by Max Brand
"But you wouldn't have to say anything," suggested Bud. "Just slip me a handful of the stuff and "
"They'd know where you got it. Nobody but me would stake any of the boys. If you think I'm wrong, go around to some of the other blankets and ask some of the fellows for a handout. See what you get!"
"I know," grunted Bud Kent, and he rolled his eyes savagely at his former companions. "I'll make 'em pay sooner or later," he declared. "The swine! Not a one in the crowd that'll stake me!"
"What about Hugh Dawn?" suggested the leader.
Bud Kent looked up at him sharply. But Jack Moon, having dropped his sinister suggestion, was staring idly up to the dark of the sky.
Chapter Twenty-one. Moon is Baffled.
The silence continued through a breathless moment.
"D'you mean it?" gasped Bud Kent at last.
"Mean what?" said Jack Moon, and his eye was innocent as the eye of a child.
Bud Kent considered his master. The moods of Jack Moon, he knew, were variable as the moods of the west wind. Other members of the crowd strove, from time to time, to find the meanings hidden in that implacable and cunning mind, but Bud Kent, the oldest member of the crew, had ceased striving to find the clue to the riddle. What Moon thought was his own property, and it was dangerous to attempt to read two meanings into his words. But now Bud scanned the face of the master and hungered for knowledge. What was the significance of that short phrase of a moment ago?
"You think," said Bud at length, very slowly and very cautiously, "that Hugh ain't got much use for his money?"
"I dunno," said the leader, as carelessly as ever. "I ain't asked him about it."
"It might take a lot of persuading," said Bud Kent, "and I ain't much at talk."
"Sure you ain't," said the other. "So you better arrange it so's there won't be no need for chatter."
Bud Kent moistened his Ups, parted them to speak, changed his mind, and finally managed to whisper: "Chief, talk out. I don't foller you exactly."
"How to stop talk?" replied the leader casually. "Any fool knows that. What mostly keeps a gent from talking?"
"Being persuaded, I guess."
"Think you can persuade a man out of thirty thousand dollars?"
Bud swallowed hard.
"I dunno," he said desperately. "You might stop a gent by gagging him."
He grinned, so that this last suggestion might pass in lieu of a jest if need be. But Jack Moon kept an entirely sober face. All the time he was watching the effect on Bud Kent. He was as interested as the scientist who watches the insect wriggle under the touch of acid.
"Gagging?" said he. "That's a fool idea."
"What is your idea?" asked Bud.
"Look here. I had to promise Dawn his share before I could find out where the gold was, didn't I? And then I gave him the gold, didn't I?"
"Sure."
"But I ain't his guardian, am I? After giving the stuff to him, I don't have to stay up all night to guard it, do I?"
"No, no!" breathed Bud, beginning to see the light.
"It sure ought to be clear to you, Bud, that it don't make me any too happy to see a skunk like Dawn, that's left the crowd once, get away with all that loot."
"That's clear, chief."
"Then, if a gent was to slip in soft to Hugh's hut and grab the coin "
"With three other men sleeping around him?"
"I'll see that he sleeps alone tonight. They ain't any need of guarding him. He thinks he's extra safe with us now!"
"Ah!" murmured Bud.
"What you want is a stake," went on Jack Moon. "Tonight ain't the only night for poker. They'll be another and then another, until the gold is all collected up in the hands of two or three of the boys. Well, Bud, you're soft moving and silent. If you was to slide in and take the stuff, it wouldn't make me extra mad. But mind this: They's no harm to come to Hugh Dawn!"
Bud Kent replied with a broad grin, nodded, and then said suddenly: "But suppose he makes a kick about his money in the morning when he finds it's gone? Suppose they search for it and find it in my saddlebags?"
"If you're enough of a fool not to bury it, son, I suppose they would find it in your saddlebags."
Bud Kent waited to hear no more, but, nodding to his chief with a whispered word of gratitude, he sauntered back to watch the game he had just left.
On and on to midnight the game continued, but by this time the terrific labors of the last two days began to tell. The gold fever was dying out, and, without this stimulant to keep them going, heads began to nod and eyes began to grow filmy. Seymour and Craig by this time were also broke; they joined Bud Kent as a gallery to watch the others. But at length, by mutual consent and almost at the same moment, the games were broken up and the gamblers staggered hollow-eyed toward their shacks. Here Jack Moon, who had been waiting for this moment, assigned them swiftly to their separate lodgings. He kept his promise to Bud, steering the others away from the hut of Dawn. The pretext was easily found no use waking up a sleeper when there was plenty of room in other huts. One shack for the girl, one for her father, and the other structures afforded room for thrice the whole number of men.
Meanwhile Ronicky waited until the leader was out of sight. Then he glanced about the clearing. Other than himself, every man in the crowd was busy with getting into his blankets all except the two outposts detailed to keep watch south and north, unfailing precautions which the bandit chief never overlooked. But the clearing itself was the very apotheosis of peace. Not a voice sounded, not a footfall was to be heard. All was dull quiet, and Ronicky turned his back on the scene, entered the hut, and straightened out his own blanket.
One by one the breathing of the men in the hut became more deep and regular. He himself imitated the same sound and lay back, veiling his eyes with the lids and only peering out through the curtain of lashes. The silence grew more and more deep, it seemed to him. The heavier sound of Treat's breathing sounded above the hushed chorus of the others. Someone was snoring in a nearby hut. But beyond and above was the silence.
It was, indeed, too quiet. It was the quiet of a snare, an illusion, a trap. And one of those impulses, which no man can really explain, came to Ronicky. An hour had passed since he lay down, and still sleep was far from his eyes. At length, with the softness of a guilty man who dreads oversight, he drew back his blanket and sat up. Finally he rose to a crouching position, stole to the door, and looked out onto the clearing.
Chapter Twenty-two. Two Against Twelve.
He saw nothing at first, and he was about to dismiss his foolish fears when something stirred near the hut in which the girl slept. Ronicky Doone was instantly alert. Staring fixedly, he saw the thing again.
It was the form of a man crawling in an almost prone position so that the ground shadows well nigh covered him from the most searching view. Suspicion had been like a searchlight to pick out the figure for Ronicky Doone. Ordinarily, he would never have seen it.
The fellow, whoever he might be, had just crawled out of sight behind the shack of the girl. Ronicky slid back to his blankets, buckled his cartridge belt about him, and, blessing the fact that he had no riding boots to encumber his stockinged feet, he stole again to the door, prepared to stalk toward the hut of Jerry Dawn.
But as he reached the door again, the figure reappeared on the nearer side of the girl's hut and crawled on until it passed behind the next shack, that where Hugh Dawn slept, and, though Ronicky waited an ample time, the stalker did not reappear. Then suddenly it flashed across the mind of the watcher that Hugh Dawn slept alone in that shack this night! Was there some ulterior purpose in the kindly insistence of Moon that Hugh be allowed to sleep on, undisturbed by the coming of others in his shack?
Ronicky did not pause to dissect possibilities. That was not his habit. He was instantly out of the door and going across the clearing at a stealthy pace.
Was it Moon himself who wandered about the camp and spied on Hugh Dawn, fearful lest the man steal away with his sha
re of the gold during the night?
Another moment and Ronicky was crouched just under the wall of the cabin. Slowly, inch by inch how painful was the movement! he raised his head and looked into the interior of the shack from the window at the side of the building.
He was right. The stalker had aimed at entering the shack of Dawn, for the back door of the little house was still ajar, and standing framed in it was the figure of the intruder. Hugh Dawn himself lay near the wall, his right arm thrown loosely about the sack which contained his share of Cosslett's plunder.
Ronicky Doone drew his revolver and waited.
The progress of the thief, if that were indeed his purpose, was infinitely slow. His forward glide was hardly faster than the steady drifting of the second hand around the dial of a watch. Presently, he leaned above the sleeper and laid hold on the canvas bag. With a cautious slowness he began to lift the burden.
The straining eyes of Ronicky now enabled him to see more details. When the bag began to be moved, for instance, he saw the hand of Dawn stir, and as it stirred a bright bit of steel was raised and poised in the hand of the thief. Now the bag, however, was safely drawn above the encircling arm of Dawn.
It was the gold itself which betrayed the thief. For as he came on his feet with that burden, the rotten old boards which floored the shack gave under him, and there was a faint squeak as board rubbed against board.
Instantly the sleeper wakened with a gasp that promised to be his last, for the knife flashed up in the hand of the thief. No mistaking that motion. He meant to strike, and he meant to strike home. Ronicky Doone fired.
When he leaped around the corner of the house and sprang through the door, he saw Hugh Dawn standing with a revolver in each hand, while a still form lay on the floor before him. Those two guns jumped up and were leveled against Ronicky.
"Don't shoot!" cried Ronicky. "Light your lantern. Quick, Hugh! Is it Moon?"
And all his heart rose up in hope that it might indeed be the master criminal.
"You, Ronicky?" breathed Dawn. "I might of knowed you'd be the one to keep watch over me tonight when I trusted to Moon's word, like a fool, and figured myself safe. Here's a light. I seen the knife drop in his hand when you shot. Fifth part of another second, and I'd be where he is now!"
His trembling hands ignited a lantern, and as the smoking flame rose Ronicky turned the dead man upon his back. They both looked down into the sullen, relaxed features of Bud Kent. The bullet had struck him in the back of the head and came out again squarely between the eyes, a grisly wound. In falling, the canvas bag had struck the floor beside the victim, and part of the gleaming contents had tumbled beside him. If ever gold had killed a man, here was a sample! Ronicky turned to Hugh Dawn, the latter trembling from the narrowness of his escape.
"Now," he said, "we're in for thunder and battle, Dawn. Guard the house, I'm going to try to get Jerry in here, or otherwise the swine Moon will "
He stopped, for the sound of clamoring voices broke in upon him. Then there was a rush of running feet and shouting across the clearing and the well-known bass thunder of Jack Moon's voice calling: "Steady, boys, and get back here. I'll do the exploring!"
Ronicky jumped to the front door.
Every man of the band was out in the clearing, and guns gleamed in every hand. Jack Moon was striding toward the shack at a long-gaited run. It was too late to reach Jerry Dawn unless she would come at his call.
"Jerry!" he shouted. "Jerry Dawn!"
And he halted Moon with a clear-ringing warning: "Get back, Moon, or I'll drill you through!"
The bandit stopped as the frightened face of Jerry appeared at the door of her shack.
"Jerry!" called Ronicky Doone. "Come here, quick! Don't stop for nothing!"
"Si!" shouted Moon in counter warning. "Get the girl and keep her from that throat-cutter. Jerry, if you trust Ronicky, you trust a man that's just done murder!"
That word was decisive. She shrank back from the door with a cry of terror, and at the same time Silas Treat, who had apparently been running up from the other side of the shack, out of sight of Ronicky, swerved into view for a moment and then sprang into the shack with the girl. Taken by surprise though he was, Ronicky managed to get in a shot, but his aim was so hurried that, even at that short distance, he missed. He was only able to knock the hat from the head of the big man, and the wide sombrero fluttered clumsily toward the ground.
In the meantime, the rest of the band in the clearing had dived for cover, and as they did so they sent a volley which crashed into the solid log walls of the hut about the doorway where Ronicky stood. He himself took to cover, calling to Hugh Dawn to turn down the flame of the lantern so as to give the enemy a dimmer target.
An instant of silence settled over the battlefield. In that breathing space Ronicky turned to his older companion and found Dawn cool and steady as a rock. The time had come for action now, and the big fellow was ready. He had now taken his post in the corner of the shack, covering, in that fashion, both the rear door and the single window to the east, facing the hut which now contained his daughter and Silas Treat.
"Get out of line!" warned Ronicky hastily. "Get out of line, Hugh! They'll be trying pot shots at the window and at the door pretty pronto."
The other nodded and stepped back. And then they heard the wailing voice of Jerry Dawn crying: "Dad! Oh, dad! Are you there? Are you safe?"
He roared the answer: "Safe and sound, girl, thanks to Ronicky Doone! Murder they can call it if they will, but it was Bud Kent or me. Ronicky dropped Bud in time to save my neck. Watch yourself, Jerry, and come to us when you can! You "
A shouting rose in the clearing, and then a crackle of guns, which Ronicky shrewdly guessed was more to drown the sound of Hugh's voice than in the hope of dropping one of the two.
Then came a frightened cry: "Dad! Help!"
But it was Ronicky Doone who responded to that call.
"They're taking her away from the shack!" he cried to Dawn. "The dogs!"
He started for the door with a fierce murmur, like that of a bull terrier before it springs at the throat of an enemy. Hugh Dawn hurled himself after his companion and gathered the smaller man into the huge embrace of his arms, where Ronicky strove vainly to worm his way toward liberty, writhing and twisting and panting.
"Let me go, Hugh!" he shouted. "Let me get at em!"
"You fool!" gasped Dawn. "Don't you know that the minute you show your head it'll be loaded with bullets? And when you go, I go, too! One man can't hold two doors and a window. Ronicky, for both our sakes we got to play safe!"
Ronicky Doone, weak with rage and disappointment, submitted and stood leaning against the wall.
"They've got her," he groaned. "And now they'll ride off with her, Hugh. They've got her and most of the money that Cosslett buried. And now Heaven knows what'll happen! When I had that chance to fight Moon man to man, why didn't I take it?" He added sadly: "Now I've lost everything!"
"She'll come to no harm in their hands," insisted the girl's father.
"No harm?" said Ronicky. "They won't lay a hand on her. I know that. But the main danger is that Moon has a chance to talk to her, the snake! And no one knows what he'll be able to persuade her to!"
"After he's sent a man to murder me? After he's taken her and is keeping her away from me by force? After he's set a siege to the cabin where I am? D'you think he can persuade away all those things?"
"He could persuade the angels that he was one of 'em, if he had a chance," said Ronicky gloomily. "Hush! There's the devil himself calling to us."
"Doone! Ronicky Doone!" called the voice of Jack Moon.
"I hear you," answered Ronicky. "Talk out, Moon."
"Do I get a truce?" said Moon. "If I come out to talk to you, Ronicky, will you and Hugh promise to gimme a chance to get back safe? I want to tell you "
"Come out," said Ronicky. "You know I won't plug you. I wish I was the kind that would take an advantage. But I ain't your brand of man, Ja
ck Moon!"
Without waiting for a further assurance, Jack Moon appeared across the clearing at the door of the shack facing that of Ronicky and Hugh. He advanced until he was three paces from Ronicky, who remained in the shadow at the door.
"Stop there!" commanded Ronicky. "That's close enough for talk."
"If you don't trust me," said Moon, "right enough! But here I am one man against two, and yet you're afraid."
Ronicky answered indirectly.
"Watch the back of the house, Hugh," he directed, "and watch sharp. If a head or a hand shows, take a potshot. They might try to rush from behind while Moon chats here in front. Now go on and talk, Moon. I suppose you want the body of Kent?"
"Was it Bud Kent you murdered, Ronicky?"
"Murdered? And you mean to say you didn't send him? You didn't send him to knife Hugh and get Hugh's share of the stuff?"
"They ain't no use trying to persuade you different," said the leader gravely, "if you look at it that way. But use sense, Ronicky, and you'll see that it didn't mean anything to me to wipe Hugh out of the way! You know what means more to me than anything else, and that's the good opinion of Jerry. Would I get that if I had her father killed?"
"You'd of talked her into thinking that you didn't send Kent."
"And I didn't!"
"You lie, Moon. I saw you talking to him."
"He was asking me for money. He lost all his share, and he wanted another stake to gamble with. I wouldn't give him anything, and the dog came here to steal. Ronicky and you, Dawn I want you to listen to sense. The boys are red-hot for action. They want the scalps of both of you, and if they's any more resistance, they'll get your scalps! But you know the way I stand. I've got to get you off if I can, for the sake of the girl and what she'll think. Boys, if you'll come out with me and give yourselves up and trust me, I can get you scot-free, I think. Otherwise, you're no better'n dead."