SHE WAS THANKING GOD THE AFFAIR WAS ENDED
SHE WAS THANKING GOD THE AFFAIR WAS ENDED
From the river bed below the departing guests looked up at the cabin hidden in the pines. The daughter was thanking God in her heart that the affair was ended. Her father was vowing to himself that it had just begun.
CHAPTER XIIAN ARREST
After half a week in the saddle Lieutenant Bucky O’Connor of the Arizona Rangers and Curly Flandrau reached Saguache tired and travel-stained. They had combed the Rincons without having met hide or hair of the men they wanted. Early next morning they would leave town again and this time would make for Soapy Stone’s horse ranch.
Bucky O’Connor was not disheartened. Though he was the best man hunter in Arizona, it was all in the day’s work that criminals should sometimes elude him. But with Curly the issue was a personal one. He owed Luck Cullison a good deal and his imagination had played over the picture of that moment when he could go to Kate and tell her he had freed her father.
After reaching town the first thing each of them did was to take a bath, the second to get shaved. From the barber shop they went to the best restaurant in Saguache. Curly was still busy with his pieà la modewhen Burridge Thomas, United States Land Commissioner for that district, took the seat opposite and told to O’Connor a most interesting piece of news.
They heard him to an end without interruption. Then Curly spoke one word. “Fendrick.”
“Yes, sir, Cass Fendrick. Came in about one o’clock and handed me the relinquishment just as I’ve been telling you.”
“Then filed on the claim himself, you said.”
“Yes, took it up himself.”
“Sure the signature to the relinquishment was genuine?”
“I’d take oath to it. As soon as he had gone I got out the original filing and compared the two. Couldn’t be any possible mistake. Nobody could have forged the signature. It is like Luck himself, strong and forceful and decided.”
“We’re not entirely surprised, Mr. Thomas,” Lieutenant O’Connor told the commissioner. “In point of fact we’ve rather been looking for something of the kind.”
“Then you know where Luck is?” Thomas, a sociable garrulous soul, leaned forward eagerly.
“No, we don’t. But we’ve a notion Fendrick knows.” Bucky gave the government appointee his most blandishing smile. “Of course we knowyouwon’t talk about this, Mr. Thomas. Can we depend on your deputies?”
“I’ll speak to them.”
“We’re much obliged to you. This clears up a point that was in doubt to us. By the way, whatwas the date when the relinquishment was signed?”
“To-day.”
“And who was the notary that witnessed it?”
“Dominguez. He’s a partner of Fendrick in the sheep business.”
“Quite a family affair, isn’t it. Well, I’ll let you know how things come out, Mr. Thomas. You’ll be interested to know. Have a cigar.”
Bucky rose. “See you later, Curly. Sorry I have to hurry, Mr. Thomas, but I’ve thought of something I’ll have to do right away.”
Bucky followed El Molino Street to the old plaza and cut across it to the Hotel Wayland. After a sharp scrutiny of the lobby and a nod of recognition to an acquaintance he sauntered to the desk and looked over the register. There, among the arrivals of the day, was the entry he had hoped to see.
Cass Fendrick, C. F. Ranch, Arizona.
Cass Fendrick, C. F. Ranch, Arizona.
The room that had been assigned to him was 212.
“Anything you want in particular, Lieutenant?” the clerk asked.
“No-o. Just looking to see who came in to-day.”
He turned away and went up the stairs, ignoring the elevator. On the second floor he found 212. In answer to his knock a voice said “Come in.”Opening the door, he stepped in, closed it behind him, and looked at the man lying in his shirt sleeves on the bed.
“Evening, Cass.”
Fendrick put down his newspaper but did not rise. “Evening, Bucky.”
Their eyes held to each other with the level even gaze of men who recognize a worthy antagonist.
“I’ve come to ask a question or two.”
“Kick them out.”
“First, I would like to know what you paid Luck Cullison for his Del Oro claim.”
“Thinking of buying me out?” was the ironical retort of the man on the bed.
“Not quite. I’ve got another reason for wanting to know.”
“Then you better ask Cullison. The law says that if a mansellsa relinquishment he can’t file on another claim. If he surrenders it for nothing he can. Now Luck may have notions of filing on another claim. You can see that we’ll have to take it for granted he gave me the claim.”
It was so neat an answer and at the same time so complete a one that O’Connor could not help appreciating it. He smiled and tried again.
“We’ll put that question in the discard. That paper was signed by Luck to-day. Where was he when you got it from him?”
“Sure it was signed to-day? Couldn’t it have been ante-dated?”
“You know better than I do. When was it signed?”
Fendrick laughed. He was watching the noted officer of rangers with narrowed wary eyes. “On advice of counsel I decline to answer.”
“Sorry, Cass. That leaves me only one thing to do. You’re under arrest.”
“For what?” demanded the sheepman sharply.
“For abducting Luck Cullison and holding him prisoner without his consent.”
Lazily Cass drawled a question. “Are you right sure Cullison can’t be found?”
“What do you mean?”
“Are you right sure he ain’t at home attending to his business?”
“Has he come back?”
“Maybe so. I’m not Luck Cullison’s keeper.”
Bucky thought he understood. In return for the relinquishment Cullison had been released. Knowing Luck as he did, it was hard for him to see how pressure enough had been brought to bear to move him.
“May I use your ’phone?” he asked.
“Help yourself.”
Fendrick pretended to have lost interest. He returned to his newspaper, but his ears were alert tocatch what went on over the wires. It was always possible that Cullison might play him false and break the agreement. Cass did not expect this, for the owner of the Circle C was a man whose word was better than most men’s bond. But the agreement had been forced upon him through a trick. How far he might feel this justified him in ignoring it the sheepman did not know.
O’Connor got the Circle C on long distance. It was the clear contralto of a woman that answered his “Hello!”
“Is this Miss Cullison?” he asked. Almost at once he added: “O’Connor of the rangers is speaking. I’ve heard your father is home again. Is that true?”
An interval followed during which the ranger officer was put into the role of a listener. His occasional “Yes——Yes——Yes” punctuated the rapid murmur that reached Fendrick.
Presently Bucky asked a question. “On his way to town now?”
Again the rapid murmur.
“I’ll attend to that, Miss Cullison. I am in Fendrick’s room now. Make your mind easy.”
Bucky hung up and turned to the sheepman. The latter showed him a face of derision. He had gathered one thing that disquieted him, but he did not intend to let O’Connor know it.
“Well?” he jeered. “Find friend Cullison in tolerable health?”
“I’ve been talking with his daughter.”
“I judged as much. Miss Spitfire well?”
“Miss Cullison didn’t mention her health. We were concerned about yours.”
“Yes?”
“Cullison is headed for town and his daughter is afraid he is on the warpath against you.”
“You don’t say.”
“She wanted me to get you out of her father’s way until he has cooled down.”
“Very kind of her.”
“She’s right, too. You and Luck mustn’t meet yet. Get out of here and hunt cover in the hills for a few days. You know why better than I do.”
“How can I when I’m under arrest?” Fendrick mocked.
“You’re not under arrest. Miss Cullison says her father has no charge to bring against you.”
“Good of him.”
“So you can light a shuck soon as you want to.”
“Which won’t be in any hurry.”
“Don’t make any mistake. Luck Cullison is a dangerous man when he is roused.”
The sheepman looked at the ranger with opaque stony eyes. “If Luck Cullison is looking for me heis liable to find me, and he won’t have to go into the hills to hunt me either.”
Bucky understood perfectly. According to the code of the frontier no man could let himself be driven from town by the knowledge that another man was looking for him with a gun. There are in the Southwest now many thousands who do not live by the old standard, who are anchored to law and civilization as a protection against primitive passions. But Fendrick was not one of these. He had deliberately gone outside of the law in his feud with the cattleman. Now he would not repudiate the course he had chosen and hedge because of the danger it involved. He was an aspirant to leadership among the tough hard-bitted denizens of the sunbaked desert. That being so, he had to see his feud out to a fighting finish if need be.
“There are points about this case you have overlooked,” Bucky told him.
“Maybe so. But the important one that sticks out like a sore thumb is that no man living can serve notice on me to get out of town because he is coming on the shoot.”
“Luck didn’t serve any such notice. All his daughter knows is that he is hot under the collar. Look at things reasonably, Cass. You’ve caused that young lady a heap of trouble already. Areyou going to unload a lot more on her just because you want to be pigheaded. Only a kid struts around and hollers ‘Who’s afraid?’ No, it’s up to you to pull out, not because of Luck Cullison but on account of his daughter.”
“Who is such a thorough friend of mine,” the sheepman added with his sardonic grin.
“What do you care about that? She’s a girl. I don’t know the facts, but I can guess them. She and Luck will stand pat on what they promised you. Don’t you owe her something for that? Seems to me a white man wouldn’t make her any more worry.”
“It’s because I am a white man that I can’t dodge a fight when it’s stacked up for me, Bucky.”
He said it with a dogged finality that was unshaken, but O’Connor made one more effort.
“Nobody will know why you left.”
“I would know, wouldn’t I? I’ve got to go right on living with myself. I tell you straight I’m going to see it out.”
Bucky’s jaw clamped. “Not if I know it. You’re under arrest.”
Fendrick sat up in surprise. “What for?” he demanded angrily.
“For robbing the W. & S. Express Company.”
“Hell, Bucky. You don’t believe that.”
“Never mind what I believe. There’s some evidence against you—enough to justify me.”
“You want to get me out of Cullison’s way. That’s all.”
“If you like to put it so.”
“I won’t stand for it. That ain’t square.”
“You’ll stand for it, my friend. I gave you a chance to clear out and you wouldn’t take it.”
“I wouldn’t because I couldn’t. Don’t make any mistake about this. I’m not looking for Luck. I’m attending to my business. Arresthimif you want to stop trouble.”
There came a knock on the door. It opened to admit Luck Cullison. He shut it and put his back to it, while his eyes, hard as hammered iron, swept past the officer to fix on Fendrick.
The latter rose quickly from the bed, but O’Connor flung him back.
“Don’t forget you’re my prisoner.”
“He’s your prisoner, is he?” This was a turn of affairs for which Luck was manifestly unprepared: “Well, I’ve come to have a little settlement with him.”
Fendrick, tense as a coiled spring, watched him warily. “Can’t be any too soon to suit me.”
Clear cut as a pair of scissors through paper, Bucky snapped out his warning. “Nothing stirring, gentlemen. I’ll shoot the first man that makes a move.”
“Are you in this, Bucky?” asked Cullison evenly.
“You’re right I am. He’s my prisoner.”
“What for?”
“For robbing the W. & S.”
Luck’s face lit. “Have you evidence enough to cinch him?”
“Not enough yet. But I’ll take no chances on his getting away.”
The cattleman’s countenance reflected his thoughts as his decision hung in the balance. He longed to pay his debt on the spot. But on the other hand he had been a sheriff himself. As an outsider he had no right to interfere between an officer and his captive. Besides, if there was a chance to send Fendrick over the road that would be better than killing. It would clear up his own reputation, to some extent under a cloud.
“All right, Bucky. If the law wants him I’ll step aside for the time.”
The sheepman laughed in his ironic fashion. His amusement mocked them both. “Most as good as a play of the movies, ain’t it? But we’d ought all to have our guns out to make it realistic.”
But in his heart he did not jeer. For the situation had been nearer red tragedy than melodrama. The resource and firmness of Bucky O’Connor had alone made it possible to shave disaster by a hair’s breadth and no more.
CHAPTER XIIIA CONVERSATION
Bucky O’Connor and his prisoner swung down the street side by side and turned in at the headquarters of the rangers. The officer switched on the light, shut the door, and indicated a chair. From his desk he drew a box of cigars. He struck a match and held it for the sheepman before using it himself.
Relaxed in his chair, Fendrick spoke with rather elaborate indolence.
“What’s your evidence, Bucky? You can’t hold me without any. What have you got that ties me to the W. & S. robbery?”
“Why, that hat play, Cass? You let on you had shot Cullison’s hat off his head while he was making his getaway. Come to find out you had his hat in your possession all the time.”
“Does that prove I did it myself?”
“Looks funny you happened to be right there while the robbery was taking place and that you had Luck’s hat with you.”
The sleepy tiger look lay warily in the sheepman’s eyes. “That’s what the dictionaries call a coincidence, Bucky.”
“They may. I’m not sure I do.”
“Fact, just the same.”
“I’ve a notion it will take some explaining.”
“Confidentially?”
“Confidentially what?”
“The explanation. You won’t use it against me.”
“Not if you weren’t in the hold-up.”
“I wasn’t. This is the way it happened. You know Cullison was going to prove up on that Del Oro claim on Thursday. That would have put the C. F. ranch out of business. I knew he was in town and at the Del Mar, but I didn’t know where he would be next day. He had me beat. I couldn’t see any way out but to eat crow and offer a compromise. I hated it like hell, but it was up to me to hunt Luck up and see what he would do. His hat gave me an excuse to call. So I started out and came round the corner of San Mateo Street just in time to see the robber pull out. Honest, the fellow did shape up a little like Luck. Right then I got the darned fool notion of mixing him up in it. I threw his hat down and shot a hole in it, then unlocked the door of the express office carrying the hat in my hand. That’s all there was to it.”
“Pretty low-down trick, wasn’t it, to play on an innocent man?”
“He was figuring to do me up. I don’t say itwas exactly on the square, but I was sore at him clear through. I wanted to get him into trouble. Ihadto do something to keep his mind busy till I could turn round and think of a way out.”
Bucky reflected, looking at the long ash on his cigar. “The man that made the raid of the W. & S. shaped up like Luck, you say?”
“In a general way.”
The ranger brushed the ash from the end of the cigar into the tray. Then he looked quietly at Fendrick. “Who was the man, Cass?”
“I thought I told you——”
“You did. But you lied. It was a moonlight night. And there’s an arc light at that corner. By your own story, the fellow took his mask off as he swung to his horse. You saw his face just as distinctly as I see yours now.”
“No, I reckon not,” Fendrick grinned.
“Meaning you won’t tell?”
“That’s not how I put it, Bucky. You’re the one that says I recognized him. Come to think of it, I’m not sure the fellow didn’t wear his mask till he was out of sight.”
“I am.”
“You are.”
“Yes. The mask was found just outside the office where the man dropped it before he got into the saddle.”
“So?”
“That’s not all. Curly and I found something else, too—the old shirt from which the cloth was cut.”
The sheepman swept him with one of his side-long, tiger-cat glances. “Where did you find it?”
“In a barrel back of the Jack of Hearts.”
“Now, if you only knew who put it there,” suggested Cass, with ironic hopefulness.
“It happens I do. I have a witness who saw a man shove that old shirt down in the barrel after tearing a piece off.”
“Your witness got a name, Bucky?”
“I’ll not mention the name now. If it became too well known something might happen to my witness.”
Fendrick nodded. “You’re wiser there. She wouldn’t be safe, not if a certain man happened to hear what you’ve just told me.”
“I didn’t sayshe, Cass.”
“No, I said it. Your witness is Mrs. Wylie.”
“Maybe, then, you can guess the criminal, too.”
“Maybe I could, but I’m not going to try.”
“Then we’ll drop that subject. I’ll ask you a question. Can you tell me where I can find a paroled convict named Blackwell?”
Fendrick shook his head. “Don’t know the gentleman. A friend of yours?”
“One of yours. Better come through, Cass. I’m satisfied you weren’t actually in this robbery, but there is such a thing as accessory after the fact. Now, I’m going to get that man. If you want to put yourself right, it’s up to you to give me the information I want. Where is he?”
“Haven’t got him inmypocket.”
The officer rose, not one whit less amiable. “I didn’t expect you to tell me. That’s all right. I’ll find him. But in the meantime I’ll have to lock you up till this thing is settled.”
From his inside coat pocket, Fendrick drew a sealed envelope, wrote the date across the front, and handed it to O’Connor.
“Keep this, Bucky, and remember that I gave it to you. Put it in a safe place, but don’t open the envelope till I give the word. Understand?”
“I hear what you say, but I don’t understand what you mean—what’s back of it.”
“It isn’t intended that you should yet. I’m protecting myself. That’s all.”
“I guessed that much. Well, if you’re ready, I’ll arrange your lodgings for the night, Cass. I reckon I’ll put you up at a hotel with one of the boys.”
“Just as you say.”
Fendrick rose, and the two men passed into the street.
CHAPTER XIVA TOUCH OF THE THIRD DEGREE
Cullison was not the man to acknowledge himself beaten so long as there was a stone unturned. In the matter of the Del Oro homestead claim he moved at once. All of the county commissioners were personal friends of his, and he went to them with a plan for a new road to run across the Del Oro at the point where the cañon walls opened to a valley.
“What in Mexico is the good of a county road there, Luck? Can’t run a wagon over them mountains and down to the river. Looks to me like it would be a road from nowhere to nowhere,” Alec Flandrau protested, puzzled at his friend’s request.
“I done guessed it,” Yesler announced with a grin. “Run a county road through, and Cass Fendrick can’t fence the river off from Luck’s cows. Luck ain’t aiming to run any wagon over that road.”
The Map of Texas man got up and stamped with delight. “I get you. We’ll learn Cass to take a joke, by gum. Luck sure gets a county road for his cows to amble over down to the water. Cass can have his darned old homestead now.”
When Fendrick heard that the commissioners had condemned a right of way for a road through his homestead he unloaded on the desert air a rich vocabulary. For here would have been a simple way out of his trouble if he had only thought of it. Instead of which he had melodramatically kidnapped his enemy and put himself within reach of the law and of Cullison’s vengeance.
Nor did Luck confine his efforts to self-defense. He knew that to convict Fendrick of the robbery he must first lay hands upon Blackwell.
It was, however, Bucky that caught the convict. The two men met at the top of a mountain pass. Blackwell, headed south, was slipping down toward Stone’s horse ranch when they came face to face. Before the bad man had his revolver out, he found himself looking down the barrel of the ranger’s leveled rifle.
“I wouldn’t,” Bucky murmured genially.
“What you want me for?” Blackwell demanded sulkily.
“For the W. & S. robbery.”
“I’m not the man you want. My name’s Johnson.”
“I’ll put up with you till I find the man I do want, Mr. Johnson,” Bucky told him cheerfully. “Climb down from that horse. No, I wouldn’t try that. Keep your hands up.”
With his prisoner in front of him, O’Connor turned townward. They jogged down out of the hills through dark gulches and cactus-clad arroyos. The sharp catclaw caught at their legs. Tangled mesquite and ironwood made progress slow. They reached in time Apache Desert, and here Bucky camped. He hobbled his prisoner’s feet and put around his neck a rope, the other end of which was tied to his own waist. Then he built a small fire of greasewood and made coffee for them both. The prisoner slept, but his captor did not. For he could take no chances of an escape.
The outlines of the mountain ranges loomed shadowy and dim on both sides. The moonlight played strange tricks with the mesquit and the giant cactus, a grove of which gave to the place an awesome aspect of some ghostly burial ground of a long vanished tribe.
Next day they reached Saguache. Bucky took his prisoner straight to the ranger’s office and telephoned to Cullison.
“Don’t I get anything to eat?” growled the convict while they waited.
“When I’m ready.”
Bucky believed in fair play. The man had not eaten since last night. But then neither had he. It happened that Bucky was tough as whipcord, as supple and untiring as a hickory sapling. Well,Blackwell was a pretty hard nut to crack, too. The lieutenant did not know anything about book psychology, but he had observed that hunger and weariness try out the stuff that is in a man. Under the sag of them many a will snaps that would have held fast if sustained by a good dinner and a sound night’s sleep. This is why so many “bad men,” gun fighters with a reputation for gameness, wilt on occasion like whipped curs. In the old days this came to nearly every terror of the border. Some day when he had a jumping toothache, or when his nerves were frayed from a debauch, a silent stranger walked into his presence, looked long and steadily into his eyes, and ended forever his reign of lawlessness. Sometimes the two-gun man was “planted,” sometimes he subsided into innocuous peace henceforth.
The ranger had a shrewd instinct that the hour had come to batter down this fellow’s dogged resistance. Therefore he sent for Cullison, the man whom the convict most feared.
The very look of the cattleman, with that grim, hard, capable aspect, shook Blackwell’s nerve.
“So you’ve got him, Bucky.”
Luck looked the man over as he sat handcuffed beside the table and read in his face both terror and a sly, dogged cunning. Once before the fellow had been put through the third degree. Somethingof the sort he fearfully expected now. Villainy is usually not consistent. This hulking bully should have been a hardy ruffian. Instead, he shrank like a schoolgirl from the thought of physical pain.
“Stand up,” ordered Cullison quietly.
Blackwell got to his feet at once. He could not help it, even though the fear in his eyes showed that he cowered before the anticipated attack.
“Don’t hit me,” he whined.
Luck knew the man sweated under the punishment his imagination called up, and he understood human nature too well to end the suspense by making real the vision. For then the worst would be past, since the actual is never equal to what is expected.
“Well?” Luck watched him with the look of tempered steel in his hard eyes.
The convict flinched, moistened his lips with his tongue, and spoke at last.
“I—I—Mr. Cullison, I want to explain. Every man is liable to make a mistake—go off half cocked. I didn’t do right. That’s a fac’. I can explain all that, but I’m sick now—awful sick.”
Cullison laughed harshly. “You’ll be sicker soon.”
“You promised you wouldn’t do anything if weturned you loose,” the man plucked up courage to remind him.
“I promised the law wouldn’t do anything. You’ll understand the distinction presently.”
“Mr. Cullison, please—— I admit I done wrong. I hadn’t ought to have gone in with Cass Fendrick. He wanted me to kill you, but I wouldn’t.”
With that unwinking gaze the ranchman beat down his lies, while fear dripped in perspiration from the pallid face of the prisoner.
Bucky had let Cullison take the center of the stage. He had observed a growing distress mount and ride the victim. Now he stepped in to save the man with an alternative at which Blackwell might be expected not to snatch eagerly perhaps, but at least to be driven toward.
“This man is my prisoner, Mr. Cullison. From what I can make out you ought to strip his hide off and hang it up to dry. But I’ve got first call on him. If he comes through with the truth about the W. & S. Express robbery, I’ve got to protect him.”
Luck understood the ranger. They were both working toward the same end. The immediate punishment of this criminal was not the important issue. It was merely a club with which to beat him into submission, and at that a moral rather than aphysical one. But the owner of the Circle C knew better than to yield to Bucky too easily. He fought the point out with him at length, and finally yielded reluctantly, in such a way as to aggravate rather than relieve the anxiety of the convict.
“All right. You take him first,” he finally conceded harshly.
Bucky kept up the comedy. “I’ll take him, Mr. Cullison. But if he tells me the truth—and if I find out it’s the whole truth—there’ll be nothing doing on your part. He’s my prisoner. Understand that.”
Metaphorically, Blackwell licked the hand of his protector. He was still standing, but his attitude gave the effect of crouching.
“I aim to do what’s right, Captain O’Connor. Whatever’s right. You ask me any questions.”
“I want to know all about the W. & S. robbery, everything, from start to finish.”
“Honest, I wish I could tell you. But I don’t know a thing about it. Cross my heart, I don’t.”
“No use, Blackwell. If I’m going to stand by you against Mr. Cullison, you’ll have to tell the truth. Why, man, I’ve even got the mask you wore and the cloth you cut it from.”
“I reckon it must a-been some one else, Major. Wisht I could help you, but I can’t.”
Bucky rose. “All right. If you can’t help me, Ican’t help you.” Apparently he dismissed the matter from his mind, for he looked at his watch and turned to the cattleman. “Mr. Cullison, I reckon I’ll run out and have some supper. Do you mind staying here with this man till I get back?”
“No. That’s all right, Bucky. Don’t hurry, I’ll keep him entertained.” Perhaps it was not by chance that his eye wandered to a blacksnake whip hanging on the wall.
O’Connor sauntered to the door. The frightened gaze of the prisoner clung to him as if for safety.
“Major—Colonel—you ain’t a-going,” he pleaded.
“Only for an hour or two. I’ll be back. I wouldn’t think of saying good-by—not till we reach Yuma.”
With that the door closed behind him. Blackwell cried out, hurriedly, eagerly. “Mister O’Connor!”
Bucky’s head reappeared. “What! Have you reduced me to the ranks already? I was looking to be a general by the time I got back,” he complained whimsically.
“I—I’ll tell you everything—every last thing. Mr. Cullison—he’s aiming to kill me soon as you’ve gone.”
“I’ve got no time to fool away, Blackwell. I’mhungry. If you mean business get to it. But remember that whatever you say will be used against you.”
“I’ll tell you any dog-goned thing you want to know. You’ve got me beat. I’m plumb wore out—sick. A man can’t stand everything.”
O’Connor came in and closed the door. “Let’s have it, then—the whole story. I want it all: how you came to know about this shipment of money, how you pulled it off, what you have done with it, all the facts from beginning to the end.”
“Lemme sit down, Captain. I’m awful done up. I reckon while I was in the hills I’ve been underfed.”
“Sit down. There’s a good dinner waiting for you at Clune’s when you get through.”
Even then, though he must have known that lies could not avail, the man sprinkled his story with them. The residuum of truth that remained after these had been sifted out was something like this.
He had found on the street a letter that had inadvertently been dropped. It was to Jordan of the Cattlemen’s National Bank, and it notified him that $20,000 was to be shipped to him by the W. & S. Express Company on the night of the robbery. Blackwell resolved to have a try for it. He hung around the office until the manager and theguard arrived from the train, made his raid upon them, locked the door, and threw away his mask. He dived with the satchel into the nearest alley, and came face to face with the stranger whom he later learned to be Fendrick. The whole story of the horse had been a myth later invented by the sheepman to scatter the pursuit by making it appear that the robber had come from a distance. As the street had been quite deserted at the time this detail could be plausibly introduced with no chance of a denial.
Fendrick, who had heard the shouting of the men locked in the express office, stopped the robber, but Blackwell broke away and ran down the alley. The sheepman followed and caught him. After another scuffle the convict again hammered himself free, but left behind the hand satchel containing the spoils. Fendrick (so he later explained to Blackwell) tied a cord to the handle of the bag and dropped it down the chute of a laundry in such a way that it could later be drawn up. Then he hurried back to the express office and released the prisoners. After the excitement had subsided, he had returned for the money and hid it. The original robber did not know where.
Blackwell’s second meeting with the sheepman had been almost as startling as the first. Cass had run into the Jack of Hearts in time to save the lifeof his enemy. The two men recognized each other and entered into a compact to abduct Cullison, for his share in which the older man was paid one thousand dollars. The Mexican Dominguez had later appeared on the scene, had helped guard the owner of the Circle C, and had assisted in taking him to the hut in the Rincons where he had been secreted.
Both men asked the same question as soon as he had finished.
“Where is the money you got from the raid on the W. & S. office?”
“Don’t know. I’ve been at Fendrick ever since to tell me. He’s got it salted somewhere. You’re fixing to put me behind the bars, and he’s the man that really stole it.”
From this they could not shake him. He stuck to it vindictively, for plainly his malice against the sheepman was great. The latter had spoiled his coup, robbed him of its fruits, and now was letting him go to prison.
“I reckon we’d better have a talk with Cass,” Bucky suggested in a low voice to the former sheriff.
Luck laughed significantly. “When we find him.”
For the sheepman had got out on bail the morning after his arrest.
“We’ll find him easily enough. And I ratherthink he’ll have a good explanation, even if this fellow’s story is true.”
“Oh, he’ll be loaded with explanations. I don’t doubt that for a minute. But it will take a hell of a lot of talk to get away from the facts. I’ve got him where I want him now, and by God! I’ll make him squeal before the finish.”
“Oh, well, you’re prejudiced,” Bucky told him with an amiable smile.
“Course I am; prejudiced as old Wall-eyed Rogers was against the vigilantes for hanging him on account of horse stealing. But I’ll back my prejudices all the same. We’ll see I’m right, Bucky.”
CHAPTER XVBOB TAKES A HAND
Fendrick, riding on Mesa Verde, met Bob Cullison, and before he knew what had happened found a gun thrown on him.
“Don’t you move,” the boy warned.
“What does this tommyrot mean?” the sheepman demanded angrily.
“It means that you are coming back with me to the ranch. That’s what it means.”
“What for?”
“Never you mind what for.”
“Oh, go to Mexico,” Cass flung back impatiently. “Think we’re in some fool moving-picture play, you blamed young idiot. Put up that gun.”
Shrilly Bob retorted. He was excited enough to be dangerous. “Don’t you get the wrong idea. I’m going to make this stick. You’ll turn and go back with me to the Circle C.”
“And you’ll travel to Yuma first thing you know, you young Jesse James. Whatyouneed is a pair of leather chaps applied to your hide.”
“You’ll go home with me, just the same.”
“You’ve got one more guess coming, kid. I’ll not go without knowing why.”
“You’re wanted for the W. & S. Express robbery. Blackwell has confessed.”
“Confessed that I did it?” Fendrick inquired scornfully.
“Says you were in it with him. I ain’t a-going to discuss it with you. Swing that horse round; and don’t make any breaks, or there’ll be mourning at the C. F. ranch.”
Cass sat immovable as the sphinx. He was thinking that he might as well face the charge now as any time. Moreover, he had reasons for wanting to visit the Circle C. They had to do with a tall, slim girl who never looked at him without scorn in her dark, flashing eyes.
“All right. I’ll go back with you, but not under a gun.”
“You’ll go the way I say.”
“Don’t think it. I’ve said I’ll go. That settles it. But I won’t stand for any gun-play capture.”
“You’ll have to stand for it.”
Fendrick’s face set. “Will I? It’s up to you, then. Let’s see you make me.”
Sitting there with his gaze steadily on the boy, Cass had Bob at a disadvantage. If the sheep owner had tried to break away into the chaparral. Bob could have blazed away at him, but he could not shoot a man looking at him with cynical, amused eyes. He could understand the point ofview of his adversary. If Fendrick rode into the Circle C under compulsion of a gun in the hands of a boy he would never hear the end of the laugh on him.
“You won’t try to light out, will you?”
“I’ve got no notion of lighting out.”
Bob put up his big blue gun reluctantly. Never before had it been trained on a human being, and it was a wrench to give up the thought of bringing in the enemy as a prisoner. But he saw he could not pull it off. Fendrick had declined to scare, had practically laughed him out of it. The boy had not meant his command as a bluff, but Cass knew him better than he did himself.
They turned toward the Circle C.
“Must have been taking lessons on how to bend a gun. You in training for sheriff, or are you going to take Bucky’s place with the rangers?” Fendrick asked with casual impudence, malicious amusement gleaming from his lazy eyes.
Bob, very red about the ears, took refuge in a sulky silence. He was being guyed, and not by an inch did he propose to compromise the Cullison dignity.
“From the way you go at it, I figure you an old hand at the hold-up game. Wonder if you didn’t pull off the W. & S. raid yourself.”
Bob writhed impotently. At this sort of thing he was no match for the other. Fendrick, now in the best of humors, planted lazily his offhand barbs.
Kate was seated on the porch sewing. She rose in surprise when her cousin and the sheepman appeared. They came with jingling spurs across the plaza toward her. Bob was red as a turkeycock, but Fendrick wore his most devil-may-care insouciance.
“Where’s Uncle Luck, sis? I’ve brought this fellow back with me. Caught him on the mesa,” explained the boy sulkily.
Fendrick bowed rather extravagantly and flashed at the girl a smiling double-row of strong white teeth. “He’s qualifying for a moving-picture show actor, Miss Cullison. I hadn’t the heart to disappoint him when he got that cannon trained on me. So here I am.”
Kate looked at him and then let her gaze travel to her cousin. She somehow gave the effect of judging him of negligible value.
“I think he’s in his office, Bob. I’ll go see.”
She went swiftly, and presently her father came out. Kate did not return.
Luck looked straight at Cass with the uncompromising hostility so characteristic of him. Neither of the men spoke. It was Bob who made the necessaryexplanations. The sheepman heard them with a polite derision that suggested an impersonal amusement at the situation.
“I’ve been looking for you,” Luck said bluntly, after his nephew had finished.
“So I gathered from young Jesse James. He intimated it over the long blue barrel of his cannon. Anything particular, or just a pleasant social call?”
“You’re in bad on this W. & S. robbery. I reckoned you would be safer in jail till it’s cleared up.”
“You still sheriff, Mr. Cullison? Somehow I had got a notion you had quit the job.”
“I’m an interested party. There’s new evidence, not manufactured, either.”
“Well, well!”
“We’ll take the stage into town and see what O’Connor says—that is, if you’ve got time to go.” Luck could be as formal in his sarcasm as his neighbor.
“With such good company on the way I’ll have to make time.”
The stage did not usually leave till about half past one. Presently Kate announced dinner. A little awkwardly Luck invited the sheepman to join them. Fendrick declined. He was a Fletcherite, he informed Cullison ironically, and was in the habit of missing meals occasionally. This would be one of the times.
His host hung in the doorway. Seldom at a loss to express himself, he did not quite know how to put into words what he was thinking. His enemy understood.
“That’s all right. You’ve satisfied the demands of hospitality. Go eat your dinner. I’ll be right here on the porch when you get through.”
Kate, who was standing beside her father, spoke quietly.
“There’s a place for you, Mr. Fendrick. We should be very pleased to have you join us. People who happen to be at the Circle C at dinner time are expected to eat here.”
“Come and eat, man. You’ll be under no obligations. I reckon you can hate us, just as thorough after a square meal as before. Besides, I was your guest for several days.”
Fendrick looked at the young mistress of the ranch. He meant to decline once more, but unaccountably found himself accepting instead. Something in her face told him she would rather have it so.
Wherefore Cass found himself with his feet under the table of his foe discussing various topics that had nothing to do with sheep, homestead claims, abductions, or express robberies. He looked at Kate but rarely, yet he was aware of her all the time. At his ranch a Mexican did the cookingin haphazard fashion. The food was ill prepared and worse served. He ate only because it was a necessity, and he made as short a business of it as he could. Here were cut roses on a snowy tablecloth, an air of leisure that implied the object of dinner to be something more than to devour a given quantity of food. Moreover, the food had a flavor that made it palatable. The rib roast was done to a turn, the mashed potatoes whipped to a flaky lightness. The vegetable salad was a triumph, and the rice custard melted in his mouth.
Presently a young man came into the dining room and sat down beside Kate. He looked the least in the world surprised at sight of the sheepman.
“Mornin’, Cass,” he nodded
“Morning, Curly,” answered Fendrick. “Didn’t know you were riding for the Circle C.”
“He’s my foreman,” Luck explained.
Cass observed that he was quite one of the family. Bob admired him openly and without shame, because he was the best rider in Arizona; Kate seemed to be on the best of terms with him, and Luck treated him with the offhand bluffness he might have used toward a grown son.
If Cass had, in his bitter, sardonic fashion, been interested in Kate before he sat down, the feeling had quickened to something different before herose. It was not only that she was competent to devise such a meal in the desert. There was something else. She had made ahomefor her father and cousin at the Circle C. The place radiated love, domesticity, kindly good fellowship. The casual give and take of the friendly talk went straight to the heart of the sheepman. This was living. It came to him poignantly that in his scramble for wealth he had missed that which was of far greater importance.
The stage brought the two men to town shortly after sundown. Luck called up O’Connor, and made an appointment to meet him after supper.
“Back again, Bucky,” Fendrick grinned at sight of the ranger. “I hear I’m suspected of being a bad hold-up.”
“There’s a matter that needs explaining, Cass. According to Blackwell’s story, you caught him with the goods at the time of the robbery, and in making his getaway he left the loot with you. What have you done with it?”
“Blackwell told you that, did he?”
“Yes.”
“Don’t doubt your word for a moment, Bucky, but before I do any talking I’d like to hear him say so. I’ll not round on him until I know he’s given himself away.”
The convict was sent for. He substantiated theranger reluctantly. He was so hemmed in that he did not know how to play his cards so as to make the most of them. He hated Fendrick. But much as he desired to convict him, he could not escape an uneasy feeling that he was going to be made the victim. For Cass took it with that sarcastic smile of his that mocked them all in turn. The convict trusted none of them. Already he felt the penitentiary walls closing on him. He was like a trapped coyote, ready to snarl and bite at the first hand he could reach. Just now this happened to belong to Fendrick, who had cheated him out of the money he had stolen and had brought this upon him.
Cass heard him out with a lifted upper lip and his most somnolent tiger-cat expression. After Blackwell had finished and been withdrawn from circulation he rolled and lit a cigarette.
“By Mr. Blackwell’s say-so I’m the goat. By the way, has it ever occurred to you gentlemen that one can’t be convicted on the testimony of a single accomplice?” He asked it casually, his chair tipped back, smoke wreaths drifting lazily ceilingward.
“We’ve got a little circumstantial evidence to add, Cass.” Bucky suggested pleasantly.
“Not enough—not nearly enough.”
“That will be for a jury to decide,” Cullison chipped in.
Fendrick shrugged. “I’ve a notion to let it go tothat. But what’s the use? Understand this. I wasn’t going to give Blackwell away, but since he has talked, I may tell what I know. It’s true enough what he says. I did relieve him of the plunder.”
“Sorry to hear that, Cass,” Bucky commented gravely. “What did you do with it?”
The sheep owner flicked his cigarette ash into the tray, and looked at the lieutenant out of half-shuttered, indolent eyes. “Gave it to you, Bucky.”
O’Connor sat up. His blue Irish eyes were dancing. “You’re a cool customer, Cass.”
“Fact, just the same. Got that letter I handed you the other day?”
The officer produced it from his safe.
“Open it.”
With a paper knife Bucky ripped the flap and took out a sheet of paper.
“There’s something else in there,” Fendrick suggested.
The something else proved to be a piece of paper folded tightly, which being opened disclosed a key.
O’Connor read aloud the letter: