by Max Brand
He turned away, with this, and went back into the jail without another word to Jude, leaving the latter standing uncertain in the dark, with fear all around him.
Inside the jail, he went at once to Henry, who was finishing his plate of rice and molasses with proper philosophic unconcern. The marshal remained outside the bars and suddenly thrust through them the chamois bag.
“Ever see this, Henry?”
Henry looked with an impatient frown. “No,” he said.
And the marshal believed him, in part, because he wished to believe.
“Henry,” he said, “I guess you know how you’ll get off with an easy sentence?”
“I dunno nothin’,” Henry said pleasantly. He shaded his eyes, the better to see the face of the marshal.
“You know, but I’ll tell you, anyway. Tell me where to get the stuff you took from Broom and Carson’s safe.”
“Broom and Carson’s safe? Are you saddlin’ that on me?” Henry chuckled a little and wagged his head at Kinkaid.
“You’ve still got the bandage on your finger, man,” said Kinkaid. “It’s the pen for you, anyway. The only thing is that if we get the money back, on account of you being old and all, the judge might parole you. Anyway, he wouldn’t make it a heavy sentence. I’d answer for that.”
“You’d answer, would you?” said the old man calmly. “You double-crossin’ sneak!”
Kinkaid started. “You think I wouldn’t keep my end of the bargain, Henry?”
“Dang you and all your bloodhound kind,” Henry said without special emphasis. “I’ll take my chances outside of your promises.”
“It’s a clear case, Henry,” said the marshal with much patience. “The prints of the mare’s shoes, and the wound on your hand. How can you dodge that?”
“The law is a good dog, if you know his name,” Henry said. “And maybe I can find that out.”
The marshal smiled in spite of himself. “If noise keeps your heart up, keep on smiling,” he said. “But you know how the facts stand, Henry. D’you count on Duval to get you out of this?”
“Why not?”
Kinkaid knocked against the bars. “Tool-proof steel,” he said. “I reckon that’s enough of an answer for you, my son.”
However, Henry chuckled and shook his head. “You got a wise head on your shoulders,” he said. “You know a lot, Kinkaid, but you don’t know much about Duval. You’ve had him with his back to the wall, and he slipped out and was behind you before you could hit him once. And that’ll happen again and again. You could have Duval cornered twenty times, Kinkaid, and every time he’d show you how much better he was than you even dreamed that he could be. If you doubt it, you keep on takin’ notes on him. Will you? And lemme know the answers, until the answer comes that’ll leave you with your tongue still.”
“Is he gonna kill me?” asked the marshal, half contemptuous and half curious.
“He’s gonna kill you, Kinkaid,” Henry said soberly, “as sure as I’m sittin’ here in jail. Lay your money on it, and make out your will, and if you got a kind feelin’ for anybody in the world, which I sort of doubt, get out a heavy life insurance policy and write in the name of the folks you like. Because they’ll collect before long.”
“Henry,” the marshal said, “I pretty nigh like you, when I hear you talk like this, but lemme tell you that the next time I meet Duval, it’ll be face to face, and then heaven help him. He’ll go where nine have gone before him. But about you...there’s one sure way you can get out of jail...maybe even without turning in all of the money that you got from Broom and Carson...and that’s to tell me...who is Duval?”
Chapter Thirty-One
Virtue, after all, is a comparative — almost a tentative thing. And the virtue of Henry halted, as it were, in mid-stride, as he heard what the marshal had to say. And the virtue of Richard Kinkaid, which had endured a thousand tests, a thousand offered bribes, now weakened, as he saw before him an opportunity of securing a prisoner who, in his eyes, was worth a thousand Henrys.
He argued, with some reason, that Henry was an old man, near the end of his possibility of doing evil, but if Duval were a criminal, as the marshal had every reason to suspect that he was, then Duval was in the very early prime of his career, with a generation of danger stretching before him. It seemed to Kinkaid only a reasonable thing that he should use one thief to catch another.
He waited a moment for Henry to speak, but the old man was lost in thought.
“Suppose,” said the marshal, “everything was returned to Broom and Carson, except fifty thousand dollars...that could be put down to commission, say. For the rest of that money, they’d be willing not to press the charges home. You see?”
Henry nodded. Still he was squinting at a most distant thought, and unable to bring it close to his mind. “That would be fifty thousand for me,” he said. “Fifty thousand clear, and Duval...where?”
“Wherever you could put him. You know where that would be a tolerable lot better than I do. In the pen...up Salt Creek. I dunno, but you ought to know.”
The eyes of old Henry turned positively green, but in the very crisis of temptation, he suddenly shrugged his shoulders and cast out his hands in a gesture of dismissal.
“You won’t do it?” asked the marshal.
“There ain’t a thing against Duval,” Henry said.
“That’s a lie! I saw it in your eyes!”
“I was tryin’ to work up a lie,” Henry said steadily, “but I seen it was no use tryin’. There ain’t a thing ag’in’ him.”
Kinkaid, having had what he felt would have been a great triumph in the grasp of his hands, now ground his teeth in a fury of disappointment.
“Why, you chump,” he said, “you’ll get life out of this...twenty years, anyway. You’ll die in stripes!”
“Stripes ain’t on the skin, they’re only on the clothes,” said Henry. “And they got long sleepin’ hours, besides, in a good, up-to-date pen.”
“Listen to me,” urged Kinkaid. “There’s no chance that Duval could harm you. Tell me what I want to know, and I’ll have him gathered up in one day and put away in irons.”
“Put irons on a ghost,” answered Henry. “You talk...well, the way I’d expect you to talk.” Then he added, while Kinkaid strove to find another argument: “Suppose I had somethin’ over his head, what’d he do? Either get me safe out, if he thought I’d play straight, or else slip in and shoot me through the head, if he thought I wouldn’t. Don’t talk to me, man. I know Duval. You only do a little guessin’ about him.”
“Then I’ll make you this promise,” the marshal said fiercely. “If there was a hundred hands on Duval, none of ’em will ever open the door of this cell. If they do, may I die!”
He turned and walked away with great strides, and found the sheriff just entering the jail. Old Nat Adare looked still full of sleep, but he blinked himself nearer awake when he saw the marshal before him.
Kinkaid was too irritated to be diplomatic. He laid his hand on the shoulder of the sheriff and said: “Adare, I’ve put an old man in that cell, yonder. He ain’t gonna do much himself, though he’s a lot smarter than you may think. But on the outside, I got an idea the smartest man that ever come over the mountains is gonna try to free him. Can you keep him safe?”
“Extra guards....”
“Extra guards can be bought up,” said the marshal. “If you can hire ’em, somebody else can pay a higher price. Ain’t that right?”
“I’ll be here myself,” said Adare. “Who’s the outside man?”
“I dunno. I’m trying to find out,” the marshal said, and abruptly left.
In spite of his bluffness, he felt a great deal of trust in the honesty and the alertness of the sheriff. He knew the veteran would be on his metal after the challenge that had been delivered, and he felt the odds were nine out of ten in favor of keeping
his prisoner securely.
Now he had other preparations to make.
* * * * *
It was almost at this hour that Mr. Broom, of Broom & Carson, stamped away from his dinner table, slammed the door in the face of his anxious wife, and retired to his study, where he paced up and down making many pauses.
Mr. Broom was a man of adroit mind and swift in his thoughts as any ferret. He looked like a ferret, in fact. That is to say, he was a little man with a long neck and a very small head. He looked almost as though he could button his collar and then put it on over his head. His ways were as swift as his thoughts, moreover, and he could rarely stay still for a moment. When he sat down, he was continually twisting from side to side, shifting his feet, jerking his head back and forth, interlacing and then separating his fingers.
In five minutes in his own room, he went through a thousand contortions, and the first problem that he put to himself was — in what manner can I shift the total loss to the shoulders of my partner?
For Carson, bigger and slower than Broom, was infinitely more stupid, just as he was infinitely more honest. Their partnership had been based upon the money of Carson and the brains of Broom. Mr. Carson wanted to be rich, but he wanted to be honest. Mr. Broom wanted to be rich and thought that any means were justified that led to the golden end.
In the beginning, he had been the obsequious servant of his wealthy partner. But now Carson was in a minority. Yet, no matter how he turned the matter back and forth through his mind, Broom was unable to find a way of taking all the loss out of Carson’s pocket. His failure to come to this desired end drove him almost mad, and it was while his nerves were jumping at their worst that his wife tapped on his door.
“Well?” screamed Broom, and since one word rarely did for him, he kept on shrieking — “Well? Well?” — several times. It helped him a little to speak in this manner.
“There’s a man to see you,” his wife said timidly through the door.
He being an incarnate fiend, without kindness, trust, gentleness, or charity, his wife, it followed almost as a matter of course, was sweet-natured, faithful, affectionate, and true. She dreaded her husband almost as much as she loved him.
“Dang the man that wants to see me!” yelled Mr. Broom. “Dang you...dang everything! You wanna drive me crazy.” He smashed at the door with his fist to emphasize his point.
But he hurt the hand more than the wood, and the pain made him so desperate that he wrenched the door open and leaped out at her with his little ferret eyes one blur of red and his thin lips stretched back from his white teeth.
Mrs. Broom, who seemed to have guessed what would happen in response to her knock and her words, already had shrunk back across the hall, so that Mr. Broom saw, directly in front of him, just inside the front door, the man who had come to see him. He was most rudely dressed in blue jeans that bagged enormously at the knees. He had on no coat, but only a loose blue-flannel shirt, and he carried his slouch hat in his hand.
Mr. Broom, in an ecstasy of rage, began to laugh. He twisted and squirmed in the exquisite height of his fury as he fairly danced toward the stranger.
“You wanna see me! You wanna see me! You wanna job, I guess? You come begging for a job...this time of night...taking my time. No, I won’t take you...dang you! Get out! I wouldn’t have you...not for a gift...you danged....”
He ceased his speech and his advance at the same moment, not because he had exhausted either his vocabulary or his vindictiveness, but because he was stopped by a short, shrill cry from his wife, who ran suddenly in front of him and caught his arms.
“Archie! Archie! Archie!” she implored. “It’s Duval!”
It was the first time in her life that she had taken such a liberty with him, but Mr. Broom did not resent her violence. Instead, he gasped, raised a hand to his face in the manner of one stunned by a blow, and fell back two or three uncertain steps, while he stared at the pale face and the gray, steady eyes of the other.
“Bless me!” said Mr. Archie Broom. “Duval! Duval! Bad light...blockheads always coming around for a job...day and night...no peace...no rest...always harassed...terrible mistake...glad to see you, Duval. Terribly glad to see you. Come right in. What can I do for you? What will you have? Heard so much...simply delighted...this is my wife...come this way....”
He led Duval into his office, and when the latter was seated, Mr. Broom himself fell into a chair, exhausted for the moment by fear. He recovered almost at once, however, and, sitting up, he consumed every feature of Duval with his rapid eyes, scanning him over and over again for a full ten seconds, while Duval filled the pause by calmly rolling a cigarette. He lighted this and flicked the match out the open window.
“Now, Mister Duval,” the lumberman said, “what is there that I can do for you?” He rubbed his hands together. “Honor to have you here, sir. We’ve heard a lot...Moose Creek talks about people, you know. But the man who’s with you...that Henry...that scoundrel! I beg your pardon...probably a mistake...but said to have been the one who robbed me! Who robbed me...almost a quarter of a million! I beg your pardon. No offense to you, Mister Duval. Wouldn’t offend you. Let’s forget Henry. What can I do for you, sir?”
Duval listened to this rapid, broken outpouring of words without impatience, and then answered: “I don’t know of anything that you can do for me. But I dropped in here sort of thinking that I might be able to do something for you, Mister Broom.”
The latter tapped himself rapidly upon the breastbone. “You for me? You for me?” he said, delighted and amazed. “What could you do for me then?”
“I don’t know if we could make a bargain,” Duval said. “But it seems to me a mighty shame that old Henry should be in jail...and that you should be out all that money. Don’t that sound as though we could meet somehow?”
Chapter Thirty-Two
If by chance the ears of Broom had been so sharpened that they could have heard the music of the spheres, no greater expression of delight could have come into his pink-stained eyes.
He grinned at Duval agape, like a thirst-starved man at a vision of blue, cool water.
“A hundred and eighty thousand dollars! Duval, Duval, you’ve brought it along with you! Don’t say a word. Just bring it in to me. That’s all. Not a word. Just bring in the money. I’ll dismiss the charges against Henry. I’ll...have a cigar, Mister Duval. Honor to have you here with me. Delighted...no idea how much we’ve talked...everybody talked...here’s a match...don’t smoke cigars? But where’s the money, Duval? Where’s the money?”
He had worked himself forward to the edge of his chair, and though he stopped making vocal sounds, still his lips rapidly and silently framed new words as Duval himself was speaking.
“Well,” Duval said, “I reckon the money’s safe. My old man used to say that money that was put away wasn’t likely to go off and spend itself.”
Although Broom wore his collars large, he now freed the one he had on to make his breathing easier. “None of it, Duval?” he said. “None of it spent? None of it split up and gone? Still the whole wad intact?” He joined his hands together. He grew pale, and seemed praying to the saints for a favorable response.
“Not a penny gone,” Duval confirmed quietly.
Broom relaxed in the chair, fell back into it, disjoined his hands, which fell loosely into his lap, and exhaled a long breath.
This weakness of joy did not last long. He was presently sitting up again on the edge of the chair, smiling at Duval, and blinking with the greatest rapidity.
“Well, then, let’s have it out! Let’s have it out! Let’s have it out!” he chattered. “I’ll be glad to see it all again. Not that I’ll forget you, Duval. You’ll come in for a commission. Something handsome. That’s a mere detail. Settle that later on, eh? But to get the money here...probably outside in your saddlebags, Duval?” He gaped with a sort of horrible expectancy.
Duval replied: “You get the money back without a commission subtracted. But what about Henry?”
“I drop all charges....”
“Does that mean that Kinkaid will drop all charges as well?”
“Kinkaid? Kinkaid? Why, all the marshal wants to do is to get my money back for me.”
“Kinkaid? Money? Is Kinkaid any friend of yours?” asked Duval.
Broom wrung his hands in nervous indecision. “Kinkaid? Friend? Kinkaid is...is....”
“Aimed tolerable straight at jailing of a crook. He’s got the right man, it looks like.”
“You admit that Henry did it, of course?”
“Sure, I admit it. The marshal has the proofs, too. Only, Henry really ought to....”
“No matter what happens to Henry, you, as an honest man...your duty to society...your duty to me...a fellow man...must give up the money, no matter what happens to Henry. You agree to that? Of course, you agree! Can see fine integrity in your face, Duval...I...I....”
“My old man used to say,” Duval said, “that there was no use buying a bird that was still on the wing.”
He paused, and Broom suddenly winced.
“Ah, you mean the freedom of Henry...the getting of an assurance from the marshal, say that the shortest sentence that....”
“The marshal never would give away a trick,” answered Duval flatly. “He ain’t got that reputation. He loves a jailed crook because he’s jailed, and that’s the only reason. But you don’t get a penny until Henry’s free, outside of that jail.”
“Meaning what? Meaning what?”
“Meaning that no matter what sort of a charge is over his head, if you’ll get Henry out of that jail, I’ll give you back your money.”