“That’s a sweet job to give anybody! Whatsa matter with yuh, Ben? Them two old jiggers wouldn’t hurt anybody. I suppose old Baggs asked yuh to detail me to dry-nurse ’em, eh?”
Breezy Hill rasped his spurred heel along the side of Ben Dillon’s desk, giving vent to his displeasure.
“Demanded it,” grinned the sheriff. “Whisperin’ and Sailor are over at the Oasis, fillin’ their skins with liquor, and I don’t hardly blame Baggs for demandin’ protection. If I was in his place I’d ask the Governor to send troops and proclaim martial law.”
“Aw, they wouldn’t shoot him, Ben.”
“They won’t if we can stop ’em, Breezy. You keep sober and stay close to ’em. Len’s got his kid over at the hotel.”
“Can’t I take a drink, Ben?”
“Sure, but stay sober.”
“Oh, shore. Say! What do yuh think about Baggs hirin’ Hashknife and Sleepy to run the Box S?”
“It’s the first sensible thing he’s ever done. Thank gosh, we’re rid of ’em. I’ve been wishin’ they’d land a job.”
“I liked ’em,” said Breezy.
“Thasall right, Breezy; but they got to be pests.”
“I s’pose. Well, I’ll go out and night-herd them two old pelicans for yuh, Ben. But don’t ask too much of me. I’m not so danged stuck on Amos Alexander Baggs m’self.”
Not realising that Breezy was acting in an official capacity, Whispering and Sailor welcomed him with open arms. Len had drawn their wages from Baggs, and they had already forgotten that this was their last pay day at the Box S.
They bought Breezy a couple of drinks, which was sufficient to organise the deputy to a point where he began buying.
“We’re here,” said Whispering owlishly, “to show a man the error of his ways, ain’t we, Sailor?”
“That’s right,” agreed Sailor heartily if thickly. “We’ve dug up the hatchet and we’re packin’ a red belt. Didja know we got throwed out of our home, Breezy? Didja? Well, it’s a sholem fac’. Throwed out in the cold world.”
It had been over a hundred in the shade that day, so Breezy had little sympathy with that statement. He nodded and turned his back to the bar, while he surveyed the room. Several of the games were going full blast, and at a poker table, only a few feet away, sat Amos Alexander Baggs. He shifted his eyes toward Breezy and nodded, possibly acknowledging the guardianship.
Breezy turned back to the bar. The bartender served some drinks at the poker game and when he came back behind the bar he caught Breezy’s eye, indicated the poker table with a jerk of his head and said softly:
“You’ve got a drink coming, Breezy.”
He meant that Baggs had told him to serve a drink to the deputy.
“All right, thanks,” Breezy replied. “Whatcha havin’, boys?”
“Same thing,” said Whispering, and Sailor nodded. The bartender tried to indicate that the order was for one drink, but Breezy ignored it. So they all had a drink on Amos Baggs.
Amos Baggs saw the old punchers drink and it made him so mad he almost forgot to draw cards. Breezy grinned gleefully. Unless these two old rangers got too drunk to navigate, it promised to be a big evening. Len came in, circled the opposite side of the room to escape Whispering, Sailor and Breezy, and sat down in another poker game, where Harry Cole was doing the dealing.
More cowboys drifted in, until the range was fairly well represented, and there was more or less confusion. Whispering and Sailor grew loud in their talk and just a little incoherent at times, but Breezy enjoyed it.
It was about eight o’clock when Hashknife and Sleepy rode in. They left their horses at the outskirts of the town and came in behind the east side of the main street. It was barely dark now. They came in behind the Oasis saloon and sat down against the side of an old shed.
There was a light in Harry Cole’s private office, which had a rear entrance. To the left of this entrance, twenty feet away, was the rear entrance to the Oasis.
From where the pair sat they could hear some of the noise in the saloon, the sound of people going in and out of the place. Both Hashknife and Sleepy had cultivated plenty of patience. They sat there like a couple of images, invisible in the dark.
Hashknife had warned Sleepy that they might be there most of the night and Sleepy agreed that it would be a nice night for it, not knowing what it was all about—nor caring.
There was one building between the Oasis and a Chinese restaurant, but even at that distance they could hear the Chinese rattling dishes at the rear of the restaurant.
It was after nine o’clock when Hashknife suddenly touched Sleepy on the arm. Some one was coming around from the rear of the restaurant. The figure shuffled softly to the rear door of Cole’s office and knocked gently several times. Finally the door opened and they saw that it was a Chinese, carrying a loaded tray, covered with a white cloth.
It was Harry Cole who opened the door. He took the tray from the Chinese.
“I’ll send the tray back later, Charley,” he said.
“Yessa.”
Cole closed the door and the Chinese shuffled back around the building. Hashknife sighed and relaxed.
“Some busy gambler will eat,” whispered Sleepy.
Hashknife did not reply. It was a common thing for food to be brought to a gambling house, as many players do not care to stop playing long enough to go out and eat a meal. There had been a light burning in Cole’s private room when the tray came, but a few moments later the light was turned out.
It was so dark out there that all they could see was the indistinct skyline of the building, the only window in the rear of the Oasis being the one in Cole’s room. About five minutes after the light had vanished they heard the door open and close gently. Came the sound of a man walking on the hard-packed ground. He passed to the left of them, evidently picking his way carefully in the dark. Hashknife squeezed Sleepy’s arm sharply and whispered in his ear:
“Stay where yuh are.”
Then he got to his feet, turned to the right around the shed and ran swiftly on his toes, praying that he might not kick a tin can or run into anything. He had his bearings fairly well and it was easier to see ahead as soon as he got away from the buildings.
He didn’t know where the man was, didn’t wait to investigate further, but kept on running. Ahead of him was the dark bulk of a house, and he halted just in time to save himself from running into the fence.
Over the fence he went, dropping to his hands and knees, while he figured out his bearings. Then he went cautiously ahead, his hands reaching out in front of him, until he could touch the building. Quickly he worked to the right, found the corner and moved a few feet to the corner of the unrailed porch. From where he stopped he could reach out and touch the front door of the Prentice house.
Hashknife had been there possibly a full minute when he heard the latch of the old gate click softly. He slipped his gun loose, gripping it tightly and stepped up on the edge of the porch. He could hear the soft slither of gravel as the man came down the walk.
He stopped a few feet away, and Hashknife took a deep breath. He was afraid the man could see him, but his fear was unfounded, for at that moment the man whistled three soft notes. It sounded to Hashknife like the first three notes in “Taps,” as played by a bugler. Then the man came on boldly, moving up the three or four steps to the top of the porch.
He was within reach of Hashknife now, panting slightly. He moved forward and something struck Hashknife’s left elbow. A dish rattled.
“What in hell!” grunted the man.
There was no waiting now. Hashknife jerked forward, struck in the direction of the man’s head, and almost at the same time he reached out his left hand. The swinging gun reached its mark, the man grunted foolishly, and fell forward in to Hashknife, forcing him back against the wall, and at that moment the door opened behind Hashknife.
Came the clatter of falling dishes, smashing on the porch, the rattle of the heavy tray, a sharp exclamation of wonder from the doorway, and Hashknife whirled and dived straight in through the doorway, striking his left shoulder heavily as he came in.
He went to his knees, badly off balance, while a revolver spurted a flame a foot above his body, and the windows of the house danced from the concussion. Again the spurt of orange-coloured flame licked out through the darkness low enough to have scorched him, but he had dropped flat on the carpet.
Swiftly he rolled aside, his gun ready. A chair rattled, echoed by the concussion of Hashknife’s big gun, but only a shower of plaster attested the hit. But in the flash of the exploding powder Hashknife saw the man dart through the doorway into the kitchen. Swiftly he shifted his gun and fired again through the doorway.
Then he sprang to his feet in the darkness and ran to the doorway, stepping aside quickly. Came the slam of a closing door, a man’s swift step on the back porch. Hashknife whirled and ran out the front door. His boots crushed down on scattered dishes and he almost fell off the porch, but he regained his balance and stopped short. He heard the fence creak from a weight, and then came the sound of a man running swiftly.
A few steps carried him to the fence, which he vaulted, and then he started running towards the rear of the Oasis.
Things were not going so smoothly at the Oasis. Sailor Jones had arrived at the point where he was becoming unmanageable. He stood alone at the end of the bar and dared anybody to touch him. Every one in the saloon knew he was as drunk as a man might become and still keep his feet, but to outward appearances he was as sober as a judge.
And he was not to be ignored. Breezy tried to get close enough to grab his gun, but failed. Sailor was an old lobo wolf, drunk enough to imagine he was cornered and ready to kill. He kept his little bloodshot eyes upon Amos Baggs, who was perspiring copiously.
“I’m gonna kill shomebody pretty quick,” he said coldly.
The sheriff came over beside the bar and Sailor gave him a venomous glance. Ben grimaced despairingly. Amos caught his eye and indicated a strong desire to commune with the sheriff. Sailor had become the centre of attraction, it seemed. No one wanted to injure the old man, and they knew it would require drastic measures to stop him, so their best bet was to let him alone until the whisky reacted and put him down.
Len Ayres left his game and came over to the bar, ten feet away from Sailor Jones.
“What are yuh drinkin’, Sailor?” he asked pleasantly.
“Ain’t drinkin’,” sullenly. “Don’t nobody touch me. I’m in the market for a scalp and I’m not askin’ for much ha’r.”
“Don’t be a dang fool, Sailor. Let’s have a good time.”
“I’m havin’ a good time.”
The sheriff went over to Baggs, who whispered earnestly. The sheriff frowned heavily, shook his head. The other players seemed uneasy. Harry Cole got up from his table and came over there, keeping an eye on Sailor Jones.
Just a little, wizened old man, with deep-sunk eyes and fox-tail hair, his collar hiked up around his flaring ears, Sailor was almost mummylike in his immobility, the palm of one skinny hand rubbing the point of his hip above his holstered gun.
“Wash ’m, Shailor?” mumbled Whispering owlishly. “I’m for yuh, ol’-tim’r. Bite ’m, Tige!”
“You shut up,” warned Breezy, who felt obliged to show some authority.
“You shut me up, will yuh?” Whispering straightened himself belligerently. “You try ’t!”
“My Gawd—you, too!” wailed Breezy. “I guess we better wire for the troops.”
Baggs was getting up from his chair, shielding himself with the sheriff. His idea was to get out of there. Sailor laughed harshly, and snarled:
“Sher’f, you better pray along with Amos Baggs.”
The sheriff stopped; Baggs stopped. There was not much of Baggs projecting outside the bulky outlines of the sheriff, but Baggs didn’t know it. Possibly he felt much larger than the sheriff.
“I—I never done anything to him,” wailed Amos. His voice sounded thin and weak in the smoke-hazy room.
“Sound yore A-string,” said Breezy foolishly.
“Sailor,” the sheriff’s voice was not too confident, “if you start anythin’⸺”
But the sheriff didn’t finish his warning. A man staggered in the front door; a man in his shirt sleeves, blood running down the side of his face, his mouth wide open, as though he had been running a long ways. It was the man who did the cleaning in the Oasis; the swamper, as he was called.
The menace of Sailor Jones was forgotten. The man staggered and would have fallen, except that the sheriff grasped his arm. Every one in the place was on his feet now. Harry Cole came forward, staring at the man.
“What in hell happened to you?” asked Breezy.
The man looked at Cole but did not speak. His face was the colour of ashes, and he seemed about to collapse.
“I’ll take him in my room,” said Cole quickly. “No, I can handle him alone. Jerry, did you get kicked by a horse?”
The swamper’s head sagged, but he did not reply. Some one suggested getting a doctor. Baggs seemed to forget Sailor Jones and came down past him, watching Cole and the swamper going toward the door of Cole’s private room.
Suddenly the back door opened and in came Jack Pollock. It seemed as though he had tried to make his entrance as inconspicuous as possible and had run slap into the spotlight. He was without a hat and minus his usual starched white collar.
Harry Cole had halted with the injured swamper when Pollock made his abrupt entrance, and Pollock came toward them, hardly knowing what else to do. No one spoke. Pollock had not closed the door behind him. He came close to Cole.
“Your door was locked,” he said, as though explaining why he had entered the saloon.
Many of those present did not know Pollock was supposed to be on his way to San Francisco. The swamper was sagging like a drunken man and Cole was trying to hold him up with one hand.
It was then that Hashknife Hartley stepped in through the rear doorway, stopped short and looked around. He was without a hat, his bandages slightly askew. Pollock’s head jerked around and he watched Hashknife from over his right shoulder.
“I reckon we’re all present,” said Hashknife slowly. “Ah, there’s our old friend, Amos Baggs. Yes, we’re all here and accounted for, gentlemen. Sheriff’s here, deputy’s here. Len, are you here?”
“Over here, Hashknife!” called Len.
“Good boy! Len, take a look at Mr. Baggs and Mr. Cole. These two men owe you five years—five years of bustin’ rocks. Prentice was the third member, but they killed him, because he might talk. I’ve got ’em cinched so tight that any jury on earth would hang ’em on my evidence alone!”
It was said in such a matter-of-fact way, so coldly confident, that every one was stunned.
“They tried twice to kill me,” said Hashknife, “because they knew I’d hang ’em higher than a kite!”
Harry Cole’s right hand whipped in under his coat and a blued Colt flashed from a shoulder holster, but he was too slow, even with all his speed. Hashknife fired once, and the shock of the heavy bullet, striking Cole in the left shoulder, whirled him on his heel and he went down flat, with the sagging swamper falling half across him.
And almost at the same instant Sleepy, who had entered the front door, came with a football rush, folded both arms around the middle of Amos Alexander Baggs, and they crashed down in the middle of the floor, with Sleepy on top of him.
Pollock, who had jerked aside, seeking a way out, possibly thinking that he had not been included, was brought up short when Hashknife’s gun barrel dug deeply into his ribs.
“You ain’t goin’ no place, Pollock,” he said shortly.
The crowd was moving forward now, coughing from the powder fumes, wondering aloud what it was all about. Sleepy jerked Amos to his feet. The skid on the rough floor had removed some skin from the bridge of Amos’s nose, and the shock of the exposé seemed to have caved in his morale.
“I can talk, can’t I?” he panted anxiously. “Can’t I tell what I know? I have that right, sheriff. I—I know my rights. I’ll talk.”
No doubt Amos could see the outline of the gallows, and he wanted to save his skin at the expense of his confederates. Hashknife stilled the hubbub.
“Let him talk, if he wants to, boys. He has a right.”
“I know I have,” whined Amos.
Hashknife said a few short words to Len, who stared at him in amazement, but went hurrying out of the place. The sheriff moved the men back from Amos, who was panting heavily.
“Go ahead and talk,” said Hashknife. “Nobody stoppin’ yuh.”
Amos gulped and began:
“I never killed anybody. Honest to God, I never killed anybody. Harry Cole pulled the jobs. He was sheriff and I was the prosecutor. He wanted money. Prentice was crooked. He wanted Len’s wife. We needed some one to blame for the two robberies, so we framed to incriminate Len. Prentice stole that hat, and the bank robbery was a fake, but we sent Len to the penitentiary. I swear that’s the way of it. We didn’t think Len would come back here. Prentice didn’t have any nerve, and he worried. He thought somebody might find out about it; so he drank. Cole was afraid he’d talk, so he killed him. I didn’t know about it until after it was all done. But I never hurt anybody. I’m innocent of that. All I ever did was to protect them and take my share.”
“Cole tried to kill me, eh?” grinned Hashknife.
“I know he did. Pollock helped him the last time.”
“You dirty liar!” screamed Pollock.
“Oh, I’ve got yore derringer,” said Hashknife. “You left your callin’ card, Jack Evans. Yeah, I think there’s still a reward for you in Redfields.”
“Cole was right,” gritted Pollock. “He had the dope on you. I thought he was crazy. Well, damn you, all you can do is send me back to Redfields. I can square that all right.”
Some one had brought the doctor, who went to work on Cole and the swamper. The sheriff walked around in a daze, after putting handcuffs on Pollock. He came to Hashknife.
“I said you was a pest,” he said seriously. “Wasn’t that funny? I did, I tell yuh. Thought you was a pest; you and yore questions. I have to laugh.”
“Go ahead,” said Hashknife. “You can laugh, if you feel thataway.”
Breezy had charge of Amos Baggs and seemed to be getting a lot of joy out of his job. Harry Cole wasn’t dead, and the doctor said he would probably live, but Cole did not seem to have any opinions in the matter.
Suddenly another hush. The roar of conversation slowed down to dead silence. Len Ayres was coming in, and beside him, looking very white and wide-eyed, was Nan. Baggs looked at her, wet his dry lips with his tongue and stared down at the floor.
Len touched Amos on the arm and the lawyer looked up at him.
“Do you want to tell this part of it?” he asked. “Or shall I ask the lady to tell it? She don’t know what it’s all about—yet.”
“I don’t know what you mean,” said Amos huskily.
“Don’t lie about it,” warned Len. He turned to Nan. “You tell it.”
“I can’t,” she said. “I don’t know what it was all about.”
“Nan, don’t lie to me!” Len cried. “I knew all the time that you wasn’t the rightful heir to the Box S. I could block yuh any time I wanted to, but I—I didn’t. Somethin’ held me back, somethin’ that told me if I went slow I’d mebby clear myself.”
“Yo’re as clear as a bell, Len,” said the sheriff. “Baggs confessed the whole thing. Cole and Prentice and Baggs pulled the job. You are cleared of everythin’.”
Nan impulsively reached out and grasped Len by the arm.
“Oh, I’m glad!” she said. “Just so glad.”
“Are yuh? Then come clean on this deal, Nan. I’ve got the goods on yuh, so yuh might as well tell us.”
Nan looked around at the circle of faces, some of them blurred by the eddying tobacco and powder smoke. She looked at Hashknife, and his gray eyes were watching her closely.
“I took a dead girl’s name,” she said slowly. “She was my room-mate. We were both poor and out of jobs. She was killed in a wreck, and Jack Pollock was hurt at the same time.
“There was a letter to her from Amos Baggs, telling her to come and claim her inheritance. There was a hundred-dollar cheque in the letter. Well, I took it and came here. I’m an impostor. My name is Nan Whitlock—not Singer. Mr. Baggs said he’d send me to prison. Pollock had told him that I wasn’t the right girl. Baggs tried to get me to sign papers out at the ranch. He said I would be sent to jail if I didn’t sign them, but I—I said I’d rather go to jail.
“They—Baggs and Pollock—brought me to town that night and were going to send me to San Francisco, but we were late getting here and Pollock had lost his pocket-book, which contained the tickets and his money. They said they would protect me from the law until they could safely ship me away; so they took me to a house and kept me there, locked up. I—I didn’t know just why they were afraid to send me away. Then to-night I heard the shooting in the house, and—and that is about all I know.”
“Thank heaven!” said Len. “That’s good news.” He turned savagely on the handcuffed Baggs. “I’ve got the goods on you, Baggs. You or some of yore gang murdered Harmony Singer. I knew it, but I couldn’t prove it. I couldn’t prove anythin’, but Hartley did. So you picked a girl named Singer to inherit the ranch, eh? Goin’ to buy her out and split the pot, eh? You fool! His name wasn’t Singer. His name was Ayres. He was my uncle, Baggs. But he was kinda wild in New Mexico; so he changed his name when he came here. His name was Jim Ayres. Here!” he handed a folded paper to Hashknife. “Read it out loud, Hashknife. That’ll explain.”
It was an old sheet of writing paper, slightly yellowed, and the writing was in ink, slightly hard to decipher. Hashknife read aloud:
“‘This is to certify that Len Ayres has paid me the sum of ten thousand dollars⸺’”
“Wait a minute,” interrupted Len. “That ten thousand is the money I inherited about six months before this gang sent me to the penitentiary. Go ahead, Hashknife.”
“‘Ten thousand dollars in cash, and I hereby give him one-half of the Box S Ranch and everything on it, and one-half of the money in the bank, and of future profits. Len don’t want no deed, so this is a bill of sale. And this is also to certify that in case of my death, everything I own belongs to Len Ayres, and he is to give Whispering Taylor and Sailor Jones a home for life, or as long as he can get along with them. Very truly yours, Jim Harmony Singer Ayres. P.S.—This is my right name, except the Singer part, which is an adopted brand, and nobody’s business.’”
“The warden at the penitentiary kept that for me,” said Len slowly. “I didn’t want a deed, and I reckon most of yuh boys present know why. I managed to save this much out of the wreck.”
“You knew?” said Nan, looking up at him. “Was that why you said, Len, when I asked you if you didn’t trust me, ‘I’ll tell yuh about it some time’?”
Len looked at her closely, and there was a half smile on his thin, drawn lips.
“I reckon it was, Nan. But this ain’t no place to tell yuh about it. C’mon.”
They turned together and walked out of the saloon. Breezy took Baggs and Pollock, and Sleepy went with him. The doctor was working over Cole in Cole’s own room, while the swamper was sitting in a chair near the door, his head bandaged temporarily. He had been the one who carried the tray to the Prentice home.
The sheriff came to Hashknife, his eyes curious.
“What evidence did yuh have against them for all that stuff, Hartley?” he asked.
“Not a bit, Dillon; just a hunch.”
“You mean—you bluffed? How did yuh find the girl?”
“Imagination,” smiled Hashknife. “I had their tickets, and I knew they never left here. Where could they go, I wondered. What better place than the Prentice home, owned by Cole? They had to be fed. I saw a Chinaman bring a tray here. That would solve the problem. So we hid out there to-night and watched a tray come in. When that swamper took it to the Prentice house I had to bat him over the head, and it almost ruined things. But, as it was, it worked out right. Pollock was fool enough to try and warn Cole. The stage was all set when I came in, and they didn’t stop to realise that I didn’t have evidence. I didn’t ask questions, Dillon; I told ’em what they’d done—and they knew it was true.”
“Golly, but yo’re lucky! I’d never ’a’ thought of that.”
“Yeah, I’m lucky. It’s shore hard work, buildin’ up luck.”
Hashknife turned and started to walk out. On the bar rail sat Whispering and Sailor, dead to the world. Whispering had an arm thrown around Sailor’s shoulders and they were both snoring lustily.
“You boys can go home again,” said Hashknife softly, but they didn’t hear him.
He walked outside and crossed the street. In front of the sheriff’s office he found Nan, Len, and little Larry. Hashknife would have avoided them, but it was impossible. Len held out his hand and they gripped tightly.
“Dad never done nothin’ wrong,” said Larry. “Ain’t it great?”
“Shore is great, Larry,” replied Hashknife. “That fixes yuh up now.”
“And the mule stepped on the kite to-day, but I can make another—if we ever git any wind.”
“Even the wind will come, if yuh wait long enough, Larry.”
Hashknife noticed that Nan was crying, and that Len put an arm around her.
“Why don’t you thank him, Len?” she asked.
“Honey, they never built enough words. I can’t think what to say.”
“Thasall right,” said Hashknife. “Everythin’ is all right.”
He walked past them to where Sleepy was coming from the door of the sheriff’s office, and they slipped away in the darkness together. They rode to the rear of the hotel, where they secured their war bags. Their rent was all paid up.
They tied the bags to their saddles and mounted.
“East of here,” said Sleepy softly, “there’s some tall hills, and they say it’s twenty-five miles to the nearest town in that direction. I dunno what else is on that side of the hill.”
“Let’s take a look, pardner,” said Hashknife, and they rode away in the darkness.
On the south road a little while later, while a moon peeped over the rim of the Broken Hills, sending its blue rays down across the Manzanita range, travelled a slow-moving buckboard, loaded to capacity.
Len and Nan were on the seat, with Larry wedged between them, while in the back of the equipage, fitted in like sardines in a can, rode Whispering Taylor and Sailor Jones, both snoring heavily, at peace with the world. They were all going back home.