The Third Western Megapack

by Barker, S. Omar

  Minutes passed, and there was no sound. Had both men been killed instantly? If so, it would no longer be necessary to remain here. But it was not certain that both had been killed instantly. It was possible that both shots had missed. In that case, both Gridley and Roebuck would be in doubt as to whether the other were dead, or standing with gun pointed, ready to shoot in the direction of the first sound or flicker of a match. And there was still another possibility. Perhaps one of them was dead. In that event, the other would not know it for sure, and would not move or strike a match until he felt certain of it. And if only one was dead, which one? That was important. If Roebuck alone was alive, there would be no danger. If Gridley alone remained, the case would be different.

  Time passed, without nothing to mark it. Perhaps an hour passed. Perhaps much more or much less time elapsed. Tense apprehension and a growing sense of futility seemed to destroy all consciousness of time. There was something, however, which seemed to be marking time. At first, Ray Peoples thought nothing of it. A little water trickled along the lower iron surface of the ore car. It soaked his clothing in spots, and he shivered with cold. Gradually it grew deeped; an inch. Two inches. Then Ray Peoples remembered the pumping machinery.

  At first thought, he was glad the water was rising. It would continue to rise until the tunnel was completely flooded, and both Roebuck and Gridley, or either of them if only one chanced to be alive, would realize that a move of some sort must be made. That would be a solution, and there would be an end of this hopeless deadlock.

  Slowly the water crawled up, until it was some six inches in depth. Chilled to the bone in his cramped position, Ray Peoples moved, ever so slightly, causing a ripple of sound from the splashing water. Crack! Crack! Two guns barked, almost simultaneously. Two bullets struck the iron car, at either end, and both failed to penetrate it.

  Then he knew that both Gridley and Roebuck were alive, and waiting for the other to move. They had fired at each other, each thinking the ripple of sound he had raised was caused by the other. And both were standing ready to shoot again in the direction of the next sound.

  Something must be done. The water was still rising. A little more and the car would be completely flooded. Before that happened, he must crawl out of his hiding place, or deliberately drown. To crawl out would mean instant

  death. Various plans occurred to him. Suppose he should strike a match? That would end the deadlock. In the first glare of light, Gridley and Roebuck would shoot, not at him but at each other. And they would shoot straight. Both would die the second he struck a match. He decided against it. It would be equivalent to killing both of them. And yet, there seemed to be no other way.

  Again he made a motion, without intending to do so. Again two bullets struck the car, and bounded. That was twice that he had made them shoot at each other, without danger to either of them or to himself. And with the discovery there came a glimmer of hope. Purposely and deliberately he brought his hand down against the surface of the water, making a distinct splash. The result was the same; two shots. Three times more, at intervals of a few minutes, he splashed with his hands against the water, and each time both Roebuck and Gridley fired. They had fired six times, now, and both must load again. That would be interesting.

  After some time there were faint clicking sounds in the direction of Gridley. Gridley was reloading, and taking chances. In the other direction there was only silence. Roebuck was not loading again. Perhaps he had two guns. It was more probable, however, that Roebuck had no more shells, and was absolutely unprotected. Another splash revealed the truth. It was followed by one shot instead of two. Roebuck was unarmed, and Gridley now had the situation in his own hands.

  It soon appeared that Gridley was rapidly appraising his advantage. At length he spoke, and his voice sounded hollow and crooning in the empty darkness. “Ain’t you going to load again, Hank?” There was no response, and it was long seconds before he spoke again. “I’m the kind of man that would do the right thing, Hank. I’ll shoot it out fair and square with you, fifty-fifty chances. Better load again. I won’t shoot till you make a move, to draw me on. Then you’ll have your shots toward the sound o’ mine; same as before.”

  But Hank Roebuck did not reply to this, nor did he fire in the direction of Gridley’s voice.

  Gridley spoke again. “Tell you what I’ll do, Hank. What do you say we call it quits? Hm? Me’ll both be dead if we keep this up. The water’s up to our knees now, and the whole drift will be flooded in an hour. Suppose we call it a draw and go on top, me and you both? Hm?”

  And out of the darkness, Roebuck spoke for the first time. “I’m willin’.”

  “Light your candle, then, and we’ll go on top, both of us.”

  “S’posn’ you light yours,” Hank Roebuck replied.

  “Little suspicious of me, ain’t you?” said Gridley. “Well, well. I’ll light my own. Then we’ll go on top.” And Gridley lit his candle.

  * * * *

  Ray Peoples still crouched in the upturned car, lying in a foot of water. From the sounds in both directions, he judged that Gridley was advancing toward him with a lighted candle, and that Roebuck was wading down the drift toward the station, in the dim flicker of light. Arriving at the car, Gridley stepped to the dry pedestal and stood there a moment.

  Then a shot roared out through the drift. Gridley was firing again, as Roebuck retreated in the dim distance. He had called a truce in order to gain an advantage. If Roebuck had lighted his own candle, it would have been sure, but the candle in his own hand, and with Roebuck unarmed, it was practically sure anyway.

  With a single motion, Ray Peoples braced his feet against the rock wall and tilted the car upward. Then he leaped forth. The candle went out. Gridley had sprawled headlong into a foot of water, and was gaining his feet. Ray Peoples fell on him, and groped for the wrist of the right hand. The gun barked, but it did no harm. He gripped it, and it was his. Stepping back a few paces, he fumbled in his wet pockets for a waterproof matchsafe, lit a candle, and viewed his dripping antagonist with mingled scorn and apprehension.

  “Well, well, said Gridley, as he sullenly found a candle and a match. “Where did you drop from?”

  “No matter,” Ray Peoples retorted. “I’m here, ain’t I? And speaking of fair fights. I’m playing fair with you. We’re all going on top. But Hank Roebuck and I go first. And it might be just as safe for you if you’d lag behind a bit.” Without further comment, he waded on down the drift toward the dim outline of Hank Roebuck.

  “Holy mackerel!” said Hank. “Where did you—”

  “Let’s go,” Ray Peoples urged. “I have a hunch we’re due for some trouble getting out of this.”

  And they were. The drift was not more than seven feet high, and for its entire length it sloped down toward the station with a perceptible gradient. Long before they reached the station it was up to their waists. Then it was still deeper, so that they waded waist-deep. Then they were compelled to swim, with candle hooks fastened to their hats, and with the wall above them only a scant foot above their heads. Almost at the station, this interval of space was reduced to a few inches. Cautiously and silently they glided on, fearing the worst.

  “We might have to swim under water yet, Hank,” Ray Peoples conjectured.

  “It can’t be done,” said Roebuck. “If the entrance is flooded, we stay under water.”

  But the entrance was not flooded. A few scant inches of air space remained. They reached the shaft. Safe.

  * * * *

  Two days later, Ray Peoples was explaining that he had bought options on Fool’s Luck just in time to avoid the rush. Somehow the report had spread far and wide that Fool’s Luck would go to a dollar a share, and it was hard to get.

  “I bought some myself,” Roebuck admitted. “Some.”

  “A thousand dollars’ worth?”

&nb
sp; “Thousand dollars, your grand-mother!” Roebuck scoffed. “Come up to my place some time, and I’ll show you that check for a thousand dollars. I’ve had it framed.” And he added meditatively. “I’ve put all the stockholders wise; the fellows that’s been putting up assessments all these years. And I’ve told the sheriff all about Gridley; how he didn’t quite make it, because he couldn’t swim. That ain’t my fault, is it? And I told him I was crooked.”

  Peoples smiled. “What did he say?”

  “He says to me, ‘Hank,’ he says, ‘you’ve got your own number mixed up with somebody else’s. You ain’t crooked. You ain’t crooked none whatever!’ And sometimes when I think it over, I think maybe I ain’t.”

  CALICO CAPEN’S CACHE, by J. E. Grinstead

  Calico Capen was a gambler and made no pretense of disguising the fact. Bad? Well, about everybody in Gold Center was more or less bad, in those days. Capen was a giant of a man. Over six feet, and of heavy build. His small nose on a big face gave him a grotesque look, but what won him the name of Calico was an affliction. His face, innocent of beard as the palms of his hamlike hands, was brown as leather, except for spots from the size of a thumbnail to the size of a dollar. These spots were a dead, pasty white that no amount of exposure to the weather could change. His small blue eyes were as expressionless as two pieces of blue china, his hair and eyebrows were white and had always been white.

  On first seeing him, one set him down as a sort of inhuman monster. After seeing him a hundred times the impression was unchanged. There was a certain chair at the poker table in the Yellow Metal gambling room that was known as Calico’s chair. When the game was running, he was usually in it. When he played, he reached swift decisions. No one had to wait on Calico. He either threw his hand into discard, or he stayed, and when he stayed, he stayed, and—usually he won!

  Calico was part of the history of Gold Center. Like many others on that frontier of the world, he had neither Genesis nor Revelation. No one knew whence he came, and no one found out anything about him. He never spoke when he could make a sign serve the purpose. An epic in the history of the wild mining town was the night that Mike Cullinan undertook to break Calico. When the game began, Mike owned the saloon. The game ended next morning, while two Chinamen were sweeping out the gambling room at the Yellow Metal. Mike was broke—and Calico owned the saloon.

  There was much speculation as to what Calico would do with that saloon. It was a rough, but staunch rock building fronting west on the main street. So much of the town as had been built at that time was in a gorge known as Tightwad Gulch. The gorge was narrow. The lots extended back two hundred feet from the curb line, but nobody used the back half of his premises. The reason was that a hundred feet back rose a sheer bluff two hundred feet high.

  A wag who owned a lot and shack next door to Cullinan’s said, “I reck’n I got one of the biggest homesteads in Ameriky. It’s seven miles from my front door to my back yard.”

  The wag had estimated the distance that would have to be traveled, either up the gorge or down the gorge, to where the bluff could be climbed, and then along the precipice to the back part of his lot.

  * * * *

  Cullinan had built his saloon on a lot forty feet wide, leaving a ten foot alley way at the south side, but fencing the entire lot from street to bluff with a high rock wall. The only entrance besides the front door, was a narrow gate that opened from the street to the alleyway. This was on account of the fact that Mike Cullnan lived in the back part of the long, low building. The front door of the place was opened only one time after Calico took possession. That was when another saloon took over the stock and fixtures and carted them away. After that the great oaken front door was locked and barred, and with the two iron grated windows, frowned on the passing throng. The windows were boarded up on the inside, giving no glimpse of what was behind them. Calico took up his abode there, alone.

  Another year passed. Calico went on gambling and went on winning. The pockets of gold played out, and the town was about to go the way of the others that had sprung up there at the foot of the Sierras. Other gamblers packed their kits and left, but Calico stayed on. Then one day some hardrock men, prospecting down the gorge just south of town, struck a rich vein of copper, and Gold Center’s permanence and prosperity was assured.

  A horde of hardrock miners came in, the Yellow Metal flourished anew. Again, Calico went on gambling and went on winning.

  It was about that time that Calico mailed the only letter that he was ever known to write. He might have been forty, or—more likely—he may have been eighty at that time; no one could guess his age by looking at him. About the same time, idle gossip began wondering what Calico did with his money. He was known to have won many thousands, and to have lost little. He drank raw spirits as a horse drinks water, but it did not seem to affect him. That was all he bought, and certainly, he could not drink up his enormous winnings.

  It may have been that cupidity induced men to investigate Calico’s premises. Twice, men were found dead in the street in front of his place, with their heads horribly crushed. Dead men were no novelty in Gold Center at that time, for the place was not yet civilized, so no questions were asked. If there had been, no one would have thought of charging the crimes to Calico. He was the most inoffensive person in the wild old town. When rows came up in the gambling rooms and men were killed all about him, Calico would calmly keep his seat until the game started again. He seemed to have a sort of fatalistic idea that if he dodged he was as likely to get in the way of a bullet, as if he sat still.

  A month after Calico mailed his lone letter, he was at the stage station one evening when the stage came in. There was a woman and also a little girl on the stage. Calico met them, but there was no demonstration. He simply took them and their scant baggage to the grim old house, with its closed front and two blind sidewalls, crouched there under the bluff. They entered the alley gate, and it was a long time before Gold Center knew anything more. People didn’t ask Calico Capen questions; and the woman and child were not seen often, after entering Calico’s grim old house.

  A few people saw the woman and child at the stage stand the day they came. The mother appeared to be about thirty, and anything but lovely, though she may have only been tired and haggard from a long and trying journey. The little girl was a beauty, with great, luminous brown eyes, peering out of a wealth of golden curls.

  It finally became known that the woman, Mrs. Kingsley by name, was Calico’s daughter, and little Leota Kingsley was his granddaughter.

  Their coming made no change in Calico’s habits. He still occupied his chair at the poker table in the saloon which had taken over the fixtures and name of the Yellow Metal. He still gambled, and he still won. No stretch of the imagination could picture Calico Capen with his beautiful granddaughter on his knee, stroking the shining gold of her hair with his mighty hand. By no sort of maneuvering would he fit into a family scene.

  * * * *

  With the discovery of copper, Gold Center flashed down into the flats like a meteor. The courthouse and the city hall were there. The better residences were farther out, and the older part of town became known again as Tightwad. It was given over to the meaner sort of residences, occupied chiefly by questionable characters. This suited the Yellow Metal admirably. It was carrying on a questionable business. It was near enough the center of town for men to find it without difficulty, yet out of the way enough that the respectable element would not notice it much, for a while at least.

  Mrs. Kingsley and Leota had been there a year, but rarely had they been seen. No other human than the woman and child had ever passed the portal of Calico’s Castle, as the place had become known, since the grotesque old gambler had taken possession of it He always slept until about noon. In the afternoon he went to the stores and markets and bought such supplies as they required, carrying them home in a basket. He was a familiar f
igure in the town, always wearing a long Prince Albert coat that must have taken a bolt of cloth in the making, and a broad, soft black hat. And then—

  Two calamities, at least, befell Gold Center on the same night. One of these was a fierce mountain storm that screamed through the gulch, sweeping all flimsy structures before it in ruins, and breaking and twisting age old trees. The storm seemed to hit Tightwad Gulch harder than any other part of town. Many people wagged their heads and said it was a judgment sent on the wicked place. Certain it is that the Yellow Metal, Calico’s Castle, and a few others of the more substantial buildings, were all that was left of the old part of town. The Yellow Metal would never be the same again, because Calico Capen was gone! It happened like this—

  Early in the evening, before the great storm struck, Calico took his seat at the poker table as usual. He seemed in normal condition, and played them close to his vest, as usual. The wind was just beginning to shriek around the corners of houses, when two men entered the room, and sat into the game on the opposite side of the table from Calico. From the first, it was evident that the mottled old gambler was disturbed. He had always cursed men who drummed on the table with their fingers, but now he was doing that himself. Calico had never been known to quarrel over a game. He was always so clearly right that no question could be raised. One of these strangers was a man in his late forties, and of the same powerful build as Calico Capen. The other was a much younger man, of rather slight build. On the first deal after the strangers sat in, Calico stayed and lost It wasn’t a very heavy pot, for the strangers seemed cautious, but Calico’s basilisk eyes narrowed and the dealer noticed that it seemed to get the shrewd old gambler’s goat. On the second deal, Calico stayed again. Everybody dropped out but Calico and the big stranger. Back and forth they raised one another until the stacks almost reached the ceiling, and then the stranger won. As he leaned forward to rake in his winnings, there was an evil grin on his face. He said something in a low tone, meant only for Calico, and no one else heard it.