The Max Brand Megapack (359 page)

“You’re wrong, Fatty,” replied O’Brien. “That ain’t his way about it. He takes his time killin’ a man. Waits till he can get him in a public place and make him start the picture. That’s Mac Strann! Remember Fitzpatrick? Mac Strann followed Fitz nigh onto two months, but Fitz knew what was up and he never would make a move. He knowed that if he made a wrong pass it would be his last. So he took everything and let it pass by. But finally it got on his nerves. One time—it was right here in my barroom, Fatty—”

“The hell you say!”

“Yep, that was before your time around these parts. But Fitz had a couple of jolts of red-eye under his vest and felt pretty strong. Mac Strann happened in and first thing you know they was at it. Well, Fitz was a big man. I ain’t small, but I had to look up when I talked to Fitz. Scotch-Irish, and they got fightin’ bred into their bone. Mac Strann passed him a look and Fitz come back with a word. Soon as he got started he couldn’t stop. Wasn’t a pretty thing to watch, either. You could see in Fitz’s face that he knew he was done for before he started, but he wouldn’t, let up. The booze had him going and he was too proud to back down. Pretty soon he started cussing Mac Strann.

“Well, by that time everybody had cleared out of the saloon, because they knowed that them sort of words meant bullets comin’. But Mac Strann jest stood there watchin’, and grinnin’ in his ugly way—damn his soul black!—and never sayin’ a word back. By God, Fatty, he looked sort of hungry. When he grinned, his upper lip went up kind of slow and you could see his big teeth. I expected to see him make a move to sink ’em in the throat of Fitz. But he didn’t. Nope, he didn’t make a move, and all the time Fitz ravin’ and gettin’ worse and worse. Finally Fitz made the move. Yep, he pulled his gun and had it damned near clean on Mac Strann before that devil would stir. But when he
did
, it was jest a flash of light. Both them guns went off, but Mac’s bullet hit Fitz’s hand and knocked the gun out of it—so of course his shot went wild. But Fitz could see his own blood, and you know what that does to the Scotch-Irish? Makes
some
people quit cold to see their own blood. I remember a kid at school that was a whale at fightin’ till his nose got to bleedin’, or something, and then he’d quit cold. But you take a Scotch-Irishman and it works just the other way. Show him his own colour and he goes plumb crazy.

“That’s what happened to Fitz. When he saw the blood on his hand he made a dive at Mac Strann. After that it wasn’t the sort of thing that makes a good story. Mac Strann got him around the ribs and I heard the bones crack. God! And him still squeezin’, and Fitz beatin’ away at Mac’s face with his bleedin’ hand.

“Will you b’lieve that I stood here and was sort of froze? Yes, Fatty, I couldn’t make a move. And I was sort of sick and hollow inside the same way I went one time when I was a kid and seen a big bull horn a yearlin’.

“Then I heard the breath of Fitz comin’ hoarse, with a rattle in it—and I heard Mac Strann whining like a dog that’s tasted blood and is starvin’ for more. A thing to make your hair go up on end, like they say in the story-books.

“Then Fitz—he was plumb mad—tried to bite Mac Strann. And then Mac let go of him and set his hands on the throat of Fitz. It happened like a flash—I’m here to swear that I could hear the bones crunch. And then Fitz’s mouth sagged open and his eyes rolled up to the ceiling, and Mac Strann threw him down on the floor. Just like that! Damn him! And then he stood over poor dead Fitz and kicked him in those busted ribs and turned over to the bar and says to me: ‘Gimme!’

“Like a damned beast! He wanted to drink right there with his dead man beside him. And what was worse, I had to give him the bottle. There was a sort of haze in front of my eyes. I wanted to pump that devil full of lead, but I knowed it was plain suicide to try it.

“So there he stood and ups with a glass that was brimmin’ full, and downs it at a swallow—gurglin’—like a hog! Fatty, how long will it be before there’s an end to Mac Strann?”

But Fatty Matthews shrugged his thick shoulders and poured himself another drink.

“There ain’t a hope for Jerry Strann?” cut in Buck Daniels.

“Not one in a million,” coughed Fatty, disposing of another formidable potion.

“And when Jerry dies, Mac starts for this Barry?”

“Who’s been tellin’ you?” queried O’Brien dryly. “Maybe you been readin’ minds, stranger?”

Buck Daniels regarded the bartender with a mild and steadfast interest. He was smiling with the utmost good-humour, but there was that about him which made big O’Brien flush and look down to his array of glasses behind the bar.

“I been wondering,” went on Daniels, “if Mac Strann mightn’t come out with Barry about the way Jerry did. Ain’t it possible?”

“No,” replied Fatty Matthews with calm decision. “It ain’t possible. Well, I’m due back in my bear cage. Y’ought to look in on me, O’Brien, and see the mountain-lion dyin’ and the grizzly lookin’ on.”

“Will it last long?” queried O’Brien.

“Somewhere’s about this evening.”

Here Daniels started violently and closed his hand hard around his whiskey glass which he had not yet raised towards his lips.

“Are you sure of that, marshal?” he asked. “If Jerry’s held on this long ain’t there a chance that he’ll hold on longer? Can you date him up for to-night as sure as that?”

“I can,” said the deputy marshal. “It ain’t hard when you seen as many go west as I’ve seen. It ain’t harder than it is to tell when the sand will be out of an hour glass. When they begin going down the last hill it ain’t hard to tell when they’ll reach the bottom.”

“Ain’t you had anybody to spell you, Fatty?” broke in O’Brien.

“Yep. I got Haw-Haw Langley up there. But he ain’t much help. Just sits around with his hands folded. Kind of looks like Haw-Haw
wanted
Jerry to pass out.”

And Matthews went humming through the swinging door.

CHAPTER XV

OLD GARY PETERS

For some moments after this Buck Daniels remained at the bar with his hand clenched around his glass and his eyes fixed before him in the peculiar second-sighted manner which had marked him when he sat so long on the veranda.

“Funny thing,” began O’Brien, to make conversation, “how many fellers go west at sunset. Seems like they let go all holts as soon as the dark comes. Hey?”

“How long before sunset now?” asked Buck Daniels sharply.

“Maybe a couple of hours.”

“A couple of hours,” repeated Daniels, and ground his knuckles across his forehead. “A couple of hours!”

He raised his glass with a jerky motion and downed the contents; the chaser stood disregarded before him and O’Brien regarded his patron with an eye of admiration.

“You long for these parts?” he asked.

“No, I’m strange to this range. Riding up north pretty soon, if I can get someone to tell me the lay of the land. D’you know it?”

“Never been further north than Brownsville.”

“Couldn’t name me someone that’s travelled about, I s’pose?”

“Old Gary Peters knows every rock within three day’s riding. He keeps the blacksmith shop across the way.”

“So? Thanks; I’ll look him up.”

Buck Daniels found the blacksmith seated on a box before his place of business; it was a slack time for Gary Peters and he consoled himself for idleness by chewing the stem of an unlighted corn-cob, whose bowl was upside down. His head was pulled down and forward as if by the weight of his prodigious sandy moustache, and he regarded a vague horizon with misty eyes.

“Seen you comin’ out of O’Brien’s,” said the blacksmith, as Buck took possession of a nearby box. “What’s the news?”

“Ain’t any news,” responded Buck dejectedly. “Too much talk; no news.”

“That’s right,” nodded Gary Peters. “O’Brien is the out-talkingest man I ever see. Ain’t nobody on Brownsville can get his tongue around so many words as O’Brien.”

So saying, he blew through his pipe, picked up a stick of soft pine, and began to whittle it to a point.

“In my part of the country,” went on Buck Daniels, “they don’t lay much by a man that talks a pile.”

Here the blacksmith turned his head slowly, regarded his companion for an instant, and then resumed his whittling.

“But,” said Daniels, with a sigh, “if I could find a man that knowed the country north of Brownsville and had a hobble on his tongue I could give him a night’s work that’d be worth while.”

Gary Peters removed his pipe from his mouth and blew out his dropping moustaches. He turned one wistful glance upon his idle forge; he turned a sadder eye upon his companion.

“I could name you a silent man or two in Brownsville,” he said, “but there ain’t only one man that knows the country right.”

“That so? And who might he be?”

“Me.”

“You?” echoed Daniels in surprise. He turned and considered Gary as if for the first time. “Maybe you know the lay of the land up as far as Hawkin’s Arroyo?”

“Me? Son, I know every cactus clear to Bald Eagle.”

“H-m-m!” muttered Daniels. “I s’pose maybe you could name some of the outfits from here on a line with Bald Eagle—say you put ’em ten miles apart?”

“Nothin’ easier. I could find ’em blindfold. First due out they’s McCauley’s. Then lay a bit west of north and you hit the Circle K Bar—that’s about twelve mile from McCauley’s. Hit ’er up dead north again, by east, and you come eight miles to Three Roads. Go on to—”

“Partner,” cut in Daniels, “I could do business with you.”

“Maybe you could.”

“My name’s Daniels.”

“I’m Gary Peters. H’ware you?”

They shook hands.

“Peters,” said Buck Daniels, “you look square, and I need you in square game; but there ain’t any questions that go with it. Twenty iron men for one day’s riding and one day’s silence.”

“M’frien’,” murmured Peters. “In my day I’ve gone three months without speakin’ to anything in boots; and I wasn’t hired for it, neither.”

“You know them people up the line,” said Daniels. “Do they know you?”

“I’ll tell a man they do! Know Gary Peters?”

“Partner, this is what I want. I want you to leave Brownsville inside of ten minutes and start riding for Elkhead. I want you to ride, and I want you to ride like hell. Every ten miles, or so, I want you to stop at some place where you can get a fresh hoss. Get your fresh hoss and leave the one you’ve got off, and tell them to have the hoss you leave ready for me any time to-night. It’ll take you clear till to-morrow night to reach Elkhead, even with relayin’ your hosses?”

“Round about that, if I ride like hell. What do I take with me?”

“Nothing. Nothing but the coin I give you to hire someone at every stop to have that hoss you’ve left ready for me. Better still, if you can have ’em, get a fresh hoss. Would they trust you with hosses that way, Gary?”

“Gimme the coin and where they won’t trust me I’ll pay cash.”

“I can do it. It’ll about bust me, but I can do it.”

“You going to try for a record between Brownsville and Elkhead, eh? Got a bet up, eh?”

“The biggest bet you ever heard of,” said Daniels grimly. “You can tell the boys along the road that I’m tryin’ for time. Have you got a fast hoss to start with?”

“Got a red mare that ain’t much for runnin’ cattle, but she’s greased lightnin’ for a short bust.”

“Then get her out. Saddle her up, and be on your way. Here’s my stake—I’ll keep back one twenty for accidents. First gimme a list of the places you’ll stop for the relays.”

He produced an old envelope and a stub of soft pencil with which he jotted down Gary Peters’ directions.

“And every second,” said Buck Daniels in parting, “that you can cut off your own time will be a second cut off’n mine. Because I’m liable to be on your heels when you ride into Elkhead.”

Gary Peters lifted his eyebrows and then restored his pipe. He spoke through his teeth.

“You ain’t got a piece of money to bet on that, partner?” he queried softly.

“Ten extra if you get to Elkhead before me.”

“They’s limits to hoss-flesh,” remarked Peters. “What time you ridin’ against?”

“Against a cross between a bullet and a nor’easter, Gary. I’m going back to drink to your luck.”

A promise which Buck Daniels fulfilled, for he had need of even borrowed strength. He drank steadily until a rattle of hoofs down the street entered the saloon, and then someone came in to say that Gary Peters had started out of town to “beat all hell, on his red mare.”

After that, Buck started out to find Dan Barry. His quarry was not in the barn nor in the corral behind the barn. There stood Satan and Black Bart, but their owner was not in sight. But a thought came to Buck while he looked, rather mournfully, at the stallion’s promise of limitless speed. “If I can hold him up jest half a minute,” murmured Buck to himself, “jest half a minute till I get a start, I’ve got a rabbit’s chance of livin’ out the night!”

From the door of the first shed he took a heavy chain with the key in the padlock. This chain he looped about the post and the main timber of the gate, snapped the padlock, and threw the key into the distance. Then he stepped back and surveyed his work with satisfaction. It would be a pretty job to file through that chain, or to knock down those ponderous rails of the fence and make a gap. A smile of satisfaction came on the face of Buck Daniels, then, hitching at his belt, and pulling his sombrero lower over his eyes, he started once more to find Dan Barry.

He was more in haste now, for the sun was dipping behind the mountains of the west and the long shadows moved along the ground with a perceptible speed. When he reached the street he found a steady drift of people towards O’Brien’s barroom. They came by ones and twos and idled in front of the swinging doors or slyly peeked through them and then whispered one to the other. Buck accosted one of those by the door and asked what was wrong.

“He’s in there,” said the other, with a broad and excited grin. “He’s in there—waitin’!”

And when Buck threw the doors wide he saw, at the farther end of the deserted barroom, Dan Barry, seated at a table braiding a small horsehair chain. His hat was pushed far back on his head; he had his back to the door. Certainly he must be quite unaware that all Brownsville was waiting, breathless, for his destruction. Behind the bar stood O’Brien, pale under his bristles, and his eyes never leaving the slender figure at the end of his room; but seeing Buck he called with sudden loudness: “Come in, stranger. Come in and have one on the house. There ain’t nothing but silence around this place and it’s getting on my nerves.”