Max Brand (27 page)

"And your mind's made up?" asked Arizona.

"Yes," said the sheriff. "You go in with Sinclair."

"Go
in
with him?" asked Arizona, baffled.

"For murder," said the sheriff. "Stick up your hands, Arizona!"

Even though he was taken utterly by surprise, habit made Arizona go for
his own gun, as the sheriff whipped out his weapon. But under those
conditions he was beaten badly to the draw. Before his weapon was half
out of the holster, the sheriff had the drop.

Arizona paused, but, for a moment, his eyes fought Kern, figuring
chances. It was only the hesitation of an instant. The battle was lost
before it had begun, and Arizona was clever enough to know it. Swiftly
he turned on a new tack. He shoved his revolver back into the holster
and smiled benevolently on the sheriff.

"What's the new game, Kern?"

"It ain't new," said the sheriff joylessly. "It's about the oldest game
in the world. Arizona, you sure killed Sandersen."

"Sandersen?" Arizona laughed. "Why, man, I ain't hardly seen him more
than once. How come that I would kill him?"

"Get your hands up, Arizona."

"Oh, sure." He obeyed with apparent willingness. "But don't let anybody
see you making this fool play, sheriff."

"Maybe not so foolish. I'll tell you why you killed him. You're broke,
Arizona. Ten days ago Mississippi Slim cleaned you out at dice. Well,
when Sinclair told me where Cold Feet was, you listened through the
door, but you didn't stay to find out that Jig wasn't wanted no more.
You beat it up to the mountain, and there you found Sandersen was ahead
of your time. You drilled Sandersen, hoping to throw the blame on Cold
Feet. Then you come down, but on the way Cold Feet gives you the slip
and gets away. And that's why you're here."

Arizona blinked. So much of this tale was true that it shook even his
iron nerve. He managed to smile.

"That's a wild yarn, sheriff. D'you think it'll go down with a jury?"

"It'll go down with any jury around these parts. What's more, Arizona,
I ain't going to rest on what I think. I'm going to find out. And, if I
send down to the south inquiring about you, I got an idea that I'll
find out enough to hang ten like you, eh?"

Once more Arizona received a vital blow, and he winced under the
impact. Moreover, he was bewildered. His own superior intelligence had
inclined him to despise the sheriff, whom he put down as a fellow of
more bulldog power than mental agility. All in a moment it was being
borne in upon him that he had underrated his man. He could not answer.
His smooth tongue was chained.

"Not that I got any personal grudge agin' you," went on the sheriff,
"but it's gents like you that I'm after, Arizona, and not one like
Sinclair. You ain't clean, Arizona. You're slick, and they ain't
elbowroom enough in the West for slick gents. Besides, you got a bad
way with your gun. I can tell you this, speaking private and
confidential, I'm going to hang you, Arizona, if there's any way
possible!"

He said all this quietly, but the revolver remained poised with
rocklike firmness. He drew out a pair of manacles.

"Stand up, Arizona."

Listlessly the fat man got up. He had been changing singularly during
the last speech of the sheriff. Now he dropped a hand on the edge of
the table, as if to support himself. The sheriff saw that hand grip the
wood until the knuckles went white. Arizona moistened his colorless
lips.

"Not the irons, sheriff," he said softly. "Not them!"

If it had been any other man, Kern would have imagined that he was
losing his nerve; but he knew Arizona, had seen him in action, and he
was certain that his courage was above question. Consequently he was
amazed. As certainly as he had ever seen them exposed, these were the
horrible symptoms of cowardice that make a brave man shudder to see.

"Can't trust you," he said wonderingly. "Wouldn't trust you a minute,
Arizona, without the irons on you. You're a bad actor, son, and I've
seen you acting up. Don't forget that."

"Sheriff, I give you my word that I'll go quiet as a lamb."

A moment elapsed before Kern could answer, for the voice of Arizona had
trembled as he spoke. The sheriff could not believe his ears.

"Well, I'm sorry, Arizona," he said more gently, because he was
striving to banish this disgusting suspicion from his own mind. "I
can't take no chances. Just turn around, will you. And keep them hands
up!"

He barked the last words, for the arms of Arizona had crooked suddenly.
They stiffened at the sharp command of the sheriff. Slowly, trembling,
as if they possessed a volition of their own hardly controlled by the
fat man, those hands fought their way back to their former position,
and then Arizona gradually turned his back on the sheriff. A convulsive
shudder ran through him as Kern removed his gun and then seized one of
the raised hands, drew it down, and fastened one part of the iron on
it. The other hand followed, and, as the sheriff snapped the lock, he
saw a singular transformation in the figure of his captive. The
shoulders of Arizona slouched forward, his head sank. From the erect,
powerful figure of the moment before, he became, in comparison, a
flabby pile of flesh, animated by no will.

"What's the matter?" asked the sheriff. "You ain't lost your nerve,
have you, Fatty?"

Arizona did not answer. Kern stepped to one side and glanced at the
face of his captive. It was strangely altered. The mouth had become
trembling, loose, uncertain. The head had fallen, and the bright, keen
eyes were dull. The man looked up with darting side-glances.

The sheriff stood back and wiped a sudden perspiration from his
forehead. Under his very eyes the spirit of this gunfighter was
disintegrating. The sheriff felt a cold shame pour through him. He
wanted to hide this man from the eyes of the others. It was not right
that he should be seen. His weakness was written too patently.

Kern was no psychologist, but he knew that some men out of their
peculiar element are like fish out of water. He shook his head.

"Walk out that back door, will you?" he asked softly.

"We ain't going down the street?" demanded Arizona.

"No."

"Thanks, sheriff."

Again Kern shuddered, swallowed, and then commanded: "Start along,
Arizona."

Slinking through the door, the fat man hesitated on the little porch
and cast a quick glance up and down.

"No one near!" he said. "Hurry up, sheriff."

Quickly they skirted down behind the houses—not unseen, however. A
small boy playing behind his father's house raised his head to watch
the hurrying pair, and when he saw the glitter of the irons, they heard
him gasp. He was old enough to know the meaning of that. Irons on
Arizona, who had been a town hero the night before! They saw the
youngster dart around the house.

"Blast him!" groaned Arizona. "He'll spread it everywhere. Hurry!"

He was right. The sheriff hurried with a will, but, as they crossed the
street for the door of the jail, voices blew down to them. Looking
toward the hotel, they saw men pouring out into the street, pointing,
shouting to one another. Then they swept down on the pair.

But the sheriff and his prisoner gained the door of the jail first, and
Kern locked it behind him. His deputy on guard rose with a start, and
at the same time there was a hurried knocking on the door and a clamor
of voices without. Arizona shrank away from that sound, scowling over
his shoulder, but the sheriff nodded good-humoredly.

"Take it easy, Arizona. I ain't going to make a show of you!"

"Sure, that's like you, sheriff," said a hurried, half-whining voice.
"You're square. I'll sure show you one of these days now I appreciate
the way you treat me!"

Kern was staggered. It seemed to him that a new personality had taken
possession of the body of the fat man. He led the way past his gaping
deputy. The jail was not constructed for a crowd. It was merely a
temporary abiding place before prisoners were taken to the larger
institution at Woodville. Consequently there was only one big cell. The
sheriff unlocked the door, slipped the manacles from the wrists of
Arizona, and jabbed the muzzle of a revolver into his back!

The last act was decidedly necessary, for the moment his wrists were
released from the grip of the steel, Arizona twitched halfway round
toward the sheriff. The scrape of the gunmuzzle against his ribs,
however, convinced him. Over his shoulder he cast one murderous glance
at the sheriff and then slouched forward into the cell.

"Company for you, Riley," said the sheriff, as the tall cowpuncher
rose.

The other's back was turned, and thereby the sheriff was enabled to
pass a significant gesture and look to Sinclair. With that he left
them. In the outer room he found his deputy much alarmed.

"You ain't turned them two in together?" he asked. "Why, Sinclair'll
kill that gent in about a minute. Ain't it Arizona that nailed him?"

"Sinclair will play square," Kern insisted, "and Arizona won't fight!"

Leaving the other to digest these mysterious tidings, the sheriff went
out to disperse the crowd.

In the meantime Sinclair had received the newcomer in perfect silence,
his head raised high, his thin mouth set in an Ugly line—very much as
an eagle might receive an owl which floundered by mistake onto the same
crag, far above his element. The eagle hesitated between scorn of the
visitor and a faint desire to pounce on him and rend him to pieces.
That glittering eye, however, was soon dull with wonder, when he
watched the actions of Arizona.

The fat man paused in the center of the cell, regarded Sinclair with a
single flash of the eyes, and then glanced uneasily from side to side.
That done, he slipped away to a corner and slouched down on a stool,
his head bent down on his breast.

Apparently he had fallen into a profound reverie, but Sinclair found
that the eyes of Arizona continually whipped up and across to him. Once
the newcomer shifted his position a little, and Sinclair saw him test
the weight of the stool beneath him with his hand. Even in the cell
Arizona had found a weapon.

Gradually Sinclair understood the meaning of that glance and the
gesture of the sheriff, as the latter left; he read other things in the
gray pallor of Arizona, and in the fallen head. The man was unnerved.
Sinclair's reaction was very much what that of the sheriff had been—a
sinking of the heart and a momentary doubt of himself. But he was
something more of a philosopher than Kern. He had seen more of life and
men and put two and two together.

One thing stared him plainly in the face. The Arizona who skulked in
the corner had relapsed eight years. He was the same sneak thief whom
Sinclair had first met in the lumber camp, and he knew instinctively
that this was the first time since that unpleasant episode that Arizona
had been cornered. The loathing left Sinclair, and in its place came
pity. He had no fondness of Arizona, but he had seen him in the role of
a strong man, which made the contrast more awful. It reminded Sinclair
of the wild horse which loses its spirit when it is broken. Such was
Arizona. Free to come and go, he had been a danger. Shut up helplessly
in a cell, he was as feeble as a child, and his only strength was a
sort of cunning malice. Sinclair turned quietly to the fat man.

"Arizona," he said, "you look sort of underfed today. Bring your stool
a bit nearer and let's talk. I been hungry for a chat with someone."

In reply Arizona rolled back his head and for a moment glared
thoughtfully at Sinclair. He made no answer. Presently his glance fell,
like that of a dog. Sinclair shivered. He tried brutality.

"Looks to me, Arizona, as though you'd lost your nerve."

The other moistened his lips, but said nothing.

"But the point is," said the tall cowpuncher, "that you've given up
before you're beaten."

Riley Sinclair's words brought a flash from Arizona, a sudden lifting
of the head, as if he had not before thought of hoping. Then he began
to slump back into his former position, without a reply. Sinclair
followed his opening advantage at once.

"What you in for?"

"Murder!"

"Great guns! Of whom?"

"Sandersen."

It brought Sinclair stiffly to his feet. Sandersen! His trail was
ended; Hal was avenged at last!

"And you done it? Fatty, you took that job out of my hands. I'm
thanking you. Besides, it ain't nothing to be downhearted about.
Sandersen was a skunk. Can they prove it on you?"

The need to talk overwhelmed Arizona. It burst out of him, not to
Sinclair, but rather at him. His shifting eyes made sure that no one
was near.

"Kern is going to send south for the dope. I'm done for. They can hang
me three times on what they'll learn, and—"

"Shut up," snapped Sinclair. "Don't talk foolish. The south is a
tolerable big place to send to. They don't know where you come from.
Take 'em a month to find out, and by that time, you won't be at hand."

"Eh?"

"Because you and me are going to bust out of this paper jail they got!"

He had not the slightest hope of escape. But he tried the experiment of
that suggestion merely to see what the fat man's reaction would be. The
result was more than he could have dreamed. Arizona whirled on him with
eyes ablaze.

"What d'you mean, Sinclair?"

"Just what I say. D'you think they can keep two like us in here? No,
not if you come to your old self."

The need to confide again fell on Arizona. He dragged his stool nearer.
His voice was a whisper.

"Sinclair, something's busted in me. When them irons grabbed my arms
they took everything out of me. I got no chance. They got me cornered."

"And you'll fight like a wildcat to the end of things. Sure you will!
Buck up, man! You think you've turned yaller. You ain't. You're just
out of place. Take a gent that's used to a forty-foot rope and a pony,
give him sixty feet on a sixteen-hand hoss, and ain't he out of place?
Sure! He looks like a clumsy fool. And the other way around it works
the same way. A trout may be a flash of light in water, but on dry land
he ain't worth a damn. Same way with you, Fatty. While you got a free
foot you're all right, but when they put you behind a wall and say
they're going to keep you there, you darned near bust down. Why?
Because it looks to you like you ain't got a chance to fight back. So
you quit altogether. But you'll come back to yourself, Arizona. You—"