by Brand, Max
"The kid's called your bluff, Larry," he said. "And the rest of us don't need to see you pull any target practice. Shake hands with the kid, will you, and tell him you were joking!"
Larry settled back in his chair with a grunt, and Henry, without a word, tipped back in his chair and kicked the table. Andy, beside him, saw the move start, and he had just time to scoop his own winnings, including that last rich bet, off the table top and into his pocket. As for the rest of the coin, it slid with a noisy jangle to the floor, and it turned the other three men into scrambling madmen. They scratched and clawed at the money, cursing volubly, and Andy, stepping back out of the fracas, saw the scar-faced man watching with a smile of contempt. There was a snarl; Jeff had Joe by the throat, and Joe was reaching for his gun. Henry moved forward to interfere once more, but this time he was not needed. A clear whistling sounded outside the house, and a moment later the door was kicked open. A man came in with his saddle on his hip.
His appearance converted the threatening fight into a scene of jovial good nature. The money was swept up at random, as though none of them had the slightest care what became of it.
"Havin' one of your little parties, eh?" said the stranger. "What started it?"
"He did, Scottie," answered Larry, and, stretching out an arm of enormous length, he pointed at Andrew.
Again it required the intervention of Henry to explain matters, and Scottie, with his hands on his hips, turned and surveyed Andrew with considering eyes. He was much different from the rest. Whereas, they had one and all a peculiarly unhealthy effect upon Andy, this newcomer was a cheery fellow, with an eye as clear as crystal, and color in his tanned cheeks. He had one of those long faces which invariably imply shrewdness, and he canted his head to one side while he watched Andy. "You're him that put the pinto in the corral, I guess?" he said.
Andy nodded.
There was no further mention of the troubles of that card game. Jeff and Joe and Larry were instantly busied about the kitchen and in arranging the table, while Scottie, after the manner of a guest, bustled about and accomplished little.
But the eye of Andy, then and thereafter, whenever he was near the five, kept steadily upon the scar-faced man. Henry had tilted his chair back against the wall. The night had come on chill, with a rising wind that hummed through the cracks of the ill-built wall and tossed the flame in the throat of the chimney; Henry draped a coat like a cloak around his shoulders and buried his chin in his hands, separated from the others by a vast gulf. Presently Scottie was sitting at the table. The others were gathered around him in expectant attitudes.
"What's new?" they exclaimed in one voice.
"Oh, about a million things. Let me get some of this ham into my face, and then I'll talk. I've got a batch of newspapers yonder. There's a gold rush on up to Tolliver's Creek."
Andy blinked, for that news was at least four weeks old. But now came a tide of other news, and almost all of it was stale stuff to him. But the men drank it in--all except Henry, silent in his corner. He was relaxed, as if he slept. "But the most news is about the killing of Bill Dozier."
Chapter 13
"Ol' Bill!" grunted red-headed Jeff. "Well, I'll be hung! There's one good deed done. He was overdue, anyways."
Andy, waiting breathlessly, watched lest the eye of the narrator should swing toward him for the least part of a second. But Scottie seemed utterly oblivious of the fact that he sat in the same room with the murderer. "Well, he got it," said Scottie. "And he didn't get it from behind. Seems there was a young gent in Martindale--all you boys know old Jasper Lanning?" There was an answering chorus. "Well, he's got a nephew, Andrew Lanning. This kid was sort of a bashful kind, they say. But yesterday he up and bashed a fellow in the jaw, and the man went down. Whacked his head on a rock, and young Lanning thought his man was dead. So he holds off the crowd with a gun, hops a horse, and beats it."
"Pretty, pretty!" murmured Larry. "But what's that got to do with that hyena, Bill Dozier?"
"I don't get it all hitched up straight. Most of the news come from Martindale to town by telephone. Seems this young Lanning was follered by Bill Dozier. He was always a hound for a job like that, eh?"
There was a growl of assent.
"He hand-picked five rough ones and went after Lanning. Chased him all night. Landed at John Merchant's place. The kid had dropped in there to call on a girl. Can you beat that for cold nerve, him figuring that he'd killed a man, and Bill Dozier and five more on his trail to bring him back to wait and see whether the buck he dropped lived or died--and then to slide over and call on a lady? No, you can't raise that!"
But the tidings were gradually breaking in upon the mind of Andrew Lanning. Buck Heath had not been dead; the pursuit was simply to bring him back on some charge of assault; and now--Bill Dozier--the head of Andrew swam.
"Seems he didn't know her, either. Just paid a call round about dawn and then rode on. Bill comes along a little later on the trail, gets new horses from Merchant, and runs down Lanning early this morning. Runs him down, and then Lanning turns in the saddle and drills Bill through the head at five hundred yards."
Henry came to life. "How far?" he said.
"That's what they got over the telephone," said Scottie apologetically.
"Then the news got to Hal Dozier from Merchant's house. Hal hops on the wire and gets in touch with the governor, and in about ten seconds they make this Lanning kid an outlaw and stick a price on his head--five thousand, I think, and they say Merchant is behind it. The telephone was buzzing with it when I left town, and most of the boys were oiling up their gats and getting ready to make a play. Pretty easy money, eh, for putting the rollers under a kid?"
Andrew Lanning muttered aloud: "An outlaw!"
"Not the first time Bill Dozier has done it," said Henry calmly. "That's an old maneuver of his--to hound a man from a little crime to a big one."
The throat of Andrew was dry. "Did you get a description of young Lanning?" he asked.
"Sure," nodded Scottie. "Twenty-three years old, about five feet ten, black hair and black eyes, good looking, big shoulders, quiet spoken."
Andrew made a gesture and looked carelessly out the back window, but, from the corner of his eyes, he was noting the five men. Not a line of their expressions escaped him. He was seeing, literally, with eyes in the back of his head; and if, by the interchange of one knowing glance, or by a significant silence, even, these fellows had indicated that they remotely guessed his identity, he would have been on his feet like a tiger, gun in hand, and backing for the door. Five thousand dollars! What would not one of these men do for that sum?
Andy had been keyed to the breaking point before; but his alertness was now trebled, and, like a sensitive barometer, he felt the danger of Larry, the brute strength of Jeff, the cunning of Henry, the grave poise of Joe, to say nothing of Scottie--an unknown force. But Scottie was running on in his talk; he was telling of how he met the storekeeper in town; he was naming everything he saw; these fellows seemed to hunger for the minutest news of men. They broke into admiring laughter when Scottie told of his victorious tilt of jesting with the storekeeper's daughter; even Henry came out of his patient gloom long enough to smile at this, and the rest were like children. Larry was laughing so heartily that his eyes began to twinkle. He even invited Andrew in on the mirth.
At this point Andy stood up and stretched elaborately--but in stretching he put his arms behind him, and stretched them down rather than up, so that his hands were never far from his hips.
"I'll be turning in," said Andy, and stepping back to the door so that his face would be toward them until the last instant of his exit, he waved good night.
There was a brief shifting of eyes toward him, and a grunt from Jeff; that was all. Then the eye of every one reverted to Scottie. But the latter broke off his narrative.
"Ain't you sleepin' in?" he asked. "We could fix you a bunk upstairs, I guess."
Once more the glance of Andrew flashed from face to fa
ce, and then he saw the first suspicious thing. Scottie was looking straight at Henry, in the corner, as though waiting for a direction, and, from the corner of his eye, Andrew was aware that Henry had nodded ever so slightly.
"Here's something you might be interested to know," said Scottie. "This young Lanning was riding a pinto hoss." He added, while Andrew stood rooted to the spot: "You seemed sort of interested in the description. I allowed maybe you'd try your hand at findin' him."
Andy understood perfectly that he was known, and, with his left hand frozen against the knob of the door, he flattened his shoulders against the wall and stood ready for the draw. In the crisis, at the first hostile move, he decided that he would dive straight for the table, low. It would tumble the room into darkness as the candles fell--a semidarkness, for there would be a sputtering lantern still.
Then he would fight for his life. And looking at the others, he saw that they were changed, indeed. They were all facing him, and their faces were alive with interest; yet they made no hostile move. No doubt they awaited the signal of Henry; there was the greatest danger; and now Henry stood up.
His first word was a throwing down of disguises. "Mr. Lanning," he said, "I think this is a time for introductions."
That cold exultation, that wild impulse to throw himself into the arms of danger, was sweeping over Andrew. He made no gesture toward his gun, though his fingers were curling, but he said: "Friends, I've got you all in my eye. I'm going to open this door and go out. No harm to any of you. But if you try to stop me, it means trouble, a lot of trouble--quick!"
Just a split second of suspense. If a foot stirred, or a hand raised, Andrew's curling hand would jerk up and bring out a revolver, and every man in the room knew it. Then the voice of Henry, "You'd plan on fighting us all?"
"Take my bridle off the wall," said Andrew, looking straight before him at no face, and thereby enabled to see everything, just as a boxer looks in the eye of his opponent and thereby sees every move of his gloves. "Take my bridle off the wall, you, Jeff, and throw it at my feet."
The bridle rattled at his feet.
"This has gone far enough," said Henry. "Lanning, you've got the wrong idea. I'm going ahead with the introductions. The red-headed fellow we call Jeff is better known to the public as Jeff Rankin. Does that mean anything to you?" Jeff Rankin acknowledged the introduction with a broad grin, the corners of his mouth being lost in the heavy fold of his jowls. "I see it doesn't," went on Henry. "Very well. Joe's name is Joe Clune. Yonder sits Scottie Macdougal. There is Larry la Roche. And I am Henry Allister."
The edge of Andrew's alertness was suddenly dulled. The last name swept into his brain a wave of meaning, for of all words on the mountain desert there was none more familiar than Henry Allister. Scar-faced Allister, they called him. Of those deadly men who figured in the tales of Uncle Jasper, Henry Allister was the last and the most grim. A thousand stories clustered about him: of how he killed Watkins; of how Langley, the famous Federal marshal, trailed him for five years and was finally killed in the duel which left Allister with that scar; of how he broke jail at Garrisonville and again at St. Luke City. In the imagination of Andrew he had loomed like a giant, some seven-foot prodigy, whiskered, savage of eye, terrible of voice. And, turning toward him, Andrew saw him in profile with the scar obscured--and his face was of almost feminine refinement.
Five thousand dollars?
A dozen rich men in the mountain desert would each pay more than that for the apprehension of Allister, dead or alive. And bitterly it came over Andrew that this genius of crime, this heartless murderer as story depicted him, was no danger to him but almost a friend. And the other four ruffians of Allister's band were smiling cordially at him, enjoying his astonishment. The day before his hair would have turned white in such a place among such men; tonight they were his friends.
Chapter 14
After that things happened to Andrew in a swirl. They were shaking hands with him. They were congratulating him on the killing of Bill Dozier. They were patting him on the back. Larry la Roche, who had been so hostile, now stood up to the full of his ungainly height and proposed his health. And the other men drank it standing. Andy received a tin cup half full of whisky, and he drank the burning stuff in acknowledgment. The unaccustomed drink went to his head, his muscles began to relax, his eyes swam. Voices boomed at him out of a haze. "Why, he's only a young kid. One shot put him under the weather."
"Shut up, Larry. He'll learn fast enough."
"Ah, yes," said Larry to himself, "he'll learn fast enough!"
Presently he was lifted and carried by strong arms up a creaking stairs. He looked up, and he saw the red hair of the mighty Jeff, who carried him as if he had been a child, and deposited him among some blankets.
"I didn't know," Larry la Roche was saying. "How could I tell a man-killer like him couldn't stand no more than a girl?"
"Shut up and get out," said another voice. Heavy footsteps retreated, then Andrew heard them once more grumbling and booming below him.
After that his head cleared rapidly. Two windows were open in this higher room, and a sharp current of the night wind blew across him, clearing his mind as rapidly as wind blows away a fog. Now he made out that one man had not left him; the dark outline of him was by the bed, waiting.
"Who's there?" asked Andrew.
"Allister. Take it easy."
"I'm all right. I'll go down again to the boys."
"That's what I'm here to talk to you about, kid. Are you sure your head's clear?"
"Yep. Sure thing."
"Then listen to me, Lanning, while I talk. It's important. Stay here till the morning, then ride on."
"Where?"
"Oh, away from Martindale, that's all."
"Out of the desert? Out of the mountains?"
"Of course. They'll hunt for you here." Allister paused, then went on. "And when you get away what'll you do? Go straight?"
"God willing," said Andrew fervently. "It--it was only luck, bad luck, that put me where I am."
The outlaw scratched a match and lighted a candle; then he dropped a little of the melted tallow on a box, and by that light he peered earnestly into Andrew's face. He appeared to need this light to read the expression on it. It also enabled Andrew to see the face of Allister. Sometimes the play of shadows made that face unreal as a dream, sometimes the face was filled with poetic beauty, sometimes the light gleamed on the scar and the sardonic smile, and then it was a face out of hell.
"You're going to get away from the mountain desert and go straight," said Allister.
"That's it." He saw that the outlaw was staring with a smile, half grim and half sad, into the shadows and far away.
"Lanning, let me tell you. You'll never get away."
"You don't understand," said Andrew. "I don't like fighting. It--it makes me sick inside. I'm not a brave man!"
He waited to see the contempt come on the face of the famous leader, but there was nothing but grave attention.
"Why," Andy went on in a rush of confidence, "everybody in Martindale knows that I'm not a fighter. Those fellows downstairs think that I'm a sort of bad hombre. I'm not. Why, Allister, when I turned over Buck Heath and saw his face, I nearly fainted, and then--"
"Wait," cut in the other. "That was your first man. You didn't kill him, but you thought you had. You nearly fainted, then. But as I gather it, after you shot Bill Dozier you simply sat on your horse and waited. Did you feel like fainting then?"
"No," explained Andrew hastily. "I wanted to go after them and shoot'em all. They could have rushed me and taken me prisoner easily, but they wanted to shoot me from a distance--and it made me mad to see them work it. I--I hated them all, and I had a reason for it. Curse them!"
He added hurriedly: "But I've no grudge against anybody. All I want is a chance to live quiet and clean."
There was a faint sigh from Allister.
"Lanning," he murmured, "the minute I laid eyes on you, I knew you were one of my ki
nd. In all my life I've known only one other with that same chilly effect in his eyes--that was Marshal Langley--only he happened to be on the side of the law. No matter. He had the iron dust in him. He was cut out to be a man-killer. You say you want to get away: Lanning, you can't do it. Because you can't get away from yourself. I'm making a long talk to you, but you're worth it. I tell you I read your mind. You plan on riding north and getting out of the mountain desert before the countryside there is raised against you, the way it's raised to the south. In the first place, I don't think you'll get away. Hal Dozier is on your trail, and he'll get to the north and raise the whole district and stop you before you hit the towns. You'll have to go back to the mountain desert. You'll have to do it eventually, why not do it now? Lanning, if I had you at my back I could laugh at the law the rest of our lives! Stay with me. I can tell a man when I see him. I saw you call Larry la Roche. And I've never wanted a man the way I want you. Not to follow me, but as a partner. Shake and say you will!"
The slender hand was stretched out through the shadows, the light from the candle flashed on it. And a power outside his own will made Andrew move his hand to meet it. He stopped the gesture with a violent effort.
The swift voice of the outlaw, with a fiber of earnest persuasion in it, went on: "You see what I risk to get you. Hal Dozier is on your trail. He's the only man in the world I'd think twice about before I met him face to face. But if I join to you, I'll have to meet him sooner or later. Well, Lanning, I'll take that risk. I know he's more devil than man when it comes to gun play, but we'll meet him together. Give me your hand!"
There was a riot in the brain of Andrew Lanning. The words of the outlaw had struck something in him that was like metal chiming on metal. Iron dust? That was it! The call of one blood to another, and he realized the truth of what Allister said. If he touched the hand of this man, there would be a bond between them which only death could break. In one blinding rush he sensed the strength and the faith of Allister.
But another voice was at his ear, and he saw Anne Withero, as she had stood for that moment in his arms in her room. It came over him with a chill like cold moonlight.