agoin’ to give Sam hark from the tomb when she gits him alone.”
“She’s a lady, Peg-leg,” Sudden replied, tying the parcel to the cantle of his saddle. “This will shorely be welcome.”
From the back of the big black he smiled wryly down at the two men. “We’ll be seein’ yu—mebbe,” he said.
For upwards of two miles neither of the outcasts spoke and then Sandy’s bitterness overflowed: “Damnation, even she believes I shot the 0I’ Man.”
“Yu ain’t no right to say that. yu weren’t lookin’ but I fancy I saw a hand wave from the tent as we left camp.”
Sandy’s doleful face changed magically. “Yu did, Jim?” he asked eagerly.
His companion grinned.
“He’s just as happy as if she had waved,” he reflected. “An’ anyways, he’d do more’n tell a lie for me.”
“Where do we head for, Jim?” the subject of his thoughts asked. “We got plenty choice.”
“We have to find Rogue,” was the unexpected reply.
Sandy stared at him. “Hell, Jim, yu ain’t goin’ to throw down the 0I’ Man, are yu?” There was real concern in his voice. “I’m admittin’ he’s treated us pretty mean, but he’s been misled, an’ the boys are our friends …”
“Findin’ don’t mean joinin’,” Sudden pointed out. “The S E is finished with us—or fancies so—but I ain’t finished with them. I don’t figure on lettin’ Rogue beat me, an’ I’m mighty interested in Mister Baudry.”
“Me too, in fact, I was so interested that I damn near beefed him where he sat.”
“I guessed that an’ was all set to knock yore gun up.”
“Whatever for?” Sandy inquired.
“It would ‘a’ turned that camp into a slaughter-pen. Now, we gotta keep cases on Rogue an’ the herd, an’ be ready to sit in the game.”
“Yo’re right, Jim,” the boy agreed. “I’m a durned fool.”
“Yu said it,” his friend smiled. “There’s time when yore brain wouldn’t keep a flea outa trouble.”
“Awright, Solomon the Second,” Sandy grinned. “Mebbe yu can tell me who pulled the floor from under us.”
“Rollitt is my guess, but who put him up to it?” Sudden debated. “Was it Rogue, tryin’ to get rid of us, or that tinhorn card-cheat? An’ what’s he after, anyways? Hell’s flames, it’s one fine tangle to unravel an’ we got on’y loose ends.”
“Here’s another,” Sandy contributed. “Baudry is goin’ in for cattle—startin’ a range somewhere near the S E.”
Sudden whistled and relapsed into a long silence. At dusk they camped in a dense thicket of scrub and dwarf-oak little more than a mil
e to the right of the herd, with which they had been keeping pace. They were building a small fire when a low voice called, “Howdy, friends!” and a man slid from the shadows. The flickering flame showed that it was Tyson.
“Didn’t hear me a-comin’, did ye?” he asked, and chuckled at his own cleverness.
“We’re glad to see yu,” Sudden said heartily.
When the business of eating was concluded, the little man filled his pipe and looked quizzically at his hosts. “So the S E has give yu the air?” he remarked.
“They told yu?” Sandy queried.
“Ain’t talked with ‘em,” Tyson said. “Here’s the how of it. When yu busted away an’ the Injuns took after yu, I follered. Bein’ on the hoof, I didn’t arrive till the fandango was finished. I collects them scalps yu left lyin’ around, for which I’m thankin’ yu; worth ten wheels apiece, them top-knots is, if yu know where to take ‘em. Then I trails yu, figurin’ yo’re still in dutch an’ that mebbe I can turn the trick, but I’m too late, yu’ve went. I points for the S E.”
“So yu know all about it?”
Tyson shook his head. “I ain’t clost enough to hear much, but my eyesight is fair an’ I’m a good guesser,” he said. “When I see Monte Jack in the company I knowed dirty work was afoot.”
“Monte Jack?” both his hearers repeated.
“Yeah, fella sittin’ next the gal.”
“He calls hisself `Baudry’ now.”
“Like enough, but he was knowed as Monte Jack in Kansas City less’n two year ago, an’ bad medicine. Catched cheatin’ at poker an’ shot the fella under the table—gun on his knees, yu know. It warn’t the first time an’ he had to flit plenty rapid. A close call for Monte, that was.”
“An’ Eden believes in him,” Sandy said.
“Well, yu don’t have to worry,” Tyson laughed. “He fired yu, didn’t he?”.
“Yeah, he fired us, shore enough,” the boy agreed. “But there’s Miss Carol, that toad’s got his poisonous eye on her, an’ the outfit—decent fellas—are dependin’ on puttin’ that drive through.
They’re our friends—still.”
“An’ not likin’ Mister Monte Jack nothin’ to notice we’re kind o’ hankerin’ to pile him up,”
Sudden added. He went on to tell of the decision he and Sandy had come to, and the “still-hunter” listened, his bright little eyes darting from one to the other, his jaw working on a plug of tobacco, alert as, and very like, a squirrel.
“Well, I took a fancy to yu boys,” he said, when their plans had been made plain. “If yo’re willin’, me an’ Betsy”—he patted the rifle beside him—“will take a hand. Three pairs o’ peepers is better nor two, an’ I savvy Injuns.”
The cowboys were glad to have him, and said so. Apart from his bloodthirsty occupation, there was a great deal that was attractive in this odd little man. Moreover, they were already deeply in his debt, and neither of them was of the type to forget that.
Chapter XXII
EARLY on the following morning Tyson left them. “Hang on to the herd an’ I’ll be with yu come dark, or sooner,” he said. Then he plunged into the thicket and was lost to sight and sound in a few seconds.
They spent a lazy day, their only concern being to keep under cover. Several times, lying flat on a ridge, they got a sight of the herd, a long, twisted string of dots, dipping into hollows, plodding up slopes, inexorably pushing northwards. And though the distance was too great for him to recognize the rider, Sandy cursed when he saw that Carol had a companion.
The shadows were gathering when Tyson joined them in the dry arroyo where they had decided to spend the night. He had the hump ribs of a buffalo calf, wrapped in part of the skin, and a bow and arrows, for which, he grimly explained, the late owner had no further use.
“I can use her pretty good—lived with ‘Paches onct. She’ll fill the pot an’ save powder.”
But this was not what the cowboys were thinking of. A brave with a bullet in his brain might well bring his tribesmen on the trail. The little man divined their thoughts and grinned as he pushed a gory hank of black hair into his pack.
“Nothin’ to go grey over, boys,” he said lightly. “I used steel an’ blinded my tracks. ‘Sides, I’m wearin’ ‘Pache moccasins, so them devils will git the blame. Allasame, I could ‘a’ shot him, so Betsy gits her tally.”
Calmly he cut a nick in the stock of the gun, one more in that terrible register, using the knife which had let the life out of the red man, and, as they knew, must later have skinned and cut up the flesh they were about to eat. Life in the wilds, however, knocked the fastidiousness out of one, and the broiled ribs tasted none the worse.
Tyson had, they learned, located the outlaw band a few miles east, creeping along on the heels of the herd like a mountain cat, ready to pounce on its prey at the propitious moment. He had counted a dozen men, and gathered that others were away hunting.
“They ain’t too well fixed for grub an’ is grumblin’,” he said. ‘A mighty hard lot. Eden will need all the help he can git, an’ then some.”
A week passed and save that all parties were nearer their destination, the position remained unchanged. Then, with the suddenness of a summer storm, danger loomed up, dire and overwhelming.
Tyson’ had, as usual, after the morning meal, gone to discover possible signs of activity in the outlaw’s camp, and his companions were riding leisurely in the wake of the herd. It was Sandy who saw the “still-hunter” first.
“Tyson is a-comin’ an’ ain’t losin’ no time neither,” he said.
In fact, the little man—abandoning his customary Indian-like stride—was running, and when, spurring their mounts, they met him, he dropped, gasping, on a nearby mound. His usually mild features were hard and fierce.
“Trouble ahead, boys,” he panted.
“Rogue goin’ to strike?” Sudden asked.
“Naw, Injuns,” the other replied. “Two score, mebbe even more—they was hidden—waitin’ to jump the herd.”
“No chance o’ dodgin’ ‘em?”
“Not a hope—the cattle has to go that way. Them war-whoops has picked the right place.
For miles now the plain is narrow, with rough country both sides. There’s one spot where they might hold the herd an’ make a fight of it.”
He described it, and Sudden listened carefully. Sandy’s face was haggard with anxiety.
“My God! Jim, what can we do?” he asked.
Sudden turned to Tyson. “Climb Sandy’s bronc an’ fetch Rogue,” he said. “Don’t let on about us; yu just happened on the redskins, saw the herd, an’ figured that, as a white man, he’d help his own kind.”
“Shore, but I’ll git there quicker afoot—it’s rough goin’,” Tyson replied, and was gone.
Sandy stared at his companion in amazement. “Yu sendin’ for Rogue?” he gasped. Then comprehension came to him and he chortled with delight. “Yu wily devil,” he complimented.
“That shore is great medicine. Do we warn the S E?”
“I do; yu cross the trail an’ follow on the other side, keepin’ outa sight. I’ll join yu later an’ mebbe the war-whoops’ll get a surprise.”
Sandy was disappointed—he might have seen Carol—but he did not demur; the situation was desperate, but he trusted this hard-faced friend of his and was prepared to obey blindly. So he too went on his appointed errand, while Sudden spurred after the herd. The latter passed the remuda in a cloud of dust and heard Rollitt’s curse of astonishment. Sam Eden, sitting at the back-end of the wagon, greeted the visitor with a glare as he reached for his gun. The young man’s cold voice interrupted:
“Don’t be a fool, Eden. If I’d come for that yu’d be halfway to hell by now. I’m here to tell yu that a big bunch o’ redskins is layin’ for yu.”
The rancher laughed jeeringly. “Yu don’t expect me to believe that yarn, do yu?” he asked.
“No, but I had to warn yu,” Sudden retorted.“Walk into the trap if yu must; I’ll
do what I can to get yu out. I’ve sent for aid.”
The cattleman’s frowning brows went up at this. “Now I know yo’re lyin’—I’d say there ain’t a settlement within a hundred mile. Where’d yu send—San Antonio?” he sneered. “I passed word to Rogue,” was the calm reply.
With the force of a blow, the statement took the rancher’s breath away. For a moment he was speechless, and then, with a furious oath, he cried, “So that’s yore scheme, huh? Rogue’s to come and help himself an’ I’m to let him. Now listen, I ain’t swallerin’ yore Injuns, but I’d sooner they had the cows than that bastard road-agent leader o’ yores. Get that.”
“Yu seem damned anxious to make yore daughter a squaw.” The biting reminder only whipped the rancher’s rage to a white heat. “Curse yu, I can fight my own battles,” he roared. “I don’t want yore help nor his.”
“Allasame, yu gotta have ‘em. I ain’t goin’ to see men I have worked with an’ liked sacrificed to yore bull-headed obstinacy. Can’t yu savvy that just because Rogue aims to steal yore herd later, he’s gotta protect it now? Hell, I must put Jeff wise.”
The black horse shot ahead of the wagon and with its disappearance the old man’s fury evaporated, and the ability to reason returned. Scowling darkly he went over the conversation again.
“Damnation, he’s right,” he muttered aloud.
“O’ course he’s right, an’ allus has been,” said a sharp voice. Aunt Judy, from the driving-seat of the vehicle shook a minatory finger at him. “That young fella has a brain where yu on’y got bone, Sam Eden.”
“Put a bridle on that tongue,” the cattleman snapped. “If yore husband had any sense he’d ‘a’ taken a whip to yu years hack.”
“An’ if yu had any yu’d ‘a’ listened to Green ‘stead o’ that mealy-mouthed, tat-faced cardsharp yo’re so fond of,” she countered.
“The fat-faced cardsharp is obliged for your opinion, ma’am.”
Baudry had just ridden up. Though his voice was studiously polite, his eyes were venomous. The lady was not abashed.
“Yo’re welcome,” she retorted, and vanished behind the canvas flaps.
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