With daylight we began to get a grip on ourselves a little. I felt strongly that I should see to Yank, and so announced. Johnny at once offered to accompany me. While we were talking over the future prospects, McNally came over to us, saying:
“The boys are pretty well agreed that we ought to divide up what gold is left, and let each man take care of his own share. Are you agreeable?”
We instantly assented. The scales were brought out, and the division began. It consumed most of the morning, and was productive of much squabbling, in which, however, we took no part. Our share, including Yank’s–with which we were intrusted–came to about thirty-one pounds: a value of about seven thousand dollars. We were impatient to be off, and now wanted nothing so much as to be done with the whole affair. Yank had ridden one of our horses; the other had been stolen in the Indian raid. We approached Don Gaspar, who had his own saddle horse and that of Vasquez, not to speak of the remaining pack-animals. To our surprise and delight he offered to accompany us; and Bagsby, too, decided to leave. McNally, Buck Barry, and Missouri Jones, however, could not be persuaded out of their intention of256remaining to dig fresh gold; nor, I am afraid, were we very cordial in our insistence. We considered them foolhardy; but in our then mood we did not greatly care.
By noon we had packed our goods, and by night we had broken the back of our return journey.
We found a full-grown town where we had left a few tents and miners’ cabins. Its main street ran either side the deep dust of the immigrant trail, and consisted of the usual shanties, canvas shacks, and log structures, with rather more than the customary allowance of tin cans, old clothes, worn-out boots, and empty barrels kicking around. The diggings were in the gulch below the road; but the streets of the town, and especially the shady sides of the buildings, were numerously furnished with lounging men. Some of these were employees or owners of the gambling halls, saloons, and boarding-houses; but most were plain “loafers”–a class never wholly absent from any mining camp, men who washed just enough gold to keep themselves fed and pickled in drink. Many of them were evil-looking customers, in fact about as tough a lot as a man would care to see, unshaven generally, but not always, dirty, truculent and rough, insolent in manner. In our passage of the main street I saw just three decent looking people–one was evidently a gambler, one a beefy, red-faced individual who had something to do with one of the hotels, and the third was a tall man, past middle age, with a clean shaven, hawk face, a piercing, haughty, black eye, and iron gray hair. He was carefully and flawlessly dressed in a gray furred “plug” hat, tailed blue coat with brass buttons, a buff waistcoat, trousers of the257same shade, and a frilled shirt front. Immaculate down to within six inches or so of the ground, his nether garments and boots were coated thickly with the inevitable red dust. He strode slowly down the street, looking neither to right nor left.
Don Gaspar led the way for a short distance along the wagon road. On the outskirts of the settlement he turned aside to a small log cabin supplemented by a brush lean-to. A long string of bright red peppers hung down the face of it. To our knock came a very fat, rather dirty, but exceedingly pleasant-faced woman with glossy black hair, parted smoothly, and soft black eyes. She opened the door only the fraction of an inch at first, but instantly recognized Don Gaspar, and threw it wide.
To our great relief we found Yank very much alive. He greeted us rather feebly, but with satisfaction. We found that he had been kindly cared for, and that the surface wounds and bruises from the horses’ hoofs had been treated with some skill.
“But I reckon I’m hurt some inside,” he whispered with difficulty, “for I can’t breathe easy; and I can’t eat nothin’ but soup. And my leg is hell.”
The broken leg too had been bound up after a fashion, but it was badly swollen above and below the bandages.
“He ought to have a doctor,” said I positively. “There’s no doubt of that. There must be some among the miners–there generally is. I’m going to see if I can find one.”
I returned to town, and hunted up the beefy, red-faced hotel keeper, who had impressed me as being an honest man.
“Yes, there’s a doctor,” said he, “a mighty good one.258He went by here a little while ago. Name’s Dr. Rankin. I’ll rustle him out for you. Oh, you Pete!” he shouted into the interior of the building.
A moment’s shuffling about preceded the appearance of a negro boy of twelve or fourteen.
“Yes, sah.”
“Go find Dr. Rankin and bring him here right away. Tell him a gentleman wants him.”
“You’ve got a mighty sudden sort of camp here,” said I, as we settled ourselves to wait. “Three months ago I went through here, and there was practically nothing.”
“Looks to be a thousand years, though,” agreed the hotel man. “Where you been?”
“Oh, just prospecting,” I replied vaguely.
“Strike it?”
“Just fair,” I evaded; “not rich enough to keep me from coming back, you see. Any finds here?”
“The diggings are rich as mud,” replied the hotel man dispassionately. “It’s a prosperous camp all right.”
“You don’t ’wash’ yourself?” I asked.
“Not I! I make more than my ‘ounce a day’ right here.” He jerked his thumb at his hotel.
“A good many ‘loafers,’” I suggested.
He looked at me steadily, hesitated for a moment, then evidently changed his mind.
“Quite a few,” he agreed.
At this moment the negro boy appeared, closely followed by the man with the blue coat and white beaver hat whom I had taken for an eccentric gambler. This man walked slowly up to face me.
259“Well, sir?” he demanded. “I am told I can be of service. In what way?”
His piercing black eye held mine with a certain high arrogance.
“Professionally, doctor,” I replied. “A friend of mine is lying badly hurt in a nearby hut.”
For a barely appreciable instant his eye held mine after I had ceased speaking, as though he was appraising me. Then he bowed with old-fashioned courtesy.
“At your service, sir,” said he. “Pete, you black rascal, get my bag, and get it quick.”
The little negro, who had stood by obviously worshipping, broke into a grin and darted into the hotel, almost instantly reappearing with a regulation professional satchel.
“At your service, sir,” repeated Dr. Rankin.
We took our stately progress up the street, through the deep red dust. The hot sun glared down upon us, reflecting from the surface of the earth in suffocating heat. Hard as I was, I flushed and perspired. The doctor never turned a hair. As we passed one of the saloons a huge, hairy man lurched out, nearly colliding with us. He was not drunk, but he was well flushed with drink. His mood was evidently ugly, for he dropped his hand to the butt of his revolver, and growled something truculent at me, glaring through bloodshot eyes. Dr. Rankin, who had stepped back to avoid collision, spoke up:
“Malone,” said he, “I told you a week ago that you have to stop drinking or come to me. I repeat it.”
260He turned his keen black eyes upon the big man, and stepped forward. The big man muttered something and moved aside.
Arrived at the hut of the Moreñas, for that it seemed was the name of our host and hostess, Dr. Rankin laid aside his furry beaver hat, walked directly to the side of the bunk on which Yank lay, and began his examination, without vouchsafing anything or anybody else the slightest glance. Nor did he seem to pay more attention to Yank as a human being, but prodded and pulled and hauled and manipulated him from top to toe, his gray, hawk face intent and absorbed. Occasionally, as he repeated some prod, he looked up keenly into Yank’s face, probably for some slight symptom of pain that escaped us, for Yank remained stoical. But he asked no questions. At the end of ten minutes he threw the blanket over our friend’s form and stood erect, carefully dusting the ends of his fingers against one another.
“Broken leg, badly set,” said he; “two broken ribs; severe surface bruises; and possibility of internal bruises in the region of the spleen. Neglected too long. Why wasn’t I sent for before?”
I explained. Dr. Rankin listened attentively, but made no comment. His eyes travelled slowly over us all–the fat, pleasant, brown California woman, her bearded husband, who had come in from the diggings, Bagsby’s tall, wiry old form, the worn remains of Don Gaspar’s finery, and lingered a moment on Johnny’s undisguisable air of high spirit and breeding.
“How many of you belong here?” he demanded. “I261can’t waste time on the rest of you. Those who are not directly concerned, kindly step outside.”
“Johnny and I will take care of this,” I told the others hastily, before they had time to say anything.
“Now,” cried Dr. Rankin, removing his blue coat, and turning back the frills of his shirt, “hot water!”
We assisted at the rather dreadful process of resetting a broken leg three days old. At the end of the operation we were all pretty limp.
“How long?” gasped Yank, opening his eyes.
“Three months; not a day less if you want that leg to be as good as ever,” stated Dr. Rankin uncompromisingly.
Yank closed his eyes and groaned.
The doctor resumed his coat and picked up his beaver hat.
“What treatment?” I ventured to ask.
“I will inform the woman,” replied the doctor. “These Californians are the best nurses in the world, once things are on a proper footing.”
“Your fee, sir?” asked Johnny very formally, for the doctor’s brusque manner had rubbed.
“One ounce,” stated Dr. Rankin. “I shall direct the woman, and I shall return one week from to-day unless conditions change. In that case, summon me.”
He pouched the gold dust that Johnny shook into the palm of his hand at a guess, bowed formally to each of us in turn, picked up his bag and departed, rigidly erect, the fine red dust crawling and eddying at his feet.
Then we held a council of war, all of us. Don Gaspar262announced his intention of returning to his rancho in the south.
“I have found the gold, and I have made fren’s, and I have now enough,” said he.
Bagsby, too, said he thought he would just ride down as far as Sutter’s Fort, there to lay in a supply of powder and ball for a trip in the mountains.
“I kind of want to git up another b’ar fight,” said he. “If I thought there was a ghost of a show to git them robbers for you boys, I’d stay and help you scout for them; but there ain’t a show in the world. They’ve had a good three days’ start.”
After shaking hands with us again and again, and obtaining promises that we should all surely meet in San Francisco or Monterey, they mounted and took their departure in order to get well clear of the settlement before nightfall.
When they had gone Yank opened his eyes from the apparent sleep into which he had fallen.
“You fellows don’t hang around here with me, I can tell you that,” he stated. “I’m fixed all right. I want you to make arrangements with these people yere to keep me; tuck my gold under my piller, stack old Betsey up yere in the corner by me, and go about your business. You come out yere to dig gold, not to take keer of cripples.”
“All right, Yank, we’ll fix it somehow,” I agreed. “Now if you’re all right, Johnny and I will just go and straighten out our camp things a little.”
We were now, it will be remembered, without horses. Don Gaspar had unpacked our few belongings before263departing. Johnny and I found a good camping place, then carried the stuff over on our backs. We cooked ourselves some food, lit pipes, and sat down to talk the situation over.
We got nowhere. As a matter of fact, we were both in the dead-water of reaction from hard, long-continued labour, and we could not bring ourselves to face with any enthusiasm the resuming of gold washing. Revulsion shook us at the mere thought of getting down in a hot, glaring ravine and moving heavy earth and rocks. Yet we had not made a fortune, nor much of a beginning at one, and neither of us was what is known as a quitter. We realized perfectly that we would go on gold mining.
“What we need is a recess,” Johnny ended, “and I move we take it. Just let’s camp here, and loaf for a few days or a week, and see how Yank gets along, and then we can go back to Porcupine.”
As though this decision lifted a great weight, we sat back on our shoulder blades with a sigh of relief, and blew tobacco smoke straight up in the air for at least fifteen minutes. By the end of that time we, being young and restless, felt thoroughly refreshed.
“Let’s go look this outfit over,” suggested Johnny.
We gravitated naturally to the diggings, which were very much like those at Hangman’s Gulch, except that they were rather more extensive, and branched out more into the tributary ravines. The men working there were, many of them, of a much better type than those we had seen in town; though even here was a large element of rough-looking, wild, reckless customers. We wandered264about here and there, our hands in our pockets, a vast leisure filling our souls. With some of the more pleasant-appearing miners we conversed. They told us that the diggings were rich, good “ounce a day” diggings. We saw a good many cradles in use. It was easy to tell the old-timers from the riffraff of newcomers. A great many of the latter seemed to lack the steadiness of purpose characteristic of nearly all the first rush. They worked haphazardly, spasmodically, pulling and hauling against each other. Some should not have been working at all, for their eyes were sunken in their heads from illness.
“We’ve got to hustle now,” they told us. “We can take a good rest when the rains stop work.”
We noticed especially a marked change in demeanour among some of the groups. In the early part of the summer every man answered every man good-naturedly, except he happened to have a next day’s head or some other sort of a personal grouch. Now many compact little groups of men worked quite apart. When addressed they merely scowled or looked sullen, evidently quite unwilling to fraternize with the chance-comer.
We loafed about here and there through the diggings, swapping remarks with the better disposed, until the men began to knock off work. Then we returned through the village.
Its street had begun to fill. Here, too, we could not but be struck by the subtle change that had come over the spirit of the people. All used to seem like the members of a big family, good-natured and approachable even when strangers. Now a slower acquaintance must precede familiarity.265We seemed out of it because we did not know anybody, something we had not felt before in a mining camp. There was no hostility in this, not an iota; only now it had evidently become necessary to hold a man off a little until one knew something about him. People seemed, somehow,watchful, in spite of the surface air of good-nature and of boisterous spirits. We did not quite understand this at the moment, but we learned more about it later.
We sauntered along peering into the various buildings. The saloons were here more elaborate than at Hangman’s, the gambling places larger, and with some slight attempt at San Francisco splendour. That is to say, there were large gilt-framed mirrors on the walls, nude pictures, and in some cases a stage for musical performers. One of the three stores was devoted entirely to clothing and “notions,” to us a new departure in specialization. We were sadly in need of garments, so we entered, and were at once met by a very oily, suave specimen of the chosen people. When we had escaped from this robber’s den we looked at each other in humorous dismay.
“Glad Yank don’t need clothes, anyway,” said Johnny.
We were, it will be remembered, out of provisions, so we entered also one of the general stores to lay in a small supply. The proprietor proved to be an old friend, Jones, the storekeeper at Hangman’s.
“Which,” said Johnny shrewdly, “is a sad commentary on the decline of the diggings at Hangman’s.”
Jones was evidently prosperous, and doing business on a much larger scale than at the old place; for in his266commodious building were quantities of goods displayed and many barrels and boxes still unopened. He did not recognize us, of course; and we had to await the completion of a tale he was telling a group perched on the counters and on the boxes.
“Got a consignment of mixed goods from Mellin,” he was saying, “and one of the barrels wasn’t marked with anything I could make out. I knocked the top in, and chucked her out behind for spoiled beef. Certainly stunk like it. Well, sir, that barrel lay there for a good ten days; and then one day up drifted a Dutchman with a brogue on him thick enough to plant flag-poles in. ‘How mooch,’ says he ‘is dot stoof?’ ‘What stuff?’ says I. ‘Dot stoof oudt behind.’ ‘I ain’t got no stuff out behind! What’s eating you?’ says I. Then he points out that spoiled beef. ‘Good Lord!’ says I, ‘help yourself. I got a lot of nerve, but not enough to charge a man for anything that stinks like that beef. But you better let it alone; you’ll get sick!’ Well, sir, you wouldn’t think there was any Dutchmen in the country, now would you? but they came to that stink like flies to molasses. Any time I’d look out the back door I’d see one or two nosing around that old spoiled beef. Then one day another old beer-belly sagged in. ‘Say, you got any more barrels of dot sauerkraut?’ he wants to know. ‘That what?’ I asks. ‘Dot sauerkraut,’ says he, ‘like dot in the backyard. I gif you goot price for a whole barrel,’ says he. And here I’d give away a whole barrel! I might’ve got a dollar a pound for the stuff.Idon’t know what it might be worth to a Dutchman.”
267He turned away to wait on us.
“And you wouldn’t guess there was so many Dutchmen in the country!” he repeated.
We paid his terrible prices for our few necessities, and went out. The music was beginning to tune up from the gambling places and saloons. It reminded us of our Italian friend.
“Seems to me his place was right here where we are,” puzzled Johnny. “Hanged if I don’t believe this is the place; only they’ve stuck a veranda roof on it.”
We turned into the entrance of the hotel, to find ourselves in the well-remembered long, low room wherein we had spent the evening a few months before. It was now furnished with a bar, the flimsy partitions had been knocked out, and evidently additions had been constructed beyond the various closed doors. The most conspicuous single thing was a huge bulletin board occupying one whole end. It was written over closely with hundreds and hundreds of names. Several men were laboriously spelling them out. This, we were given to understand, was a sort of register of the overland immigrants; and by its means many parties obtained first news of scattered members.
The man behind the bar looked vaguely familiar to me, but I could not place him.
“Where’s the proprietor of this place?” I asked him.
He indicated a short, blowsy, truculent-looking individual who was, at the moment, staring out the window.
“There used to be an Italian─” I began.
The barkeeper uttered a short barking laugh as he turned to attend to a customer.
268“He found the climate bad for his heart–and sold out!” said he.
On the wall opposite was posted a number of printed and written handbills. We stopped idly to examine them. They had in general to do with lost property, stolen horses, and rewards for the apprehension of various individuals. One struck us in particular. It was issued by a citizens’ committee of San Francisco, and announced a general reward for the capture of any member of the “Hounds.”
“Looks as if they’d got tired of that gang down there,” Johnny observed. “They were ruling the roost when we left. Do you know, I saw one of those fellows this afternoon–perhaps you remember him–a man with a queer sort of blue scar over one cheekbone. I swear I saw him in San Francisco. There’s our chance to make some money, Jim.”
The proprietor of the hotel turned to look at Johnny curiously, and several of the loafers drinking at the bar glanced in the direction of his clear young voice. We went on reading and enjoying the notices, some of which were very quaint. Suddenly the door burst open to admit a big man followed closely by a motley rabble. The leader was a red-faced, burly, whiskered individual, with a red beard and matted hair. As he turned I saw a star-shaped blue scar above his cheekbone.
“Where’s the ─ ─ ─ that is going to make some money out of arresting me?” he roared, swinging his huge form ostentatiously toward the centre of the room.
I confessed I was aghast, and completely at a loss.269A row was evidently unavoidable, and the odds were against us. Almost at the instant the door came open, Johnny, without waiting for hostile demonstration, jerked his Colt’s revolvers from their holsters. With one bound he reached the centre of the room, and thrust the muzzles beneath the bully’s nose. His black eyes were snapping.
“Shut up, you hound!” he said in a low, even voice. “I wouldn’t condescend to make money out of your miserable carcass, except at a glue factory. And if you or your friends so much as wink an eyelid, I’ll put you in shape for it.”
Caught absolutely by surprise, the “Hound” stared fascinated into the pistol barrels, his jaw dropped, his face redder than ever, his eyes ridiculously protruding. I had recovered my wits and had backed against the bulletin board, a revolver in either hand, keeping an eye on the general company. Those who had burst in with the bully had stopped frozen in their tracks. The others were interested, but not particularly excited.
“I’m going to stay in this camp,” Johnny advised crisply, “and I’m not going to be bothered by big bluffs like you. I warn you, and all like you, to let me alone and keep away from me. You stay in camp, or you can leave camp, just as you please, but I warn you that I shoot you next time I lay eyes on you. Now, about face! March!”
Johnny’s voice had an edge of steel. The big man obeyed orders implicitly. He turned slowly, and sneaked out the door. His followers shambled toward the bar. Johnny passed them rather contemptuously under the review of270his snapping eyes, and they shambled a trifle faster. Then, with elaborate nonchalance, we sauntered out.
“My Lord, Johnny!” I cried when we had reached the street, “that was fine! I didn’t know you had it in you!”
“Damn the luck!” he cried, kicking a tin can. “Oh,damn!”
He muttered to himself a moment, then turned to me with humorous despair.
“What a stupid, useless mess!” he cried. “The minute that fellow came into the room I saw we were let in for a row; so I went at it quick before he had got organized. He didn’t expect that. He thought he’d have to work us into it.”
“It certainly got him,” said I.
“But it just starts us all wrong here,” complained Johnny. “We are marked men.”
“We’ll just have to look out for him a little. I don’t believe he’s really dangerous. He looks to me a lot like a bluffer.”
“Oh, him!” said Johnny contemputously, “he doesn’t worry me any. It’s all the rest of them. I’ve practically challenged all the hard cases in camp, don’t you see? I’m no longer an inconspicuous newcomer. Every tough character with any real nerve will want to tackle me now, just to try me out.”
From the impulsive and unanalytical Johnny this was surprising enough, and my face must have showed it.
“I’ve seen it worked out in my part of the country,” he explained sombrely. “I don’t want to bother with that sort of thing. I’m a peaceable citizen. Now I’ve271got to walk around on tiptoe all the time watching for trouble. Oh,damn!”
“If you’re afraid─” I began.
“I’m not afraid,” said Johnny so simply that I believed him at once. “But I’m annoyed. And of course you recognized that barkeeper.”
“I thought I’d seen him before, but I don’t remember just where.”
“He’s one of those fellows we fired out of our canoe down at Chagres. You can bet he doesn’t love us any!”
“You move along to Porcupine to-morrow,” I suggested. “I can look after Yank all right. They won’t bother me.”
Johnny walked for some steps in silence.
“No, they won’t bother you,” he repeated slowly.
He thought for a moment, then he threw back his head. “But look here, Jim,” he said briskly, “you forget. I told that fellow and his friends that I was going to live in this place. I can’t leave now.”
“Nonsense,” said I. “What do you care for that gang?”
“It would look like running away. No, I certainly don’t intend to leave now.”
We went out to see Yank, with the full intention of spending the evening and cheering him up. He was dozing, restless, waking and sleeping by fits and starts. We sat around in the awkward fashion peculiar to very young boys in the sickroom; and then, to our vast relief, were shoved out by Señora Moreña. With her we held a whispered conversation outside, and completed satisfactory arrangements for Yank’s keep. She was a chuckling, easy-going, motherly sort of creature, and we were very lucky to have her. Then we returned in the gathering dusk to our camp under the trees across the way.
A man rose from a seat against a tree trunk.
“Goodevenin’, stranger,” said he.
“Good evening,” responded Johnny guardedly.
“You are the man who stuck up Scar-face Charley in Morton’s place, ain’t you?”
“What’s that to you?” replied Johnny. “Are you a friend of his?”
His habitual air of young carelessness had fallen from him; his eye was steady and frosty, his face set in stern lines. Before my wondering eyes he had grown ten years older in the last six hours. The other was lounging toward us–a short, slight man, with flaxen moustache and eyebrows,273a colourless face, pale blue eyes, and a bald forehead from which the hat had been pushed back. He was chewing a straw.
“Well, I was just inquirin’ in a friendly sort of way,” replied the newcomer peaceably.
“I don’t know you,” stated Johnny shortly, “nor who you’re friends to, nor your camp. I deny your right to ask questions. Good night.”
“Well, good night,” agreed the other, still peaceable. “I reckon I gather considerable about you, anyhow.” He turned away. “I had a notion from what I heard that you was sort of picked on, and I dropped round, sort of friendly like; but Lord love you! I don’t care how many of you desperadoes kill each other. Go to it, and good riddance!” He cast his pale blue eyes on Johnny’s rigid figure. “Also, go to hell!” he remarked dispassionately.
Johnny stared at him puzzled.
“Hold on!” he called, after a moment. “Then you’re not a friend of this Hound?”
The stranger turned in slow surprise.
“Me? What are you talking about?” He looked from one to the other of us, then returned the few steps he had taken. “I believe you don’t know me. I’m Randall, Danny Randall.”
“Yes?” puzzled Johnny.
“Of Sonoma,” added Randall.
“I suppose I should know you, but I’m afraid I don’t,” confessed Johnny.
Randall turned back to the tree beneath which lay our effects.
274“I believe I’ll just have a cup of coffee with you boys,” said he.
We blew up the fire, scoured the frying pan, made ourselves food. Randall brought a pail of water. We all ate together, without much conversation; then lit our pipes and piled on dry wood to make a brighter friendship fire.
“Now, boys,” said Randall, “I’m going to ask you some questions; and you can answer me or not, just as you please. Only I’ll say, it isn’t just curiosity.”
Johnny, who was studying him covertly from beneath the shadow of his hat, nodded briefly, but said nothing.
“How long have you been in the mines?”
“Since March.”
“Since March!” echoed Randall, as though a little bewildered at this reply. “Yet you never heard─What camp?”
Johnny studied a while.
“Hangman’s Gulch for six weeks,” said he. “Then just prospecting.”
“Where?”
“I don’t believe I’ll answer that question,” replied Johnny slowly.
“But somewhere back in the hills?” persisted Randall.
“Somewhere back in the hills,” agreed Johnny.
“Seems to me─” I broke in, but Johnny silenced me with a gesture. He was watching Randall intently, and thinking hard.
“Then you have been out of it for three months or so. That explains it. Now I don’t mind telling you I came275up here this evening to size you up. I heard about your row with Scar-face Charley, and I wanted to see whether you were just another fighting desperado or an honest man. Well, I’m satisfied. I’m not going to ask you if you have much gold with you, for you wouldn’t tell me; but if you have, keep it with you. If you don’t, you’ll lose it. Keep in the middle of the road, and out of dark places. This is a tough camp; but there are a lot of us good men, too, and my business is to get us all to know each other. Things are getting bad, and we’ve got to get together. That’s why I came up to see you. Are you handy with a gun?” he asked abruptly.
“Fair,” said Johnny.
“You need to be. Let’s see if you are. Stand up. Try to get the draw on me. Now!”
Johnny reached for his pistol, but before his hand was fairly on the butt, Randall had thrust the muzzle of a small revolver beneath his nose. His pale blue eyes had lit with concentration, his bleached eyebrows were drawn together. For an instant the thought flashed across my mind that this was a genuine hold-up; and I am sure Johnny caught the same suspicion, for his figure stiffened. Then Randall dropped his hand.
“Very pretty,” said Johnny coolly. “How did you do that? I didn’t catch your motion.”
“From the sleeve,” said Randall. “It’s difficult, but it’s pretty, as you say; and if you learn to draw from the sleeve, I’ll guarantee you’ll get the draw on your man every time.”
“Show me,” said Johnny simply.
276“That gun of yours is too big; it’s a holster weapon. Here, take this.”
He handed Johnny a beautifully balanced small Colt’s revolver, engraved, silver-plated, with polished rosewood handles. This he showed Johnny how to stow away in the sleeve, how to arrange it, how to grasp it, and the exact motion in snatching it away.
“It takes practice, lots of it, and then more of it,” said Randall. “It’s worse than useless unless you get it just right. If you made a mistake at the wrong time, the other man would get you sure.”
“Where can I get one of these?” asked Johnny.
“Good!” Randall approved his decision. “You see the necessity. You can’t. But a derringer is about as good, and Jones has them for sale. Now as for your holster gun: the whole trick of quick drawing is to throw your right shoulder forward anddragthe gun from the holster with one forward sweep. Don’t lift it up and out. This way!” He snapped his hand past his hip and brought it away armed.
“Pretty,” repeated Johnny.
“Don’t waste much powder and ball shooting at a mark,” advised Randall. “It looks nice to cut out the ace of hearts at ten yards, but it doesn’t mean much. If you can shoot at all, you can shoot straight enough to hit a man at close range. Practise the draw.” He turned to me. “You’d better practise, too. Every man’s got to take care of himself these days. But you’re not due for trouble same as your friend is.”
“I’m obliged to you,” said Johnny.
“You are not. Now it’s up to you. I judged you277didn’t know conditions here, and I thought it only right to warn you. There’s lots of good fellows in this camp; and some of the hard cases are a pretty good sort. Just keep organized, that’s all.”
“Now I wonder who Danny Randall is!” speculated Johnny after our visitor had departed. “He talked as though we ought to know all about it. I’m going to find out the first fellow I get acquainted with.”
Next morning we asked the Moreñas who was Danny Randall.
“El diabolo,” replied Moreña shortly; and trudged obstinately away to his work without vouchsafing further information.
“Which is interesting, but indefinite,” said Johnny.
We found Yank easier in body, and embarked on the sea of patience in which he was to float becalmed until his time was up. In reply to his inquiries as to our plans, we told him we were resting a few days, which was the truth. Then we went up to town and made two purchases; a small tent, and a derringer pistol. They cost us three hundred and fifty dollars. It was the quiet time of day; the miners had gone to work, and most of the gentlemen of leisure were not yet about. Nevertheless a dozen or so sat against the walls, smoking paper cigarettos. They all looked at us curiously; and several nodded at Johnny in a brief, tentative sort of fashion.
The rest of the day, and of several days following, we spent in putting up our tent, ditching it, arranging our cooking affairs, building rough seats, and generally making ourselves comfortable. We stretched these things to cover278as long a space of time as possible, for we secretly dreaded facing the resumption of the old grind, and postponed it as long as we could. A good deal of the time we spent at Yank’s bedside, generally sitting silent and constrained, to the mutual discomfort of all three of us, I am sure. At odd intervals we practised conscientiously and solemnly at the “draw.” We would stand facing each other, the nipples of our revolvers uncapped, and would, at the given word, see who could cover the other first. We took turns at giving the word. At first we were not far apart; but Johnny quickly passed me in skill. I am always somewhat clumsy, but my friend was naturally quick and keen at all games of skill or dexterity. He was the sort of man who could bowl, or play pool, or billiards, or anything else rather better than the average accustomed player the first time he tried. He turned card tricks deftly. At the end of our three days’ loafing he caught me at the end of his pistol so regularly that there ceased to be any contest in it. I never did get the sleeve trick; but then, I never succeeded in fooling the merest infant with any of my attempts at legerdemain. Johnny could flip that little derringer out with a twist of his supple wrist as neatly as a snake darts its forked tongue. For ten minutes at a time he practised it, over and over, as regularly as well-oiled machinery.
“But that proves nothing as to how it would work out in real action,” said Johnny thoughtfully.
The afternoon of the third day, while we were resting from the heat beneath the shade of our tree, we were approached by three men.
“THE BIG MAN WHIRLED TO THE FLOOR”
“THE BIG MAN WHIRLED TO THE FLOOR”
279“Howdy, boys,” said the first. “We hain’t seen you around camp lately, and thought mebbe you’d flew.”
“We are still here,” replied Johnny with smooth politeness. “As you see, we have been fixing our quarters to stay here.”
“Scar-face Charley is here, too,” observed the spokesman, “and he wanted me to tell you that he is going to be at the Bella Union at eight this evenin’, and he wants to know, will he see you? and to come heeled.”
“Thank you, gentlemen,” replied Johnny quietly. “If by accident you should happen to see the desperado in question–who, I assume, can be in no way your friend–I hope you will tell him that I, too, will be at the Bella Union at eight o’clock, and that I will come heeled.”
“You’ll be comin’ alone?” said the man, “or p’rhaps yore friend─”
“My friend, as you call him, is simply a miner, and has nothing to do with this,” interrupted Johnny emphatically.
“I thank you, sir,” said the spokesman, rising.
The other two, who had throughout said no word, followed his example.
“Do you know Danny Randall?” asked Johnny as they moved off.
If he had presented his derringer under their noses, they could not have stopped more suddenly. They stared at each other a moment.
“Is he a friend of yours?” inquired the spokesman after an uncertain moment.
“He likes fair play,” said Johnny enigmatically.
The trio moved off in the direction of town.
280“We don’t know any more about Danny Randall than we did,” observed Johnny, “but I tried a shot in the dark.”
“Nevertheless,” I told him, “I’m going to be there; and you want to make up your mind to just that.”
“You will come, of course,” agreed Johnny. “I suppose I cannot keep you from that. But Jim,” he commanded earnestly, “you must swear to keep out of the row, unless it develops into a general one; and you must swear not to speak to me or make any sign no matter what happens. I must play a lone hand.”
He was firm on this point; and in the end I gave my promise, to his evident relief.
“This is our visitors’ day, evidently,” he observed. “Here come two more men. One of them is the doctor; I’d know that hat two miles.”
“The other is our friend Danny Randall,” said I.
Dr. Rankin greeted us with a cordiality I had not suspected in him. Randall nodded in his usual diffident fashion, and slid into the oak shadow, where he squatted on his heels.
“About this Scar-face Charley,” he said abruptly, “I hear he’s issued his defi, and you’ve taken him up. Do you know anything about this sort of thing?”
“Not a bit,” admitted Johnny frankly. “Is it a duel; and are you gentleman here to act as my seconds?”
“It is not,” stated the downright doctor. “It’s a barroom murder and you cannot get around it; and I, for one, don’t try. But now you’re in for it, and you’ve got to go through with it.”
“I intend to,” said Johnny.
281“It’s not precisely that,” objected Danny Randall, “for, d’ye see, he’s sent you warning.”
“It’s about all the warning you’ll get!” snorted the doctor.
“There’s a sort of rule about it,” persisted Randall. “And that’s what I’m here to tell you. He’ll try to come up on you suddenly, probably from behind; and he’ll say ‘draw and defend yourself,’ and shoot you as soon after that as he can. You want to see him first, that’s all.”
“Thanks,” said Johnny.
“And,” exploded the doctor, “if you don’t kill that fellow, by the Eternal, when you get a chance─”
“You’ll give him a pill, Doctor,” interrupted Randall, with a little chuckle. “But look here,” he said to Johnny, “after all, this sort of a mess isn’t required of you. You say the word and I’ll take on this Scar-face Charley and run him out of town. He’s a good deal of a pest.”
“Thank you,” said Johnny stiffly; “I intend to paddle my own canoe.”
Randall nodded.
“I don’t know as we can help you any more,” said he. “I just thought you ought to be on to the way it’s done.”
“I’m obliged to you,” said Johnny warmly. “The only doubt in my mind was when I was privileged to open.”
“I’d pot him through the window with a shotgun first chance I got,” stated the doctor; “that sort of a ruffian is just like a mad dog.”
“Of course you would, Doctor,” said Randall with just the faintest suspicion of sarcasm in his voice. “Well, I guess we’ll be toddling.”
282But I wanted some information, and I meant to have it.
“Who is this Scar-face Charley,” I asked.
“Got me,” replied Randall; “you fellows seemed to recognize him. Only he’s one of the gang, undoubtedly.”
“The gang?”
“Oh, the general run of hangers-on. Nobody knows how they live, but every one suspects. Some of them work, but not many. There are a heap of disappearances that no one knows anything about; and every once in a while a man is found drowned and floating;floatingmind you!”
“What of that?” I asked; “drowned bodies usually float.”
“There’s no miner in these diggings but has gold enough in his belt to sink him. If a man floats, he’s been robbed, and you can tie to that reasoning. And the fellows are all well mounted, and given to mysterious disappearances.”
“In other words,” broke in the doctor, “they are an organized band of cut-throats and highway robbers making this honest camp a headquarters.”
“Pshaw, Doctor,” said Randall, “that’s by no means certain.”
“It’s certain enough,” insisted the doctor.
“I should think the miners would drive them out,” I said.
“Drive them out!” cried the doctor bitterly; “they’re too busy, and their own toes haven’t been trodden on, and they’re too willing to let well enough alone so as not to be interrupted in their confounded digging for gold.”
“They’re not organized and they are quite justly unwilling to get in a row with that gang when they know they’d be killed,” stated Randall quietly. “They’re getting on ‘well enough,’ and they’ll continue to be run by this lot283of desperadoes until something desperate happens. They want to be let alone.”
The doctor recovered his equanimity with an effort.
“They present the curious spectacle,” said he thoughtfully, “of the individual man in a new untrammelled liberty trying to escape his moral obligations to society. He escapes them for a while, but they are there; and in the end he must pay in violence.”
Randall laughed and arose.
“If the doctor is going to begin that sort of thing, I’m going,” said he.
Our visitors took their departure.
“Oh, Doctor, one moment!” I called; then, as he returned. “Tell me, who and what is Danny Randall?”
“Danny Randall,” said the doctor, a humorous twinkle coming into his eyes, “is a gentleman of fortune.”
“And now we know a lot more than we did before!” said Johnny, as we watched the receding figures.
We ate a very silent supper, washed our dishes methodically, and walked up to town. The Bella Union was the largest of the three gambling houses–a log and canvas structure some forty feet long by perhaps twenty wide. A bar extended across one end, and the gaming tables were arranged down the middle. A dozen oil lamps with reflectors furnished illumination.
All five tables were doing a brisk business; when we paused at the door for a preliminary survey, the bar was lined with drinkers, and groups of twos and threes were slowly sauntering here and there or conversing at the tops of their voices with many guffaws. The air was thick with tobacco smoke. Johnny stepped just inside the door, moved sideways, and so stood with his back to the wall. His keen eyes went from group to group slowly, resting for a moment in turn on each of the five impassive gamblers and their lookouts, on the two barkeepers, and then one by one on the men with whom the place was crowded. Following his, my glance recognized at a corner of the bar Danny Randall with five rough-looking miners. He caught my eye and nodded. No one else appeared to notice us, though I imagined the noise of the place sank and rose again at the first moment of our entrance.
285“Jim,” said Johnny to me quietly, “there’s Danny Randall at the other end of the room. Go join him. I want you to leave me to play my own game.”
I started to object.
“Please do as I say,” insisted Johnny. “I can take care of myself unless there’s a general row. In that case all my friends are better together.”
Without further protest I left him, and edged my way to the little group at the end of the bar. Randall nodded to me as I came up, and motioned to the barkeeper to set me out a glass, but said nothing. Ours was the only lot away from the gaming tables not talking. We sipped our drink and watched Johnny.
After surveying coolly the room, Johnny advanced to the farther of the gambling tables, and began to play. His back was toward the entrance. The game was roulette, and Johnny tossed down his bets methodically, studying with apparent absorption each shift of the wheel. To all appearance he was intent on the game, and nothing else; and he talked and laughed with his neighbours and the dealer as though his spirit were quite carefree.
For ten minutes we watched. Then a huge figure appeared in the blackness of the doorway, slipped through, and instantly to one side, so that his back was to the wall. Scar-face Charley had arrived.
He surveyed the place as we had done, almost instantly caught sight of Johnny, and immediately began to make his way across the room through the crowds of loungers. Johnny was laying a bet, bending over the table, joking with the impassive dealer, his back turned to the door,286totally oblivious of his enemy’s approach. I started forward, instantly realized the hopelessness of either getting quickly through that crowd or of making myself heard, and leaned back, clutching the rail with both hands. Johnny was hesitating, his hand hovering uncertainly above the marked squares of the layout, in doubt exactly where to bet. Scar-face Charley shouldered his way through the loungers and reached the clear space immediately behind his unconscious victim. He stopped for an instant, squared his shoulders, and took one step forward. Johnny dropped his chips on the felt layout, contemplated his choice an instant–and suddenly whirled on his heel in a lightning about-face.
Although momentarily startled by this unexpected evidence that Johnny was not so far off guard as he had seemed, the desperado’s hand dropped swiftly to the butt of his pistol. At the same instant Johnny’s arm snapped forward in the familiar motion of drawing from the sleeve. The motion started clean and smooth, but half through, caught, dragged, halted. I gasped aloud, but had time for no more than that; Scar-face Charley’s revolver was already on the leap. Then at last Johnny’s derringer appeared, apparently as the result of a desperate effort. Almost with the motion, it barked, and the big man whirled to the floor, his pistol, already at half raise, clattering away. The whole episode from the beginning occupied the space of two eye-winks. Probably no one but myself and Danny Randall could have caught the slight hitch in Johnny’s draw; and indeed I doubt if anybody saw whence he had snatched the derringer.
287A complete silence fell. It could have lasted only an instant; but Johnny seized that instant.
“Has this man any friends here?” he asked clearly.
His head was back, and his snapping black eyes seemed to see everywhere at once.
No one answered or stirred. Johnny held them for perhaps ten seconds, then deliberately turned back to the table.
“That’s my bet on theeven,” said he. “Let her roll!”
The gambler lifted his face, white in the brilliant illumination directly over his head, and I thought to catch a flicker of something like admiration in his passionless eyes. Then with his left hand he spun the wheel.
The soft, dull whir and tiny clicking of the ball as it rebounded from the metal grooves struck across the tense stillness. As though this was the releasing signal, a roar of activity burst forth. Men all talked at once. The other tables and the bar were deserted, and everybody crowded down toward the lower end of the room. Danny Randall and his friends rushed determinedly to the centre of disturbance. Some men were carrying out Scar-face Charley. Others were talking excitedly. A little clear space surrounded the roulette table, at which, as may be imagined, Johnny was now the only player. Quite methodically he laid three more bets.
“I think that’s enough for now,” he told the dealer pleasantly, and turned away.
“Hullo! Randall! hullo! Frank!” he greeted us. “I’ve just won three bets straight. Let’s have a drink. Bring your friends,” he told Randall.
288We turned toward the bar and way was instantly made for us. Johnny poured himself a big drink of whiskey. A number of curious men, mere boys most of them, had crowded close after us, and were standing staring at Johnny with a curiosity they made slight attempt to conceal. Johnny suddenly turned to them, holding high his whiskey in a hand as steady as a rock.
“Here’s to crime, boys!” he said, and drank it down at a gulp. Then he stood staring them uncomprisingly in the face, until they had slunk away. He called for and drank another whiskey, then abruptly moved toward the door.
“I think I’ll go turn in,” said he.
At the door he stopped.
“Good-night,” he said to Randall and his friends, who had followed us. “No, I am obliged to you,” he replied to a suggestion, “but I need no escort,” and he said it so firmly that all but Randall went back.
“I’m going to your camp with you, whether you need an escort or not,” said the latter.
Without a word Johnny walked away down the street, very straight. We hurried to catch up with him; and just as we did so he collapsed to the ground and was suddenly and violently sick. As I helped him to his feet, I could feel that his arm was trembling violently.
“Lord, fellows! I’m ashamed,” he gasped a little hysterically. “I didn’t know I had so little nerve!”
“Nerve!” suddenly roared Danny Randall; “confound your confounded impudence! If I ever hear you say another word like that, I’ll put a head on you, if it’s the289last act of my life! You’re the gamest little chicken in this roost, and I’ll make you beg like a hound if you say you aren’t!”
Johnny laughed a little uncertainly over this contradiction.
“Did I kill him?” he asked.
“No, worse luck; just bored him through the collarbone. That heavy little derringer ball knocked him out.”
“I’m glad of that,” said Johnny.
“Which I amnot,” stated Danny Randall with emphasis. “You ought to have killed him.”
“Thanks to you I wasn’t killed myself. I couldn’t have hoped to get the draw on him with my holster gun. He is as quick as a snake.”
“I thought you were going to bungle it,” said Randall. “What was the matter?”
“Front sight caught at the edge of my sleeve. I had to tear it loose by main strength. I’m going to file it off. What’s the use of a front sight at close range?”
I heaved a deep sigh.
“Well, I don’t want ever to be so scared again,” I confessed. “Will you tell me, by all that’s holy,whyyou turned your back on the door?”
“Well,” said Johnny seriously, “I wanted to get him close to me. If I had shown him that I’d seen him when he first came in the door, he’d have opened fire at once. And I’m a rotten shot. But I figured that if he thought I didn’t see him, he’d come across the room to me.”
“But he nearly got you by surprise.”
“Oh, no,” said Johnny; “I saw him all the time. I290got his reflection from the glass over that picture of the beautiful lady sitting on the Old Crow Whiskey barrel. That’s why I picked out that table.”
“My son,” cried Danny Randall delightedly, “you’re a true sport. You’ve got a head, you have!”
“Well,” said Johnny, “I figured I’d have to dosomething; I’m such a rotten shot.”
We slept late the following morning, and awoke tired, as though we had been on a long journey.
“Now,” said Johnny, when our after-breakfast pipes had been lit, “we’ve got to get together. There’s two serious questions before the house: the first and most important is, who and what is Danny Randall?”
“I agree with you there,” said I heartily.
“And the second is, what are we going to do with ourselves?”
“I’m going to begin mining,” I stated.
“All right, old strong-arm; I am not. I’m dead sick of cricking my back and blistering my hands. It isn’t my kind of work; and the only reason I ever thought it was is because the stuff we dig is called gold.”
“You aren’t going to lie down?” I cried incredulously.
“No, old sport, I’m not going to lie down. I came out here to make my fortune; but I don’t know that I’ve got to dig gold to do that.”
“What are you going to do?”
“That I don’t know,” confessed Johnny, “but I’ll be able to inform you in a few days. I suppose you’ll be going back to the Porcupine?”
“I don’t know about that,” said I seriously. “I don’t292believe the Porcupine is any richer than these diggings, and it’s mighty uncertain. I believe a man’s more apt to keep what he gets here, and there’s a lot more company, and─”
“In other words, you’re going to stick around old Yank or know the reason why!” interrupted Johnny with a little smile.
I flushed, hesitated, then blurted out: “Well, yes. I shouldn’t be easy about him here by himself. It strikes me this is a tough camp, and almost anything’s likely to happen.”
“I feel the same way,” confessed Johnny. “We’re all partners. All right; ‘stick’ it is. We’ll have to be mighty plausible to keep Yank quiet. That’s agreed,” he grinned. “Now I’m going up to town to find out about Danny Randall, and incidentally to look around for something to do. You’re a good steady liar; you go over and talk to Yank.”
We separated until noon. I had no great difficulty with Yank, either because I was, as Johnny said, a plausible liar, or because Yank was secretly glad to have us near. After visiting with him a while I took the axe and set about the construction of a cradle. Johnny returned near twelve o’clock to find me at this useful occupation.
“As to Danny Randall,” he began at once, squatting near by: “Origin lost in mists of obscurity. First known in this country as guide to a party of overland immigrants before the gold discovery. One of the original Bear Flag revolutionists. Member of Fremont’s raiders in the293south. Showed up again at Sonoma and headed a dozen forays after the horse-thieving Indians and half-breeds in the San Joaquin. Seems now to follow the mines. Guaranteed the best shot with rifle or pistol in the state. Guaranteed the best courage and the quietest manners in the state. Very eminent and square in his profession. That’s his entire history.”
“What is his profession?” I asked.
“He runs the Bella Union.”
“A gambler?” I cried, astonished.
“Just so–a square gambler.”
I digested this in silence for a moment.
“Did you discover anything for yourself?” I asked at last.
“Best job ever invented,” said Johnny triumphantly, “at three ounces a day; and I can’t beat that at your beastly digging.”
“Yes?” I urged.
“I invented it myself, too,” went on Johnny proudly. “You remember what Randall–or the doctor–said about the robberies, and the bodies of the drowned men floating? Well, every man carries his dust around in a belt because he dare not do anything else with it. I do myself, and so do you; and you’ll agree that it weighs like the mischief. So I went to Randall and I suggested that we start an express service to get the stuff out to bank with some good firm in San Francisco. He fell in with the idea in a minute. My first notion was that we take it right through to San Francisco ourselves; but he says he can make satisfactory arrangements to send it in from Sacramento. That’s about sixty miles; and we’ll call it294a day’s hard ride through this country, with a change of horses. So now I’m what you might call an express messenger–at three good ounces a day.”
“But you’ll be killed and robbed!” I cried.
Johnny’s eyes were dancing.
“Think of the fun!” said he.
“You’re a rotten shot,” I reminded him.
“I’m to practise, under Danny Randall, from now until the first trip.”
“When is that?”
“Do you think we’ll advertise the date? Of course I’d tell you, Jim; but honestly I don’t know yet.”
Since the matter seemed settled, and Johnny delighted, I said no more. My cradle occupied me for three days longer. In that length of time Johnny banged away an immense quantity of ammunition, much of it under the personal supervision of Danny Randall. The latter had his own ideas as to the proper practice. He utterly refused to let Johnny shoot at a small mark or linger on his aim.
“It’s only fairly accurate work you want, but quick,” said he. “If you practise always getting hold of your revolver the same way, and squeeze the trigger instead of jerking it, you’ll do. If you run against robbers it isn’t going to be any target match.”
When my cradle was finished, I went prospecting with a pan; and since this was that golden year 1849, and the diggings were neither crowded nor worked out, I soon found ‘colour.’ There I dragged my cradle, and set quite happily to work. Since I performed all my own labour, the process seemed slow to me after the quick results of trained cooperation;295yet my cleanings at night averaged more than my share used to be under the partnership. So I fell into settled work, well content. A week later Johnny rode up on a spirited and beautiful horse, proud as could be over his mount.
He confided to me that it was one of the express horses; that the first trip would be very soon; and that if I desired to send out my own savings, I could do so. I was glad to do this, even though the rates were high; and we easily persuaded Yank of the advisability. Nobody anticipated any danger from this first trip, for the simple reason that few knew anything about it. Randall and his friends made up the amount that could be carried by the three men. For the first time I learned that Johnny had companions. They started from our own tent, a little after sundown. Indeed, they ate their supper with us, while their beautiful horses, head high, stared out into the growing darkness. One of the express riders was a slight, dark youth whom I had never seen before. In the other I was surprised to recognize Old Hickory Pine. He told me his people had “squatted” not far from Sacramento, but that he had come up into the hills on summons by Danny Randall. The fact impressed me anew as to Randall’s wide knowledge, for the Pines had not been long in the country.
The trip went through without incident. Johnny returned four days later aglow with the joy of that adventurous ride through the dark. Robbers aside, I acknowledge I should not have liked that job. I am no horseman, and I confess that at full speed I am always uneasy as to how a four-hoofed animal is going successfully to plant all296four of them. And these three boys, for they were nothing else, had to gallop the thirty miles of the road to Sacramento that lay in the mountains before dawn caught them in the defiles.
Johnny seemed to glory in it, however. Danny Randall had arranged for a change of horses; and the three express riders liked to dash up at full speed to the relay station, fling themselves and their treasure bags from one beast to the other, and be off again with the least possible expenditure of time. The incoming animal had hardly come to a stand before the fresh animal was off. There could have been no real occasion for quite so much haste; but they liked to do it. The trips were made at irregular intervals; and the riders left camp at odd times. Indeed, no hour of the twenty-four was unlikely to be that of their start. Each boy carried fifty pounds of gold dust distributed in four pouches. This was a heavy weight, but it was compensated for to some extent by the fact that they rode very light saddles. Thus every trip the enormous sum of thirty-five thousand dollars went out in charge of the three.
The first half dozen journeys were more or less secret, so that the express service did not become known to the general public. Then the news inevitably leaked out. Danny Randall thereupon openly received shipments and gave receipts at the Bella Union. It seemed to me only a matter of time before the express messengers should be waylaid, for the treasure they carried was worth any one’s while. I spoke to Randall about it one day.
“If Amijo or Murietta or Dick Temple were in this297part of the country, I’d agree with you,” said he seriously, “but they are not, and there’s nobody in this lot of cheap desperadoes around here that has the nerve. Those three boys have a big reputation as fighters; their horses are good; they constantly vary their route and their times of starting; and Johnny in especial has a foxy head on him.”
“The weak point is the place they change horses,” said I.
Randall looked at me quickly, as though surprised.
“Why, that’s true,” said he; “not a doubt of it. But I’ve got five armed men there to look after just that. And another thing you must remember: they know that Danny Randall is running this show.”
Certainly, thought I, Danny at least appreciates himself; and yet, after all, I do not think he in any way exaggerated the terror his name inspired.