CHAPTER XV
THE KID
So the next day Buck Thornton rode away to the south and to Hill'sCorners.
He had planned to have his errand over early, to have seen the Kid andto have turned back toward the ranch before noon. For he knew the town'shabit of late sleeping and he wanted to be gone from it before it wasawake and pouring into its long street and into its many swinging doorsthe stream of men whom he had no wish to see now. Perfectly well he knewhow easily he could find trouble there, and it seemed to him that he hadenough on his hands already without seeking to add to it.
But the press of range business kept him later than he had thought itwould. And then the one horse on the range he would ride today had to befound out in the hills and roped.
"For," he told himself grimly, "if I'm going to stick my nose in thatman's town I'm going to have a horse between my knees that knows how todo something more than creep! And when it comes to horses there's onlyone real horse I ever saw. I got you, Comet, you old son-of-a-gun!"
And his rope flew out and its wide noose landed with much precision,drawing tight about the neck of a great, lean barrelled, defiant-eyedfour-year-old that in the midst of its headlong flight stopped with feetbunched together before the rope had grown taut. The animal, standingnow like a horse cut from a block of grey granite, chiselled by thehands of a great sculptor who at the same time was a great lover ofequine perfection, swung about upon its captor, its eyes blazing, just alittle quiver of the clean-cut nostrils showing the red satin of theskin lining them. The mane was like a tumbled silken skein, the earsdainty and small and keen pointed, the chest splendidly deep and strong;the forelegs small, so slender that to a man who did not know a horsethey would have seemed fragile but only because they were all bone andsinew like steel and muscle hardened and stripped clean of the lastmilligram of fat, as exquisite as the perfect ankle of a high bredwoman.
"Part greyhound and part steam engine and part devil!" Thornton mutteredwith vast approval shining in his eyes. "And _all horse_! A man couldride you right through hell, Little Horse, and come out the other sideand never smell your hair burn!"
He drew saddle and bridle from the animal he had been riding and turnedit loose. Then coiling his rope as he went, he came up to Comet'shigh-lifted head. With much evident distaste but with what looked liketoo much pride to struggle in an encounter in which he knew that he wasto be overcome, the big grey accepted the hard Spanish bit. He allowed,too, the saddle to be thrown on him, only a quick little quivering ofthe tense flanks and a twitching of the skin upon his back showing thathe felt and resented. And then with his master's weight upon him, hismaster's softened voice in his ear, a hard hand very gently stroking thehot shoulder, Comet shook his head, a great sigh expanded the deeplungs, and he was the perfect saddle horse with too much sense to rebelfurther at the knowledge that after all he is a horse and the man whobestrides him is a man. And Buck Thornton, because he knew this animaland loved him, slackened the reins a little, sensed the tensing of thepowerful muscles slipping like pliant steel through satin sheaths,turned the proud head toward the south and felt the rush of air whippingback his hat brim, stinging his face as they shot out across the rollinghills.
When Comet had had his run, racing through the other herds that flung uptheir heads to look at him and the first half mile had sped away behind,Thornton coaxed him down into a gentle gallop, swearing at him with muchsoft and deep affection.
"Easy, Little Horse," he soothed. "Easy. We're going to Dead Man's.We'll go in slow and watching where we put our feet, all rested andquick on the trigger and ready to come out ... if we _want_ to! ... likewinning a race."
And Comet, snorting his dislike of any conservation of strength andenergy, nevertheless obeyed. So it was a little after three o'clockwhen they entered the crooked, narrow street which gives a bad town abad name.
The town had shaken off the lethargy of its morning sleep: there weremany men in the street, some riding back and forth, disdaining to walkthe distance of a hundred yards from a saloon they had just left to thesaloon to which they were going, some sitting their horses in the shade,lounging in the saddle as a man may lounge in an arm chair, some idledon foot at the swinging doors, while many others made a buzz of deepthroated voices at the bars and over the gaming tables. As BuckThornton, riding slowly, his hat back upon his head, his eyes ranging toright and left, came into the street where Winifred Waverly had enteredit last week, more than one man lifted his eyebrows on seeing him andwondered what business had brought him here. For the memory of hismeeting with the Bedloes was still green, the scars which the Kid woreon his right wrist and his left arm were still fresh, and this town wasthe Bedloes' town in more ways than one.
He nodded to a few men, spoke to fewer, for here was he more a strangerthan he was in Dry Town. Riding straight to the Brown Bear Saloon heswung down. He left his horse, trained to stand by the hour for him, atthe edge of the board sidewalk, the bridle reins caught around the hornof the saddle, moved at an even pace through the men at the door andwent inside.
A dozen men stood at the long bar, big men and little, dark men andlight, of this nationality and that, but alike in the one essentialthing that they were of the type by which the far-out places are wrestedfrom the wilderness of God and made part of the wildness of man, hardmen of tongue, of hand, of nature, hard drinkers, hard fighters. Gunmen,to the last man of them, who live with a gun always, by a gun oftenenough, who are dropping fast before the onrush of the civilization forwhich they themselves have made the way, but who will daily walk overtheir graves until the glimmer of steel rails runs into the last of thefar places, until there be no longer wide, unfenced miles where cattlerun free and rugged mountain sides into which men dip to bring out redand yellow gold.
Thornton's eyes ran down the line of them, swiftly. There was no manthere whom he knew. He stepped a little to one side, the door at hisleft, the bare front wall at his back. He stood loosely, carelessly tojudge from the little slump of the shoulders, the burning cigarette inthe fingers of his left hand, the thumb of the right hand caught in hisbelt.
The bar was at his left, the bare floor running away in front of him,sawdust covered, the string of gaming tables stretched along the wall athis right. As by instinct his eyes lighted upon the man whom he sought.First a round topped table where three men cut and dealt at "stud";then a faro lay-out with its quick-eyed dealer, its quick-eyed look-outupon his stool, its half dozen men playing and looking on; then the"wheel"; then a second table with six men busy at "draw." There, at thistable, with his broad back to him, sat the Kid. And as usual, to completethe youthful swagger of him, he wore his two guns in plain sight.
Still the cattle man made no move, still his eyes ran back and forth,seeking, showing nothing of what they sought or of what they had foundalready. He marked every man in the place; saw that there were only twoof them besides the Kid whom he had ever seen before, one the bartender,one a man with whom he had had no dealings; noted that neither Charleynor Ed Bedloe were in the house. He saw too that the bartender hadleaned a little over his bar, saying something swiftly to the man whomhe was serving; that the man turned curiously to look toward the door;while at the same time the man across the table from the Kid had givenwarning, and the Kid's hands had come away from his cards, dropping downinto his lap.
Then Thornton came on, walking slowly, passing about the first pokertable, then by the faro table, the roulette wheel, and finally to thetable where the Kid sat. Bedloe had not moved again: he had not turned,his cards lay unheeded before him. The other men were silent with a jackpot waiting for their attention.
"When he turns," Thornton was telling himself, "it's going to be in thedirection of his gun, and he's going to come up shooting."
There were many men there who sensed the thing he did. Not a man in thesaloon whose eyes were not keen and expectant as they ran back and forthbetween the two, Thornton who had shot Bedloe before now, Bedloe who hadsworn to "get him." A chair leg scraped and m
any men started as if ithad been the first pistol shot; it was only the man across the tablefrom Bedloe moving back a little, ready to leap to his feet to right orleft. Somebody laughed. At the sound though Bedloe's big thick bodyremained steady like a rock his fingers twitched perceptibly.
"Bedloe," and Thornton's voice was cool and low toned, with no tremor init, no fear, no threat, no hint of any kind of expression, "I want atalk with you."
He was not five short paces behind the brawler's back. The Kid turned alittle in his chair, slowly, very slowly like a machine. His eyes cameto rest full upon Thornton's. And Thornton, looking back steadily intothe hard eyes, steely and blue and fearless, low lidded and watchful,knew that the man had fully expected to see straight into the barrel ofa revolver. For a moment it was as though this place had come under sucha spell as that in the tale of the Sleeping Beauty, with every mantouched by a swift enchantment that had stilled his blood and turned hisbody to stone.
Thornton saw that Bedloe's hands were tense with tendons standing outsharply under the brown skin, the fingers rigid, curved inward a little,and not three inches from the grips of his guns. And Bedloe saw thatThornton carried a burning cigarette in his left hand, that his right,with thumb caught in the band of his chaps, was careless only in theseeming and that it, too, was alert and tense. And he remembered thelighting quickness of that right hand.
"What do you want?"
No bluster, no threat, no fear, no hint of expression in the voice whichwas as steady as Thornton's, with something in it akin to the steelysteadiness of the hard eyes.
They spoke slowly, with little pauses, little silences between. The manwhose chair had scraped looked uncomfortable; the muscles of his throatcontracted; his hand shut tight upon his cards, cracking the backs; thenhe pushed back his chair again, swiftly, and got to his feet. His deepbreathing was audible when he stood to one side where, if there was tobe shooting, he would no longer be "in line." No one noticed him.
"I want a quiet talk," was Thornton's reply. "I'm not here to startanything, Bedloe. Will you give me a chance to talk with you?"
Bedloe pondered the words, without distrust, without credence, merelysearching for what lay back of them. And finally he answered with abrief question:
"Where?"
"Anywhere. In yonder," and Thornton's nod indicated the little roompartitioned off from the larger for a private poker room while his eyesclung to Bedloe's. "Or outside. Anywhere."
Again the Kid pondered.
"I'm playin' poker," he said presently, very quietly. "An' I ain'tplayin' for fun. There's one hell of a lot of money changin' han's thisdeal, an'," with the first flash of defiance, and much significance towords and look alike, "my luck's runnin' high today!"
"I'll wait until you play your hand," returned Thornton withouthesitation. "I'll step right over here."
As he spoke he moved, walking slowly with cautious feet feeling for anobstacle over which he might stumble and so for just the one vitalfraction of a second give the Kid the chance to draw first, his eyesupon the eyes which followed him. He stepped, so, about the table, tothe other side, so that Bedloe, once more sitting straight in his chair,faced him over the jack pot.
The big blue eyed man didn't speak. It was his move and he knew it, knewthat all men there were looking at him. He studied Thornton's eyes as hehad never studied a man before, taking his time, cool, clear headed. Hecould get his gun in a flash; he could throw himself to one side as hejammed it across the table, shooting; he could do it before most menthere could even guess that he was going to do it. He knew that verywell. And he knew too, that although he was quick and sure on the draw,here was a man who was just that wee, deadly fraction of a secondquicker.
As though he would find a flicker in the steady eyes of the other man totell him what he wanted to know, he moved his hand, his left, a very,very little, so little that save at a time like this no man would haveseen. There came no change in Thornton's eyes. The Kid lifted the hand,laying it with still fingers upon the table before him. Still nothing inThornton's eyes to tell that he had seen or had not seen. One secondmore the Kid sat motionless, pondered. Then he had decided. The righthand came up and lay beside the left on the table.
A man at the bar set down his glass and the faint noise against the hardwood sounded unnaturally loud. Another man ordered a drink, and the lowvoice breaking the silence sounded like a shout. Men who had stood intense, cramped positions moved, games that had stopped went on. Thestrain of a few moments was gone, though still no one lost sight formore than an instant of Thornton and the Kid.
Bedloe dropped his eyes to his cards, merely turning the corners as theylay flat on the table. The man who had gotten hastily out of his chaircame back. The game went on as the others were going, silently andswiftly. The jack pot was opened, "boosted," and grew fat. Bedloe playeda cool hand, and the impression until near the show-down was that he wasnot to be reckoned with. Then, a little impudently, as was his way, heshoved his pile to the centre of the table.
"See that or drop out," he said curtly.
The nervous man dropped out. Two men saw it. They both lost to the Kid'sfull hand.
He swept up the gold and silver and slipped it into his pocket, hishand going very close to his gun during the process but neverhesitating. Then he got to his feet.
"Let's go outside," he said, turning toward Thornton.
He led the way, swinging about so that the broad of his back was to theman who followed him and the man whom he had sworn to kill. Walking so,a few paces between them, they passed by the bar, through the clutter ofmen about the door and out upon the narrow sidewalk. Still the Kid didnot stop. He strode on, not so much as looking to see if he werefollowed, until he came to the middle of the narrow street. Then he cameto a quick halt and turned.
"Now," said the Kid, "spit it out. If you want to finish what we begunat Smith's start in. I'm ready."
"I told you," Thornton answered him, "that I am not looking for trouble.When I am I know where I can find it." He dropped his voice yet lower sothat by no possibility could any one of the men upon the sidewalk hearhim, and ended, "Jimmie Clayton sent me."
"An'," asked the Kid coolly, "who the hell is Jimmie Clayton?"
"He's a poor little devil who is in need of a friend, if he's got any,"Thornton returned. "And he said you were the only friend he had here."
"Maybe I am an' maybe I ain't." The sharpness of suspicion was still highin Bedloe's eyes. "What about him?"
"You knew he was in the pen?"
"I ain't answerin' questions. Go ahead."
"He broke jail a few days ago. He killed his guard and got himselfpretty badly shot up. I guess they're on his trail now. And he's goingto swing for it if they ever get him."
"Where is he?" asked Bedloe sharply with no lessening of the suspicionand ready watchfulness.
"In the old dugout at the Poison Hole."
"How's it happen you know so much about it?"
"Jimmie was a friend to me once when I needed a friend. He got this far,he held out to ride to my cabin night before last and left a note. Itook him out some grub last night. It's all I can do for him; I haven'tany way to hide him out. And he's in too bad shape to ride."
"Well, where do I come in?"
Thornton shrugged his shoulders.
"That's your business, yours and Jimmie's. He said that you were a palof his, and," he added bluntly, with a keen curious look into the Kid'ssteel-blue eyes, "that you never went back on a pal."
Behind him in the street Thornton heard the clatter of horses' hoofscoming on rapidly. He paid no attention until they were close to him, soclose that from the corner of his eye he caught the flutter of a woman'sskirt. Then he knew who it was before she passed on. One was Pollardlooking white and sick; the other, rosy cheeked and bright eyed, wasWinifred Waverly.
A quick smile drove the sternness from his eyes and he swept off his hatto her, ignoring the presence of Pollard. But into her expression as shereturned his look for the
moment in which she was flashing by, therecame no vague hint of recognition. He turned back to Bedloe, a littleflush of anger in his cheeks. The two men were very near only battlejust then. For the Kid smiled.
"How do I know you're tellin' me the truth?" They had gone back toJimmie Clayton, Bedloe speaking suspiciously again. "How do I know youain't puttin' up a game on me? It's a nice lonely place, where thatdugout is."
The flush died out of the cowboy's tanned skin as swiftly as it had runinto it.
"I guess you can't tell," he retorted. "Unless you go and find out. Andyou know if I wanted to get you I could have got you in there, and Icould have got you that time at Smith's. And," with an impudence tomatch Bedloe's, "I could get you now!"
The Kid passed over the remark, his brows knitted thoughtfully.
"Well," he said in a moment, "you've shot your wad now, ain't you? Iguess there ain't no call for me an' you to talk all day."
"That's all. What'll I tell Jimmie?"
"You can tell him he ain't made no mistake. You may be lyin' an' youmay be tippin' me the straight. But he is a pal of mine an' a damndecent little pal, an' I'll take a chance."
"You'll get him?"
"If he's there I'll get him."
"When?"
"You'd like the time o' day to the minute, I reckon!" He laughed softly."Jus' the first show I get, which'll be in three or four days."
"If you want a horse for him after a while, a good horse, I'll give himone. That's the best I can do. And I guess that's all, Bedloe."
Thornton stepped back toward his horse. Bedloe turned abruptly andstrode through the crowd of men on the sidewalk and back to the saloonand his game, no doubt. Thornton swung up into the saddle, and ridingswiftly, passed down the street and back toward the range. As he went hefelt little satisfaction in an errand done, little relief to have itover. For he was thinking of the look in a girl's eyes, and again aflush ran up into his cheeks, the bright flush of anger.
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