A bomb exploding in the smoking remnants could hardly have caused more consternation among the man hunters than the Snipe's naming of Abe Hawk. But however Doubleday's jaw set at the unwelcome surprise he was not the one to swerve in the face of any personal danger, and those with him were not men to bolt whatever adventure they embarked in. However, it was remarked by the Snipe that those least acquainted with Abe were least disturbed by the news of his almost certain presence in the cabin the day and night before and his escape after the fight.
Common prudence made it necessary to cross the small divide with care and to get word of the unpleasant discovery as soon as possible to Van Horn in order that he and his companions might not be picked off by the wounded man from ambush. The Snipe was assigned to Hawk's trail and two men were sent to the wings to scout for him among the rocks. Bradley rode to warn Van Horn; but the old man did not sweat his horse in the effort.
The trackers soon made it plain to those behind that the escaping man had ridden a pretty straight course himself, and had picked his way in the night like one thoroughly at home in the hills of the Turkey. And though losing the trail at times, the Snipe had no serious trouble in picking it again from the grass or the rocks.
The country lying north of the forks of the Turkey is rougher than to the south and pretty well covered with pine. On the Northern slope, Hawk's trail led down a long and winding break mile after mile and in the end pointed straight for his shack on the creek.
Moving as nearly as possible in the order in which they had started, the party emerged from the hills half a mile from the creek, and not much farther from Hawk's, when they encountered Bradley and Van Horn with one of his men. Doubleday hoarsely asked for the news.
Van Horn rode up close before he answered, and, though his tone was confident, his manner showed his annoyance at the way things had turned: "Robinson's shack was empty," he said. "Whether he got wind of yesterday I don't know; anyway, he's skipped—there's nothing left on his place."
"What's there to this talk of Barney's about Abe Hawk?" demanded Doubleday.
"From what Bradley says, it looks as if he might be right," said Van Horn. "The horse Hawk took is eating grass in front of his cabin; we saw him when we got here and waited for Hawk to show himself."
"He didn't do it," interrupted Doubleday huskily and baring his teeth as he spoke.
"Stone's watching the place."
"Is Abe there?" demanded Doubleday.
"You tell," responded Van Horn. "He may or may not be. That horse may be a stall. We've got to close in somehow on the shack and find out."
A cowboy clattered up from the creek and pulled his horse to its haunches between Doubleday and Van Horn: "He's just closed the door," declared the cowboy. "The door was open when we got here—wasn't it, Harry?" He pointed his finger at Van Horn in his excited appeal.
Van Horn scowled and waved his head from side to side in irritation: "The door was open, yes; the door is shut, yes." Then he swore at the alarmist: "You blamed monkey," he pointed to the cottonwood. "Don't you see how the wind is blowing? That door has been swinging half an hour. The shack is empty."
But nobody could be found with confidence enough in Van Horn's belief to close in and demonstrate its truth. After a litany of hard words in which everybody took more or less part, Van Horn declared he would demonstrate. Whatever his faults, he was dead game, a formidable antagonist in an encounter. He was risking his life on his belief that either Hawk was disabled, or the cabin was empty. Stripping himself to shirt and trousers, turning his effects over to a cowboy, bare-headed and with only a six-shooter in hand, he shook out his long, brown hair, hooked up his belt and started to crawl up a little wash breaking into the creek not far from the cabin.
There was no point from which he could be seen and his companions, secreted where they could watch, bent their eyes along the course of the wash up which their hidden leader was making his way.
Fortunately for the slippery undertaking, Van Horn, by a little digging as he made his way carefully ahead, was able to crawl to within fifty feet of the door without exposing himself to fire. Reaching the nearest spot he could attain with safety, he called in stentorian tones to the cabin:
"You're surrounded, Abe. You can't get away. If you want to surrender, I'll guarantee your life. Come out unarmed and I'll meet you unarmed. If not, it's what Gorman and Dutch Henry got, for you, Abe."
The cabin gave no answer back. But Van Horn would not be baffled. Knowing it would be suicide to venture closer he patiently sought his answer on the ground he now began to cover on his way back to the creek. And on the ground he found it.
"He's slipped us," Van Horn called out when Doubleday arrived, "but I've got his trail."
"Two hundred and fifty dollars to the man that gets him!" shouted Doubleday, huskily. Some of the boys gave a whoop and began to look around, but they did not scatter much.
Van Horn, losing no time, led Doubleday part way up the break along which he had crawled. Telltale traces of blood at irregular intervals, sometimes imprinted as if by a hand on the flat face of rock that bedded the wash; sometimes smeared on a starving bunch of grass, where it clung desperately to a crevice in the scant soil—all so slight and so well concealed that only the mere chance of Van Horn's crawling up the very break chosen by Hawk for his escape to the creek had revealed it to his pursuers. The tracker took the slender trail, followed the wounded rustler to the creek bottom and thence down the creek to its junction with the North Fork. There they lost the trail in a pool of water, nor could they pick it up again.
A mile below the fork of the Turkey stood Jim Laramie's cabin. The raiders had already entered on his land; his cattle and some of his horses were, in fact, grazing in and about the creek fork. The following of Hawk's trail had been a nerve-racking job. Hawk, his enemies knew, might be waiting at any turn in it and that meant, in all probability, death for someone. In consequence, the pioneering fell chiefly on Van Horn; even Stone showed little stomach for the job. But the trail was completely lost.
"There's a bunch of horses grazing at the fork," reported Van Horn, as Doubleday reached the front, "Laramie's, I guess—anyway, the trail's gone."
A council was held. Doubleday, long-headed and crafty, listened to all that was said. Van Horn finally asked for his opinion.
"I don't know no more than the rest of you; but a blind man can figure a few things out. He's hit, ain't he?" Barb put the question as one not to be gainsaid and found none to say him nay. "He's looking for help, that's more'n likely, ain't it? He's a mile from Jim Laramie's cabin, not more; he's three miles from anybody else's—what?" he exclaimed, as Bill Bradley interrupted to suggest that it was less than two miles over to Ben Simeral's. "All right," shouted Barb, "Hawk's here, ain't he? He's close to Laramie. Laramie's his friend. Where would he go—what?"
Chopping his ideas out as with an ax, Doubleday showed his companions what they should have thought of without being told. "The thing to do," he added, "is to go down to Laramie's cabin and see what we can see—and find out what we can find out."
It was precisely what Bradley had feared would happen, but there was no escape from Doubleday's logic and no help for what others as well as Bradley feared might follow.
On the morning the raiders entered the Falling Wall, Laramie had started with Henry Sawdy for the Reservation to appraise some allotted Indian lands. Laramie rode home that night; Sawdy, promising to stop at the ranch on his way down in the morning, stayed overnight at the Fort with Colonel Pearson. Laramie got home late. He was asleep next morning when a door was pushed open and a man walked unceremoniously in on him. To what instinct some mountain men owe their composure when disturbed in their sleep by a friend, as contrasted with the instant defense they offer in like circumstances to an enemy, it would be difficult to say—certainly there is a difference.
Laramie half opened his eyes to realize that Abe Hawk had come into his room and seated himself on the one chair. The sleepy man was not inclined to wake up. "You're early, Abe," was his only greeting. Hawk made no answer.
After a further effort the drowsy man roused himself to the attention that seemed demanded in the case: "Going somewhere?" he mumbled perfunctorily.
"Yes." Hawk's hard tone might have surprised his host for a moment; but if it did, drowsiness overpowered his senses once more and it was some time before he realized that his visitor was sitting silent at his side and that he himself ought to say something. In protest he shifted his comfortable position in bed: "Get your breakfast ready, Abe," he suggested, hospitably, but with his heavy eyes closed.
"I've had breakfast."
"Where you bound for today?"
"On a long trip."
"Which way?"
"Home."
"What do you mean, 'home'?"
"I mean hell, Larrie—the home long waiting for me."
Laramie's eyes batted slowly. Not a half a dozen times in all their long acquaintance had Hawk shortened Laramie's name in speaking to him; and then only when he spoke as he rarely did from a depth always hidden from the men among whom his wasted life had been spent. Roused by something in the utterance of his guest, Laramie looked up.
If the sight was a shock, the mountain man gave no outward sign of it. The lower right side of Hawk's face had been torn away as if by some explosion, and blood, darkened by clay and rude styptics, clotted the long beard that naturally fell in a glossy black. His disordered garments, blood-smeared and hanging loose—his coat sleeve and his shirt torn from his forearm for bandages, his soft hat jammed low over his eyes—for an instant, Laramie hardly recognized him. But the cold black eyes that looked out of the wreck of a man before him pierced so clearly the long shadows of the early light that Laramie had no choice but to realize it was Hawk and even the shock only served to restrain and steady him. He showed but little of his amazement when he sat up and spoke quietly: "What's up, Abe?"
"Night before last I was playing cards with Gorman over at Henry's. After daylight Gorman went out for a bucket of water. We heard a rifle crack. I looked out the window. Stormy was tumbling.
"You know the draw that runs down past his corral? Barb Doubleday, Pettigrew, Van Horn, Stone and a bunch of cowboys and Texas men lay in that draw. It was hell to pay from daylight till dark. The Dutchman got laid out cold right at the start. They tried to rush me. I stopped three of 'em and dug myself in. We went at it hammer and tongs. In the afternoon they put a hole through my whiskers. After awhile they clipped my shoulder. Then I got a bullet through my arm." He held up his left forearm swathed in a mass of soiled and blood-soaked bandages. And he told of Van Horn's go-devil.
"The raid's on," muttered Laramie.
"Soon as it was dark, I began to dig under the sill," Hawk went on. "They began lighting fires. I knew they couldn't keep those going a great while. About ten o'clock I crawled out under the front sill and got to the creek; I never was so gone for water in my life. I set a candle so it would fire the shack when it burned down and sneaked a horse from their bunch and got over to my place." He looked at his arm. "I tried to keep things bound up. Maybe I left a little red behind me. If I did, they'll be after me."
His story haltingly told; his utterance through his torn cheek thick and painful but savagely uncompromising; carrying a physical burden of wounds that would have overwhelmed a lesser man but with a deadly hate showing in his manner, Hawk, from sheer weakness, paused: "I went to my cabin to look for more cartridges," he added slowly, "and not a one was there left on the place." He hesitated again. "I didn't want to come here——"
Laramie sprang to his feet: "Where the hell else would you go?"
Hawk heard unmoved the rough assurance; perhaps his eyes flashed, for Laramie's voice rang strong and true. He already had his hand on Hawk's chair: "Come over here to the light," he said, "till we get some of this dirt off you. You need a bath, Abe. For a clean man you look like——"
Hawk put up his right hand: "I'll do for all the job that's left ahead of me."
"What job's left ahead of you?"
"You've got a rifle like mine, Jim; the Marlin you don't use."
"Well?"
"I come to see if you'd lend it to me again."
"Why not?"
"Got any shells for it?" snapped Hawk.
"I guess so."
"I left the horse at the cabin to stand 'em off awhile. They'll lose a little time there. They'll come down the creek—can't come any other way. I'm going to wait for 'em in the timber."
"What for?"
"I'll finish with Doubleday and Van Horn, anyhow. Maybe I can with Stone."
"And they'll finish with you."
"After I get them three the rest are welcome to what's left of me. I've got to be moving."
"Hold on a minute, Abe." Laramie sat down on the side of his cot, his knees spread apart, his elbows resting on them, and his hands clasped as he leaned forward, head down, to think.
"Them fellows are riding every minute," Hawk reminded him grimly.
"Let's talk this thing over," persisted Laramie.
"I'll pay you for your rifle right now," mumbled Hawk, feeling with his right hand in his trousers pocket for some gold pieces.
"Don't talk monkey stuff, Abe."
"Then don't make a monkey out ofme," snapped Hawk. "Give me your rifle and let me go!"
"After we've talked it over."
Hawk pulled himself up out of the chair. "You blamed fool," he said brokenly. "Don't you know that bunch will track me to your door and smash us with lead or burn us up in this shack if they get here first? Give me the rifle," he thundered, "or I'll go into the timber with this six-shooter. What do you mean? Are you going to turn yellow on me because I'm a thief?"
Laramie moved neither hand nor foot: "You're an older man than I am, Abe," he replied, without even looking up. "I can take words from you, I'd hate to take from anybody else—you know that; and you know why. You won't talk; all right. Now I'll tell you where you get off; you're not going down to the timber—not a blamed step," he added deliberately. "Finger your six-shooter as much as you like." Laramie waved his hand with his words. "Use it on me if you like. But, by ——, Abe——" As his voice changed, he jumped to his feet, adding like lightning, "you're not going to use it on yourself!"
He sprang for Hawk, reaching with his left hand for the gun. In tigerish ferocity the two men came together. Sleepy Cat worthies had sometimes speculated on what might happen if the two men most known and most feared in the Falling Wall country, Hawk and Laramie, should ever quarrel. They met now; but in a quarrel the wildest gossip had not fancied. Reeling, feet slipping, knees and hands locking, eyes staring, no word spoken and breathing hard, the two struggled in the middle of the cooped-up room—Hawk striving to free and kill himself; Laramie determined to wrest the gun from his grasp.
It was an unequal contest. Weakened by loss of blood, Hawk was not long a match for the only man on the range who under other conditions could have stood up before him. Gradually, with the gun in his right hand, Hawk was bent backward, with Laramie's left hand slipping along the barrel closer and closer to the grip. Prolonged by the fear of further injuring the wounded man, the tempestuous effort for mastery ended when Hawk was forced to the bed and Laramie's iron fingers, closing on the gun, wrenched it from him.
Hawk was done out and Laramie without more resistance straightened him out on the bed.
"You're worse hit than you think," panted the conqueror. "I've got a scheme better than yours, if there's time to put it through. Wait till I get a couple of horses."
The clatter of a horse outside cut into his last words. Laramie instantly slipped Hawk's revolver back into his hand, picked up his own gun and holster, strapping it to his waist as he ran, crossed the room, tore up a board in the floor, snatched a pair of rifles from their cache and hastening back to Hawk, his eyes glued all the while to the door, pushed one rifle into Hawk's hand and swung the other to his hip.
Not a word had been spoken. But preparations for a reception had been made complete and eventualities thoroughly considered. Heavy footfalls outside announced the approach of a man. The next moment the door was flung open and the intruder heard Laramie's voice in savage emphasis:
"Pitch up!"
The intruder did not, however, pitch up. It was John Lefever. He stood amazed. "For the love of God," he exclaimed, "what's broke loose?"
"Come in, John," cried Laramie, seizing his arm. "I want your horse a minute. Stay here till I get back—come, Abe, lively!"
"Where you going?" demanded Lefever, staring as he tried to collect his wits.
Laramie hurried Hawk past him: "That'll depend on the shooting, John," was all Laramie hastily said. "Doubleday and Van Horn have got a bunch of Texas men raiding the Falling Wall."
Lefever, gazing stunned at Hawk, talked as if he saw nothing. "I know all about that," he cried. "Man alive, that's what I'm here for. Hold on, can't you?"
"Not now. Stick around till I get back."
Lefever caught his breath in time to fire one more question:
"What about Abe?"
"He's not coming back. Scout around down along the creek, John, so you can see those fellows when they ride in. Hold 'em as long as you can and for God's sake keep 'em out of this cabin—there's blood on everything."
Laramie knew Lefever to be quite equal to the highly particular job he had assigned to him and that John would give his best to it. Hardly thirty minutes later, the raiders rode out of the timber along the creek. Van Horn stopped his pack for a word of warning:
"Look to your guns," he said harshly. "You can guess most o' you what you'll be up against, if there's trouble at this joint." Leaving the creek, the party rode out on a rarely used trail that, Stone told them, led to Laramie's cabin. They followed this for some distance, keeping two men ahead as they had done in the early morning. These two men, reaching the bench, which at that point had been cut sharply away by a flood, halted. The main party riding up the hill debouched on level ground at the crest and joined their scouts. Half a mile to their right stood Laramie's cabin. The bench land lying in front of it was as smooth as a table and covered with mountain blue stem. Out of the level ground, a hundred yards from the edge of the bench where Doubleday's party had halted, rose a huge and solitary fragment of rock.
Beside this rock stood a large man facing the intruders; slung over his left forearm he carried a rifle and his right hand he held well out toward them with its open palm raised in the air. The raiders understood the signal; it warned them to advance no farther.
"What's that fat buck doing up in this country?" asked Van Horn, angrily.
"Who is it?" demanded Doubleday.
"John Lefever," returned Van Horn, greatly nettled. "What are you doing here?" he bellowed at the unwelcome sentinel.
John pointed a stubby forefinger at Van Horn and returned a perfectly intelligible retort: "That's not the first question, Harry; that's the second question," he yelled. "What are you doing here?"
This was not in all respects a question easy to answer. But Van Horn was resourceful: "We're on our way down the creek, John. Rode up from the bottom to see Jim Laramie a minute."
"Just a friendly call," assented John. "Well, how about sidearms," he shouted, "and how many of you are there?"
Van Horn looked around him: "Why, maybe a dozen, I reckon, John. You know most everybody here."
"How many of you are there want to see Jim a minute, Harry?" asked Lefever, calm but conveniently close to the rock and quite conscious of the delicacy of his position should shooting begin.
There was some exchange of talk before the question was answered: "Look here, Lefever," roared Doubleday huskily; "what the hell's all this fuss about?"
"Why, it's like this, Barb," returned Lefever, nothing abashed. "When I seen you crossing down there at the forks I thought maybe you'd lost your Bibles in the creek. That's the way you acted. But when I seen you and Harry Van Horn and Tom Stone loading your rifles in the timber, I reckoned you must be comin' up to ask Jim to run for sheriff on the cattle ticket."
Sarcasm could hardly convey more defiance and contempt. The riders realized they had been watched and that deception was useless; Van Horn was furiously angry. "Look here, Lefever," he called out, short and sharp.
"I'm looking right there, Harry," yelled Lefever irreverently. "With a bunch of mugs like that on the horizon I sure wouldn't dare look anywhere else!"
"These boys won't stand any more fooling," roared Doubleday.
"I wouldn't either, Barb, if you'd got me into this scrape as deep as you've got them," was the retort.
Nothing less than violent outbursts of profanity served now. And these proceeding to a climax of strength and rapidity, gradually subsided as such outbursts do and the two sides started to argue all over again.
After much parley and protestations of peaceful intent, provided they were treated fair, Doubleday and Van Horn were allowed to ride up to the rock, but not to dismount. "Now," suggested Lefever to the two, "talk just plain business."
"Right you have it, John," returned Van Horn briskly. "The rustlers have got to go. We're looking for Abe Hawk. Gorman and Dutch Henry are lifting cattle now in the Happy Hunting Grounds. We're going to clean out the rest of 'em. We've tracked Abe here. Without any hard words, we want him."
"Then, boys, you want to ride right on; keep on riding, for he's not here. I don't know anything, but that much I do know," asserted the big fellow positively.
"How do you know?" demanded Doubleday grimly.
"I just walked down here from the cabin; there's no one there. I rode in here this morning from the Reservation, Barb. A buck looking for horses over on the North Fork yesterday saw the fight at Gorman's—everybody knows about it."
Van Horn showed his teeth: "You're a pretty good artist, John, with your buck looking for horses."
Lefever deprecated the compliment: "You must remember, Harry, I worked seven year for you. Seven year—and then didn't get all was coming to me."
"If you had," returned Van Horn candidly, "your headstone would be covered with moss by this time, John. Where's Laramie?"
Lefever stood with his left hand eagerly extended and appeared as if sensitive at Van Horn's incredulity:
"All the same, Harry," he exclaimed, "I can take you to that buck inside two hours' ride and get his story. I've got five twenty-dollar gold pieces in my pocket that says so. I'll put 'em up in Barb Doubleday's hands right now against your five."
"A man couldn't pry you loose from five twenty-dollar gold pieces if you had five thousand in your pocket, John. What are you stalling around for?" demanded Van Horn suspiciously. "Where's Laramie?"
Lefever was frankness itself; almost over-frank in his genuine simplicity. Had it not been for his big, blunt eyes and round, smooth face he might have been suspected of duplicity—but not by the two men now talking to him; they knew beyond a doubt that John was "stringing" them. Unfortunately they could not prevent it. He answered Van Horn's sharp question as innocently as a child.
"That's more than I can say this minute, Harry, where Jim Laramie is; but he's not far, I can tell you that, for the coffee pot was on the stove when I got to the shack a while ago."
"Then what are you holding us up here for?" barked Doubleday with rough words.
"I'm a peace officer, Barb, a deputy marshal." The bursting expression of disgust on his questioners' faces did not ruffle John's candor. "I know what you fellows are up to. I won't have any bloodshed here this morning—that's flat. Laramie gets hot sometimes and this is one of the times for folks to go slow. If you want to talk to Laramie come along up to the shack. But send them longhorns over there down to the creek," he added, as an afterthought and in the bluntly candid tone of appeal that distinguished his persuasiveness.
"Long hell!" spluttered Doubleday.
"Longhorns," persisted Lefever.
Barb growled at the proposal to send the boys down to the creek, and Van Horn objected, but there was no escape from Lefever's stubbornness, except a fight and this was not wanted. Lefever passed his word that Hawk was not in the cabin, but he was adamant on sending the men to the bottoms and his demand was grudgingly acceded to. In point of fact, John reckoned himself on foot with a rifle equal to two men on horseback, even if Van Horn were one. But not being able to take care of a dozen horsemen he was resolved to have no volleying applause from other guns, if the unexpected should happen on the open bench land.
After Doubleday and Van Horn's following had at length filed down to the creek bottom, Lefever walked beside the two horsemen toward the cabin, and, since he would not walk fast and the two refused to ride ahead of him, the pace was deliberate all the way. Nor could Lefever be persuaded even to walk between the two horsemen; he kept them both religiously on his left, his rifle lying carelessly across his forearm as he entertained them with a moderately timed and unfailing flow of Reservation small talk.
But he could not control Van Horn's quick, flashing eyes, and these were busy every moment and every foot of the way with reconnaissance and inference. It did not escape either him or Doubleday that a bunch of horses had been but lately driven over the ground they were crossing, and every trail leading to and from the cabin obliterated; this, however, only assured both that their man was close at hand and strengthened their determination to get him in their own way when they were ready. So intent were they on reading the ground as well as on keeping a sharp eye on the cabin itself, that they had almost reached it before Van Horn, halting, fixed his eyes on the hills to the left—that is, down the creek—and exclaimed sharply: "Who's that?"
Riding in a leisurely fashion down and out of the rough country to the South, a mile away, a man emerging from a rift between two hills could be seen following one of the cattle trails toward the creek.
Lefever, after a minute's study, answered the question blandly: "I'm thinkin' that's Jim Laramie, right now."
He waved his hat at the distant horseman, who, also rode with a rifle slung across his pommel and carried his lines high in his right hand. The horseman continued for some moments toward the creek, then looking, seemingly by accident, toward the house he saw the signaling, stopped his pony, paused, and reigning him around, headed at an easy pace for the group before the cabin. It was, as Lefever had said, Laramie.
A few minutes later he trotted his horse across the field and slowed him up in front of Van Horn and Doubleday. His greeting to his visitors was dry; their own was somewhat strained, but Lefever at once took the initiative: "Jim," he said, identifying himself in his bluntly honest way with the interests of the raiders, "we're looking for Abe Hawk."
Laramie's response was merely to the point: "He's not here."
"Has he been here?" demanded Van Horn.
"Yes," answered Laramie. Lefever at intervals looked virtuously from questioner to questioned.
"How long ago, Jim?" continued Van Horn.
Laramie regarded him steadily: "Several times in the last few weeks."
"Was he here yesterday?" asked Van Horn suddenly.
"I was on the Reservation yesterday."
"Has he been here this morning?"
"Yes."
If Lefever jumped inwardly at this most unexpected admission he suppressed all outward sign of surprise; his wide open eyes did not blink and his close-cut mustache preserved its honesty undefiled. But he wondered what might be coming.
"How long ago?" continued Van Horn.
"Early. What's all this questioning about?" Laramie demanded in turn, looking from Van Horn to Doubleday and to Lefever. "Who wants Hawk?"
"Jim, we're cleaning up the rustlers," said Van Horn. "Things have got so bad it had to be done. We want Hawk. We've got Gorman and Henry. Now, if it's a fair question, is Abe here?"
"He's not."
"Not in your shack?"
"No."
"Are you willing we should search it?"
"Search hell! What do you mean?" asked Laramie curtly. "Isn't my word good as to who's in my shack?"
"Jim!" Lefever held up a peacemaker's hand. "We thought maybe he might have come in since you rode away."
"Well——" Laramie cooled somewhat, "if it'll do you any good, I'll look inside and see."
Van Horn sarcastically demurred: "Don't take the trouble, don't take the trouble, Jim."
"Still he might be there," urged Lefever, "in the way I say—he might've walked in since you went into the hills—what? No objection to my looking in there, is there, Jim?"
"No man can search my cabin," snapped Laramie. "Have you got a warrant for Abe Hawk?" He threw the question sharply at Lefever.
With Lefever's disclaimer, Doubleday interposed a savage rejoinder: "A rope'll fit Abe's neck better than a warrant."
Laramie eyed the old cattleman unmoved: "And you're here to get me to help you slip the noose, are you?"
"We're here to clean out these cattle thieves," stormed Doubleday.
"There are no cattle thieves here," retorted Laramie undisturbed. "You're wasting the time you'll need on your job. Move on!"
Even Van Horn was taken aback by the rude command; he pulled his horse around: "Look here, Jim; let me talk to you a minute alone."
Laramie, guiding his horse with his heels, followed Van Horn twenty feet away and listened: "Jim, I'm leading this bunch, and whatever troubles you've had with Barb and his friends, now's the time to fix 'em up. They'll give you the best of it. If you've got any line on where Hawk is, say so and it puts you with us; say nothing, and you're against us."
Laramie eyed him without a quiver: "I'm against you, Harry."
Van Horn did not give up. He talked again, and talked hard. It was useless. Doubleday rode over to where Van Horn held Laramie in deadly earnest conference. Van Horn, ready to quit, gladly let the older man take over the case. But Doubleday made no better success. Laramie could not be moved. If coaxed, he was obstinate; if threatened, impatient—contemptuous. Doubleday, when Laramie coldly refused even to answer his questions concerning Hawk, boiled over.
He moved his horse a step and opened his vials of wrath: "Laramie, you've turned down the last chance decent folks on the range'll ever try to hand you—the last chance you'll ever see to pull away from these Falling Wall thieves. Now," he exclaimed, raising his right hand and arm with a bitter imprecation, "we'll show you who's going to run the Sleepy Cat range. I'll drive you out of this country if it takes every cowboy I can hire and every dollar I've got. This country won't hold you and me after today. D'ye hear?" he shouted, almost bending with his huge frame over Laramie and beside himself with rage. Then spurring his horse, he wheeled it around to rejoin Van Horn.
Even then Laramie was too quick for him. Almost in the very instant, he jumped his own pony after the angry man and gaining the head of Doubleday's horse, caught the bridle and jerked the beast almost to its haunches.
It was a ticklish instant. Van Horn, with his hand on his revolver, attempted to spur to Doubleday's assistance. Lefever interposed with a sharp move that put him plumply in front of Van Horn: "Not till them two are through, Harry. We stay right here till them two's done."
The very impudence of Laramie's move had taken Doubleday by surprise and Laramie was hurling angry words at him before Lefever had intervened: "Hold on, Doubleday," Laramie said bluntly, "you can't put your abuse all over me first and then run away with it. You'll hear what I've got to say. I rode this range before you ever saw it; I'll ride this range when you're gone. I was born here, Doubleday; my father lived here before me. The air I breathe, this sky over my head, this ground under my feet, are mine, and I stick here in spite of you and your cattle crooks. If men run off your cattle it's your sheriff's business—you own him. And it's your business to run 'em down—not mine. You come here without a warrant, without a definite complaint, and ask me to turn an old man over to a bunch of lynchers! Not on your life. Not today or any other day."
Doubleday interrupted, but he was forced to listen: "You talk about thieves," Laramie spoke fast and remorselessly, "and you belong to the bunch that's tried to steal every foot of land I own in the Falling Wall. After you and your lawyers and land office tools have stolen thousands of acres from the government, you talk as if you were an angel out of heaven about the men that brand your mavericks. Hell!" The scorn of the expletive drew from the very depths of furious contempt. "I'd rather stand by a thief that calls himself a thief, than a thief that steals under a lawyer. Send your hired men after me; give 'em plenty of ammunition. They'll find me right here, Barb—right here where I live."
When Sawdy rode into Sleepy Cat next morning it was known that he had come from the Reservation and he was besieged for news from the Falling Wall. At Kitchen's, where he put up his horse; on his way up street to his room over McAlpin's pool hall, he was assailed with questions. Pretty accurate reports of the two exciting days in the North country had already trickled into Sleepy Cat. To these, Sawdy listened with stolid attention but he managed to add to them very little. He possessed to a degree the faculty of talking freely, sententiously even, without contributing anything strictly pertinent to a subject. What he conveyed, when he meant to withhold information, was really no more than an air of reserve in which wisdom seemed discreetly restrained. On this present occasion he realized it would be known that he had encountered the raiders the day before at Laramie's—but while admitting this profusely, he minimized all else.
Not until he had bathed, slept, shaved and set himself down near nightfall at Belle Shockley's did he tell any considerable part of his story. But all that prudence would permit he told, or rather, Belle demanded and received at his hands. Where the heart is involved the strongest men are helpless.
"I ran into the bunch on my way down, right at Laramie's cabin," Sawdy said to Belle. "Laramie and Doubleday were having the hottest kind of a row when I rode up. I made sure we'd be shooting in the next couple of minutes. But John Lefever was watching pretty close and holding Van Horn. Barb cooled down when he saw three of us on deck. I told him on the side, the Governor had telephoned Pearson and the Colonel was going to send cavalry down after them and they'd better scatter. It was a bluff, but for a few minutes I had him and Van Horn guessing. They said they'd go home when they got Hawk. Lefever is staying up there for a day or two."
"What did they do after that?" demanded Belle, referring to the men whose names were on everybody's tongues.
"Beat the bushes from Laramie's to the Reservation," answered Sawdy. "Didn't leave a square yard of country unturned from the Falling Wall to the Crazy Woman."
"Will they ever find Hawk?"
"Did you ever find a needle in a haystack?"
"I never looked for one."
"Them fellows are looking for the stack. They can't locate the hay. Slip me that Worcestershire sauce, Belle. Yours truly. No more potatoes. This is a good piece of ham, Belle. I wish to God you'd serve a glass of beer with a man's supper."
"You can get all the supper and all the beer you want at the hotel," flared Belle. "This is no blind pig——"
"It's the only place in Main Street, then, that ain't."
"And it never will be," averred Belle, indignantly.
"Come up to the hotel with me right now," returned Sawdy coldly, "and I'll buy you a bottle of beer. Bet you ten dollars you da'ssent do it—who the devil—" Sawdy almost choked as the two heard a knock at the door—"who the devil is that?" he repeated. The door opened and Jim Laramie walked in.
He sent his hat sailing toward a side table, stepped forward and, catching at a chair on the way, greeted Belle and her guest and sat down before a plate cover opposite Sawdy. He pointed to what remained of Sawdy's supper and, with knife and fork, started in: "There's enough for me right here, Belle," he said.
Sawdy raised his chin: "Not this time, Jim. Not on your life. That's the way you always eat my supper."
"You eat too much, Henry—it will kill you some time," observed Laramie, losing no time in his initiative. He ignored Sawdy's stare and the big man, disgusted, sat dumb: "Don't surrender, Sawdy," counseled Laramie. "Keep going, and excuse me if I seem to begin."
Sawdy paused, his knife and fork firmly in hand, but pointing helplessly into the air: "This is the first square meal I've had for two days," he said, as one whose hopes have been dashed.
"First I've had for ten days," returned Laramie.
"What are they doing up there, Jim?" asked Sawdy peremptorily.
"Killing their horses."
"They won't find him," Sawdy predicted in words inaudible six feet away.
"I hope not."
"How's he holding out?"
"Hard hit, Henry."
"Will he make it?"
"You can't kill a cat."
"Well"—Sawdy resumed his supper, "it's your game, Jim, not mine; but I'd think twice before I'd get that range bunch after me on any man's account."
Laramie's eyes flashed, but he spoke quietly: "I couldn't see Abe killed like a rattlesnake."
"What are you down for?"
"I've got to have a couple of needles, a little catgut and some gauze."
"Where are you going to get them?"
"Going to steal them over at Doc. Carpy's."
"Nervy."
"You can do it for me, Henry."
"Me?"
"I'll give you the key to his cabinet."
"Where'd you get that?"
"Met him on my way in. He was going up to Pettigrew's to look after the wounded. The window in the end of the wing opens into the operating room, where the supplies are."
"I'd look fine climbing into a window at two hundred and twenty pounds."
"It's on the ground floor," returned Laramie, unmoved.
"What will the family be doing while I'm burgling?"
"Mrs. Carpy and the girls are in Medicine Bend. The house is empty. When you're through, leave the key in the skull of the skeleton behind the door."
Sawdy stared without much enthusiasm at the little key that Laramie passed to him; then he slipped it without comment into his pocket. The talk went on in low, leisurely tones until the second portion of ham had been served, when both resumed their supper as if nothing had been eaten or said. Afterward, Laramie spent an hour getting together some things he needed at home. He met Sawdy later at Kitchen's barn. Sawdy, with abundance of grumbling at his assignment, had the gauze and the catgut, but he had brought the key back. He could not find the surgeon's needles. There seemed nothing for it but for Laramie to go to the office and make the search himself. He thought of Belle; she would do it for him, he knew, but he felt it would not be right to mix her up in what might prove a still more tragic affair. After brief reflection he started for Carpy's himself.
The doctor's house stood back of Main Street, a block and a half from the barn. Laramie walked half a mile to reach it, choosing unlighted ways for the trip. The night was dark and by crossing a vacant lot he reached the rear of the house unobserved. The office, divided into a consulting room and an operating room, consisted of a one-story wing connecting with the residence—the consulting room adjoining the residence, the operating room occupying the end of the wing. This latter was the room Laramie sought. The window that Sawdy had already burglariously entered, opened easily, and Laramie, standing alone in the dark room, felt in his pocket for a match.
He had been in the office more than once before and knew about where the cabinet containing the surgical instruments stood. A connecting door led from the room he had entered to the office proper. He tried this. It was unlocked and he left it closed. The curtains of the windows were drawn and he took a match from his pocket, lighted it and looked around. The first thing he saw was the articulated skeleton suspended near the door from the ceiling. It would have been a shock had he not seen it before and been familiar with the label fastened to the breastbone reciting that this had once been Flat Nose George, an early day desperado of the high country.
Turning from this relic, Laramie set about his work, disdaining to inspect various gruesome specimens in alcohol ranged along a shelf. Aided by an occasional match which he lighted and shielded in his left hand, he found the cabinet and with his key opened the door. The flame of his match too carefully guarded, flickered in his fingers, failed and went out. He thrust it hastily into one pocket, drew a fresh match from another and was about to scratch it across his leather wristlet when he heard a door open. The next moment he saw, under the door leading from his room to the consulting room, a flash of light.
Awkward as it was to be interrupted, he faced the surprise with such composure as he could muster. Who could it be? he asked himself. The family was accounted for, the house locked. He scratched the match again. As it flared up he looked into the cabinet, found the packet of needles, tore a card of them in two, slipped one piece into a waistcoat pocket and closed the cabinet door. He turned to listen to the office intruder. Laramie hoped that nothing would bring the unwelcome visitor into the operating room, but as he stood awaiting developments the unlocked door was pushed open and a tiny flashlight was thrown into the room in which he stood.
Fortunately Laramie outside the circle of light was left in the dark. The intruder was a woman. He shrank back and she luckily turned her light from him but only to encounter, as she stepped forward, Flat Nose George, no less forbidding now than he had been in life. The woman with the light started back in horror and a sharp little exclamation betrayed her identity; Laramie was at once aware that he was facing Kate Doubleday.
Nothing could have pleased him less. In so small a room it was impossible to escape detection. He could almost hear her breathe and would have reveled in her presence so close, but that the apprehension of frightening her weighed on him like a mountain. Hardly daring to breathe himself he cursed the erratic doctor's skeleton pet—hung, of all places, where every little while he was cutting people open.
The skeleton had already set the girl's nerves on edge. What would happen if she discovered a live man as well as the ghastly remains of a dead one—not to mention alcoholic clippings from other subnormal notables of the mountains? With the flashlight she was evidently searching for something and Laramie surmised it must be the electric light switch: "I think," he suggested in as steady a tone as possible, "you'll find the light button to the right of the door behind you."
He was prepared for a scream or a swoon. Instead, the flashlight was turned directly on him: "Who are you?" came sharply and quickly from behind it.
"I might ask the same question. You can see I'm Jim Laramie. I can guess you're Kate Doubleday."
"I am, and I've come here for dressings for wounded men at Pettigrew's. What are you doing here?" she demanded, peremptorily.
His lips were sealed for more reasons than one. Least of all would it do for him to expose Doctor Carpy's friendliness and embroil him in a feud which Laramie knew he ought to face alone.
Kate held the light excitedly on him. It was an instant before he had his answer in hand: "I've lied to a good many people at different times about different things," he said deliberately. "I've still got my first lie to tell to you, Kate. And I certainly won't tell it tonight. Don't ask me what I'm doing here. Turn on the light by the door, or let me do it, so I can see you. You here alone?"
"No, there are plenty of men outside with me," she exclaimed abruptly.
"I shouldn't have asked that question," he continued in the same tone. "I know you're alone. You say 'men' because you're afraid of me——"
"I'm not the least afraid of you. And don't deceive yourself. There are men here."
"But they are mostly in bottles, Kate—and in pieces. Live men don't ride up to a place like this without making a noise. Flat Nose George is the only man here besides me, outside the alcohol, and I can claim him as well as you can."
"I'm sure you would feel perfectly at home with Flat Nose George," she retorted swiftly.
If the words stung, Laramie kept his temper. "Probably there's a good deal I deserve that you haven't heard about me," he said slowly. "But from the way you talk, you've heard a few things maybe I don't deserve. Nobody's got any right to class me with Flat Nose George or anybody else in Carpy's museum."
"You've classed yourself with him," she exclaimed vehemently. "Defending cattle thieves and harboring them! Everyone knows that!"
"I did talk rough to your father this morning. I was pretty angry. Just the same, don't believe everything you hear about me. At present, it's just us two. What do you want to do, surrender to me?"
"No!" she snapped the word out furiously. "I won't, not if you kill me."
"Suppose I surrender to you? What do you want me to do—stick up my hands? So far, they haven't been up—if I remember right. But I expect I'll have to learn sometime how to surrender."
"I want no surrender, no parley with you. The doctor told me his house was empty and directed me here for the dressings. When I come, I find you. I'll get away at once. Before I go——"
"No, I'll go. But let me turn on the light." He stepped to the door and pressed the button. "I wanted," he continued, as a light flooded the queer room, "to have just one look at you before I go." She stood before him quite unafraid. Her eyes flashed as if she were actually mistress of the situation instead of really helpless in the presence of her father's most resourceful enemy.
Laramie half-smiled at her serenity: "Why don't you go?" she exclaimed.
Still regarding her, he shifted his position a little and replied with entire good-nature: "I only live along, from one sight to another of you. I'm just filling up, like a man at a spring. You don't object to my only looking at you for a minute?"
"I object to being delayed and annoyed," she declared in a blaze. "I've come here for dressings needed for wounded men——"
"Well, so have I, if you must have it."
"I was sent here by Doctor Carpy for things he wants tonight; you have no more right here helping yourself to his property than you have taking other people's."
"Don't say I take other people's property!" Laramie spoke fiercely. "Don't call me a thief." His words burned with anger. "My hands may not be as white as yours—they're just as clean!"
Stunned as she might well have been at the outburst, Kate stood her ground: "Did Doctor Carpy give you permission to come here tonight?" She shot the words at Laramie without giving him time to breathe.
Laramie checked the flood of anger he had loosed: "I don't need permission from Doctor Carpy to come here night or day. Ask him if you want to," he said with scornful disgust. He sank down on the chair at his side in complete resentment of the whole situation and, leaning forward with a hand spread over one knee and one fist clenched on the other, he stared not at Kate's eyes, but at the floor, with only her trim boots in his field of vision. "What's the use?" he exclaimed, drawing the words up seemingly all the way from his own disorderly and alkali-stained foot coverings. "What's the use?" he repeated, in stronger and more savage tones. "I've treated her from the first instant I saw her, and every instant since, as I thought a woman ought to be treated—would like to be treated. Now I get my reward. She calls me a thief—and, my God! I take it. I don't ride out and kill her father who taught her to do it, quick as I can reach him; I just take it!" he exclaimed.
He hesitated a moment. Then he flung a question at her like a thunderbolt: "What do you want here?"
She was frightened. His rage was plain enough; who could tell the lengths to which it might carry him?
She kept her dignity but she answered and without quibbling: "I want some gauze and some cotton and some medicines."
He strode to the cabinet and, concealing the movement as he unlocked it with Carpy's key, he threw open the glass door: "You'd be all night finding the stuff," he said curtly, taking the supplies from various cluttered piles on different shelves. "You say he wants this tonight," he added, when her packet was complete: "How are you going to get it to him?"
"Carry it to him."
"At Pettigrew's? What do you mean? It would take an experienced horseman all night to ride around by Black Creek."
"I'm going over the pass."
He could not conceal his anger: "Does your father know that?"
"He said I might try it."
Laramie flamed again: "A fine father to send a tenderfoot girl on a night ride into a country like that!"
She was defiant: "I can ride anywhere a man can."
"Let me tell you," he faced her and his eyes flashed, "if you try riding 'anywhere' too often, some night your father's daughter will fail to get home!"
Ignoring the door, he stepped to the open window by which he had entered and, springing through it, was gone.