Max Brand (29 page)

"You can force me to come," she admitted quietly, "but if you do, I'll
let the whole truth be known that I ran away from you. Can your pride
stand that, Jude?"

He writhed. "And how'll you get around that, even if I don't make you,
and you come back of your own free will?"

"Somehow I'll manage. I'll find a story of how I was carried away by
half a dozen men who had come to loot the upper rooms of the house,
while the wedding party was downstairs. I'll find a story that will
wash."

"Yes, I think you will," said Cartwright, breathing heavily. "I sure
think you will. You was always a clever little devil, I know! But a
bargain! I'd ought to—" He checked himself. "But I'm through with the
black talk. When I get you back on the ranch I'll show you that you can
be happy up there. And when you get over your fool notions, you'll be a
wife to be proud of. Now, honey, tell me what you want?"

"I want you to save the lives of two men. They're both in jail—on my
account. And they're both charged with murder. You know whom I mean."

Cartwright rose out of his chair.

"Sinclair!" he groaned. "Curse him! Sinclair, ag'in, eh? What's they
between you two?"

Her answer smothered his fury again. It was pain that was giving her
strength.

"Jude, if you really want me to go back with you, don't ask that
question. He has treated me as an honorable man always treats a
woman—he tried to serve me."

"Serve you? By coming here trying to kill me?"

"He may have thought I wished to be free. He didn't tell me what he was
going to do."

"That's a lie." He stopped, watching her white face. "I don't mean
that, you know. But you ain't actually asking me to get Sinclair out of
jail? Besides, I couldn't do it!"

"You could easily. Moreover, it's to your interest. It will take a
strong jail to hold him, and if he breaks away, you know that he's a
dangerous man. He hates you, Jude, and he might try to find you. If he
did—"

She waved her hand, and Cartwright followed the gesture with great,
fascinated eyes, as if he saw himself dissolving into thin air.

"I know; he's a desperado, right enough, this Sinclair. Ain't I seen
him work?" He shuddered at the memory.

"But get him out of the jail, Jude, and that will be ended. He'll be
your friend."

"Could I trust him?"

"Don't you think Riley Sinclair is a man to be trusted?"

"I dunno." He lowered his eyes. "Maybe he is."

"As for Arizona," she went on, "the same thing holds for him."

"Yes; if I could get one out, I could get two. But how can I do it?
This Sheriff Kern is a fighting idiot, and loves a gunplay. I ain't no
man-killer, honey."

"But you're rich, Jude."

"Tolerable. They may be one or two has more than me, around these
parts."

"And money buys men!"

"Don't it, though?" said Jude, expanding. "Why, when they found that I
was a spender they started in hounding me. One gent wanted me to help
him on a mortgage—only fifty bucks to meet a payment. And they's half
a dozen would mortgage their souls if I'd stake 'em to enough
downstairs to get them into a crap game, or something."

"Then let them have the money they need. Why, it wouldn't be more than
a hundred dollars altogether."

"A hundred is a hundred. Why should I throw it away on them bums?"

"Because after you've done it, you'll have a dozen men who'll follow
you. You'll have a mob."

"Sure! But what of that? Expect me to lead an attack on a jail, eh?
Throw my life away? By guns, I think you'd like that!"

"You don't have to lead. Just give them the money they need and then
spread the word around that Riley Sinclair is really an honorable man
who killed Quade in a fair fight. I know what they thought of Quade. He
was a bully. No one liked him. Tell them it's a shame that a man like
Sinclair should die because he killed a big, hulking cur such as Quade.
They'll listen—particularly if they have your money. I know these men,
Jude. If they think an injustice is being done, they'll risk their
necks to right it! And if you work on them in the right way, you can
have twenty men who'll risk everything to get Riley out. But there
won't be a risk. If twenty men rush the jail, the guards will simply
throw down their guns and give up."

"Well, I wonder!" muttered Cartwright.

"I'm sure of it, Jude. Do you think a deputy will let himself be killed
simply to keep a prisoner safely? They won't do it!"

"You don't know this Kern!"

"I
do
know him, and I know that he's human. I've seen him beaten once
already."

"By Sinclair! You keep coming back to him!"

"Jude, if you do this thing for me," she said steadily, "I'll go back
with you. I don't love you, but if I go back I'll keep you from a great
deal of shameful talk. I'm sorry, truly, that I left. I couldn't help
it. It was an impulse that—took me by the throat. And if I go back
I'll honestly try to make you a good wife."

She faltered a little before that last word, and her voice fell. But
Jude Cartwright was wholly fascinated by the color in her face, and the
softness of her voice he mistook for a sudden rise of tenderness.

"They's only one thing I got to ask—you and Sinclair—have you ever—I
mean—have you ever told him you're pretty fond of him—that you love
him?" He blurted it out, stammering.

Certainly she knew that her answer was a lie, though it was true in the
letter.

"I have never told him so," she said firmly. "But I owe him a great
debt—he must not die because he's a gentleman, Jude."

All the time she was speaking, he watched her with ferret sharpness,
thinking busily. Before she ended he had reached his decision.

"I'm going to raise that mob."

"Jude!"

What a ring in her voice! If he had been in doubt he would have known
then. No matter what she said, she loved Riley Sinclair. He smiled
sourly down on her.

"Keep your thanks. You'll hear news of Sinclair before morning." And he
stalked out of the room.

Cartwright went downstairs in the highest good humor. He had been
convinced of two things in the interview with his wife: The first was
that she could be induced to return to him; the second was that she
loved Riley Sinclair. He did not hate her for such fickleness. He
merely despised her for her lack of brains. No thinking woman could
hesitate a moment between the ranches and the lumber tracts of
Cartwright and the empty purse of Riley Sinclair.

As for hatred, that he concentrated on the head of Sinclair himself. He
had already excellent reasons for hating the rangy cowpuncher. Those
reasons were now intensified and given weight by what he had recently
learned. He determined to raise a mob, but not to accomplish his wife's
desires. What she had said about the weakness of jails, the strength of
Sinclair, and the probability that once out he would take the trail of
the rancher, appealed vigorously to his imagination. He did not dream
that such a man as Sinclair would hesitate at a killing. And, loving
the girl, the first thing Sinclair would do would be to remove the
obstacle through the simple expedient of a well-placed bullet.

But the girl had not only convinced him in this direction, she had
taught him where his strength lay, and she had pointed a novel use for
that strength. He went to work instantly when he entered the big back
room of the hotel which was used for cards and surreptitious drinking.
A little, patient-faced man in a corner, who had been sucking a pipe
all evening and watching the crap game hungrily, was the first object
of his charity. Ten dollars slipped into the pocket of the little
cowpuncher brought him out of his chair, with a grin of gratitude and
bewilderment. A moment later he was on his knees calling to the dice in
a cackling voice.

Crossing the room, Cartwright picked out two more obviously stalled
gamblers and gave them a new start. Returning to the table, he found
that the game was lagging. In the first place he had from the start
supplied most of the sinews of war to that game. Also, two disgruntled
members had gone broke in his absence, through trying to plunge for the
spoils of the evening. They sat back, with black faces, and watched him
come.

"We're getting down to a small game," said the gray-headed man who was
dealing.

But Cartwright had other ideas. "A friend's a friend," he said
jovially. "And a gent that's been playing beside me all evening I
figure for a friend. Sit in, boys. I'll stake you to a couple of
rounds, eh?"

Gladly they came, astonished and exchanging glances.

Cartwright had made a sour loser all the game. This sudden generosity
took them off balance. It let in a merciful light upon the cruel
criticism which they had been leveling at him in private. The pale man,
with the blond eyelashes and the faded blue eyes, who had been
dexterously stacking the cards all through the game, decided at that
moment that he would not only stop cheating, but he would even lose
some of his ill-gotten gains back into the game; only a sudden rush of
unbelievable luck kept him from executing his generous and silent
promise.

This pale-faced man was named Whitey, from the excessive blondness of
his hair and his pallor. He was not popular in Sour Creek, but he was
much respected. A proof of his ingenuity was that he had cheated at
cards in that community for five years, and still he had never been
caught at his work. He was not a bold-talking man. In fact he never
started arguments or trouble of any kind; but he was a most dexterous
and thoroughgoing fighter when he was cornered. In fact he was what is
widely known as a "finisher." And it was Whitey whom Cartwright had
chosen as the leader of the mob which he intended raising. He waited
until the first shuffle was in progress after the hand, then he began
his theme.

"Understand the sheriff is pretty strong for this Sinclair that
murdered Quade," he said carelessly.

"'Murder' is a tolerable strong word," came back the unfriendly answer.
"Maybe it was a fair fight."

Cartwright laughed. "Maybe it was," he said.

Whitey interrupted himself in the act of shoving the pack across to be
cut. He raised his pale eyes to the face of the rancher. "What makes
you laugh, Cartwright?"

"Nothing," said Jude hastily. "Nothing at all. If you gents don't know
Sinclair, it ain't up to me to give you light. Let him go."

Nothing more was said during that hand which Whitey won. Jude,
apparently bluffing shamelessly, bucked him up to fifty dollars, and
then he allowed himself to be called with a pair of tens against a full
house. Not only did he lose, but he started a laugh against himself,
and he joined in cheerfully. He was aware of Whitey frowning curiously
at him and smiling faintly, which was the nearest that Whitey ever came
to laughter. And, indeed, the laugh cost Cartwright more than money,
but it was a price—the price he was paying for the adherence of
Whitey.

"What about this Sinclair?" asked the man with the great, red, blotchy
freckles across his face and the back of his neck, so that the skin
between looked red and raw. "You come from up north, which is his
direction, too. Know anything about him? He looks like pretty much of a
man to me, and the sheriff says he's a square shooter from the word
go."

"Maybe he is," said Cartwright. "But I don't want to go around digging
the ground away from nobody's reputation."

"Whatever he's got, he won't last long," said Whitey definitely. "He'll
swing sure."

It was Cartwright's opening. He took advantage of it dexterously,
without too much haste. He even yawned to show his lack of interest.

"Well, I got a hundred that says he don't hang," he observed quietly
and looked full at Whitey across the table. It was a challenge which
the gambling spirit of the latter could not afford to overlook.

"Money talks," began Whitey, then he checked himself. "Do you
know
anything, Cartwright?"

"Sure I don't," said Jude in the manner of one who has abundant
knowledge in reserve. "But they say that the sheriff and Sinclair have
become regular bunkies. Don't do nothing hardly but sit and chin with
each other over in the jail. Ever know Kern to do that before?"

They shook their heads.

"Which is a sign that Sinclair may be all right," said the sober
Whitey.

"Which is a sign that he might have something on the sheriff," said
Jude Cartwright. "I don't say that he
has
, mind you, but it looks
kind of queer. He yanked a prisoner away from the sheriff one day, and
the next day he's took for murder. Did the sheriff have much to do with
his taking? No, he didn't. By all accounts it was Arizona that done the
taking, planning and everything. And after Sinclair is took, what does
the sheriff do? He gets on the trail of Arizona and has him checked in
for murder of another gent. Maybe Arizona is guilty, maybe he ain't.
But it kind of looks as if they was something between Sinclair and
Kern, don't it?"

At this bold exposition of possibilities they paused.

"Kern is figured tolerable straight," declared Whitey.

"Sure he is. That's because he don't talk none and does his work.
Besides, he's a killer. That's his job. So is Sinclair a killer. Maybe
he did fight Quade square, but Quade ain't the only one. Why, boys,
this Sinclair has got a record as long as my arm."

In silence they sat around the table, each man thinking hard. The
professional gunman gets scant sympathy from ordinary cowpunchers.

"Now I dropped in at the jail," said the man of the great freckles,
"and come to think about it, I heard Sinclair singing, and I seen him
polishing his spurs."

"Sure, he's getting ready for a ride," put in Cartwright.

There was a growl from the others. They were slowly turning their
interest from the game to Cartwright.