It was perhaps eight o'clock, the morning blue, cloudless, and still. Packard had conferred briefly with Barbee; the Ranch Number Ten men had gone about their work. Steve and Bill Royce, riding side by side, had mounted one of the flat, treeless hills in the upper valley and were now sitting silent while Royce fumbled with his pipe and Steve sent a long, eager look down across the open meadow-lands dotted with grazing cattle.
Suddenly their two horses and the other horses browsing in a lower field, jerked up their heads, all ears pricked forward. And yet Steve had heard no sound to mar the perfect serenity of the young day. He turned his head a little, listening.
Then, from some remote distance there floated to him a sound strangely incongruous here in the early stillness, a subdued screech or scream, a wild, clamorous, shrieking noise which for the life of him he could not catalogue.
It was faint because it came across so great a distance and yet it was clear; it was not the throbbing cry of a mountain lion, not the scream of a horse stricken with its death, nothing that he had ever heard, and yet it suggested both of these sounds.
"Bill!" he began.
"I heard it," Royce muttered. "An' I've heard it before! In a minute——"
Royce broke off. The sound, stilled a second, came again, seeming already much closer and more hideous. Steve's horse snorted and plunged; some of the colts in the pasture flung up their heels and fled with streaming manes and tails. Royce calmly filled and lighted his pipe.
Stillness again for perhaps ten or twenty seconds. Steve, about to demand an explanation from his companion, stared as once more came the shrieking noise.
"You can hear the blame thing ten miles," grunted Royce. "It's only about half that far away now. Keep your eye glued on the road across the valley where it comes out'n Blue Bird Cañon."
And then Steve understood. Into the clear air across the valley rose a growing cloud of dust; through it, out of the cañon's shadows and into the sunlight, shot a glistening automobile, hardly more than a bright streak as it sped along the curving down-grade.
"Terry Temple?" gasped young Packard. Royce merely grunted again.
"Jus' you watch," was all he said.
And, needing no invitation, Packard watched. The motor-car's siren—he had never heard another like it, knew that such a thing would not be tolerated in any of the world's traffic centres—sounded again a long, wailing note which went across the valley in billowing echoes.
Then it grew silent as, with the last of the dangerous curves behind it, the long-bodied roadster swung into the valley. Packard, an experienced driver himself, with his own share of reckless blood, opened his mouth and stared.
It was hard to believe that the big, spinning wheels were on the ground at all; the machine seemed more like an aeroplane content with skimming the earth but hungry for speed. Only the way in which it plunged and lurched and swerved and plunged again testified to highly inflated tires battling with ruts and chuck-holes.
"The fool!" he cried as the car negotiated a turn on two wheels with never a sign of lessened speed. "He'll turn turtle. He's doing sixty miles an hour right now. And on these roads——"
"More likely doin' seventy-five," grunted Royce. "Can do ten better'n that. Out on the highway he's done a clean hundred. That car, my boy——"
"He's going into the ditch!" exclaimed Steve excitedly.
The car, racing on, was already near enough for Steve to make out its two passengers, a man bent over the steering-wheel, another man, or boy, for the figure was small, clinging wildly to his place on the running-board, seeming always in imminent danger of being thrown off.
"He's drunk!" snapped Packard angrily. "Of all blind idiots!"
Another strident blast from the horn, that sent staid old cows scurrying this way and that to get out of the way, and the car swerved from the road and took to the open field, headed straight toward the hill where the two horsemen were. Jerking his horse about, Steve rode down to meet the new arrivals. And then——
"My God! It's my grandfather! He's gone mad, Bill Royce!"
"No madder'n usual," said Royce.
The car came to a sudden stop. The man on the running-board—he had a man's face, keen and sharp-eyed and eager, and the body of a slight boy—jumped down from his place and in a flash disappeared under the engine. The man at the wheel straightened up and got down, stretching his legs. Steve, swinging down from his saddle, and coming forward, measured him with wondering eyes.
And he was a man for men to look at, was old man Packard. Full of years, he was no less full of vigor, hale and stalwart and breathing power. A great white beard, cut square, fell across his full chest; his white mustache was curled upward now as fiercely as fifty years ago when he had been a man for women to look at, too.
He was dressed as Steve had always seen him, in black corduroy breeches, high black boots, broad black hat—a man standing upward of six feet, carrying himself as straight as a ramrod, his chest as powerful as a blacksmith's bellows, the calf of his leg as thick as many a man's thigh; big, hard hands, the fingers twisted by toil; the face weatherbeaten like an old sea captain's, with eyes like the frozen blue of a clear winter sky.
His voice when he spoke boomed out suddenly, deep and rich and hearty.
"Stephen?" he demanded.
Steve said "Yes" and put out his hand, his eyes shining, the surprising realization upon him that he was tremendously glad to see his father's father once more. The old man took the proffered hand into a hard-locked grip and for a moment held it, while, the other hand on his grandson's shoulder, he looked steadily into Steve's eyes.
"What sort of a man have they made of you, boy?" he asked bluntly. "There's the makings of fool, crook an' white man in all of us. What for a man are you?"
Steve flushed a little under the direct, piercing look, but said steadily—
"Not a crook, I hope."
"That's something, if it ain't everything," snorted the old man as, withdrawing his hand, he found and lighted a long stogie. "Blenham tells me you fired him las' night?"
Young Packard nodded, watching his grandfather's face for the first sign of opposition. But just now the old man's face told nothing.
"Thinking of runnin' the outfit yourself, Stephen?" came the next question quietly.
"Yes. I had intended looking in on you in a day or so to talk matters over. I understand that my father left everything to me and that it is pretty heavily mortgaged to you."
"Uhuh. I let Phil have a right smart bit of money on Number Ten firs' an' las', my boy. Don't want to pay it off this mornin', do you?"
Steve laughed.
"I'm broke, Grandy," he said lightly, unconsciously adopting the old title for the man who had made him love him and hate him a score of times. "My working capital, estimated last night, runs about seventy-five dollars. That wouldn't quite turn the trick, would it?"
The old man's eyes narrowed.
"You mean that seventy-five dollars is all you've got to show for twelve years?" he asked sharply.
Again, hardly understanding why, Steve flushed. Was a man to be ashamed that he had not amassed wealth, especially when there had never been in him the sustained desire for gold? He owed no man a cent, he made his own way, he asked no favors—and yet there was a glint of defiance in his eye, a hint of defiance in his tone, when he replied briefly.
"That's all. I haven't measured life in dollars and cents."
"Then you've missed a damn' good measure for it, my son! I ain't sayin' it's the only one, but it'll do firs' class. But you needn't get scared I've gone into the preaching business.… An' with that seventy-five dollars you're startin' out to run a big cow outfit like this, are you?"
There was a gleam of mockery in the clear blue eyes which Steve gave no sign of seeing.
"I've got a big job on my hands and I know it," he said quietly. "But I'm going to see it through."
"There's no question about the size of the job! It's life-size, man's size—Number Ten size, if you want to put it that way. It wants a real man to shove it across. Know just how much you're mortgaged for?"
"No. I was going to ask you."
"Close to fifty thousan' dollars, countin' back interest, unpaid. More'n you ever saw in a day, I reckon."
Steve shrugged. This to hide his first inclination to whistle. Fifty thousand—why, he didn't know Number Ten ranch was worth that much money. But it must be worth a good deal more if his grandfather had advanced so much on it.
"It is a nice little pile," he admitted carelessly.
The old man grunted, thrust his hands into his pockets, and drew deeply at his stogie. Steve rolled a cigarette. In the silence falling upon them they could hear the sound of the mechanician's wrench.
"Anything wrong with the car?" asked Steve for the sake of breaking unpleasant silence.
"Not that I know of. He's jus' takin' a peek to make sure, I guess. That's what he's for. He knows I got to get back to my place in a couple of shakes."
Steve smiled; by wagon road his grandfather's ranch home was fifty miles to the northward.
"You won't think of going back before noon."
"Won't I? But I will, though, son; Blenham's sticking aroun', waitin' for my say-so what he'll do nex'." He snapped open a big watch and stared at it a moment with pursed lips. "I'll be back home in jus' one hour an' a half. All I got is fifteen minutes to talk with you this mornin'."
"You mean that you can drive those fifty miles in an hour and a quarter!"
"Have done it in less; if I was in a hurry I'd do it in an hour flat. But allowin' for time out I want fifteen minutes more'n that. And now, if we're goin' to get anywhere——"
He stopped suddenly and stood toying with his big watch passing it back and forth through the loop he made of its heavy chain, his gaze steady and earnest and searching upon his grandson.
"Stephen," he said abruptly, "I ain't playin' any favorites in my ol' age. An' I ain't givin' away big chunks of money hit or miss. You wasn't countin' on anything like that, was you?"
"No, I wasn't," announced Steve quickly. "I remember your old theory; that a man should make his own way unaided, that——"
"That whatever he got he's got to get with his one head an' one set of han's. Now, the things I got to say I'll spit out one at the time: Firs', I'd like to have you come visit me for a spell at my place. Will you do it? To-day, to-morrow, any time you feel like it."
"Yes; I'll be glad to."
"That's good. Nex', not even if you was the right man for the job you can't save this ranch now; it's too late, there's to much to dig up in too short a time. I've got my hooks in deep an' whenever that happens I don't let go. I want you to quit before you get started."
Steve looked his surprise.
"Surely," he said wonderingly, "you don't want me to give you the ranch just because you happen to hold the mortgages on it?"
"Business is business, Stephen," said the old man sternly. "Sometimes, between Packards, business is hell. It'd be that for you. I've started out to get this outfit an' I'd get it. An' doin' it I'd be wastin' my time besides breakin' you all to smithereens. Better drop it."
Steve had hardly expected this. But he answered calmly, even lightly.
"I think I'd like a try at holding it."
"That's two things," old man Packard said crisply. "Number three is this here: Blenham tells, me you've put Royce in as foreman under you?"
"I offered him the place. He could have it yet if he wanted it. But he refused. I've passed the job on to a man named Barbee."
"Barbee!" cried the old man. "Barbee! That yellow canary-bird? Meaning him?"
"Yes," retorted Steve a trifle stiffly. "Anything wrong with him?"
"I didn't roll them fifty miles to talk about jay-birds an' canary-birds an' such," growled his grandfather. "But here's one thing I've got to say: This ranch is goin' to be mine real soon; that's in the cards, face up. It's as good as mine now. I've been runnin' it myself for six months. I want it right, hear me? What do you know about running a big outfit? What does a kid without whiskers like Barbee know about it? Think I want it all run down in the heel when it comes to me? No, sir! I don't. Blenham knows the lay of the land, Blenham knows my ways, Blenham knows how to run things. I want you to put Blenham back on the job!"
Steve bit his lip, holding back a hot reply.
"Grandfather," he said slowly, "suppose we take a little more time in getting squared around? I want to do what's right; I know that you want to do what's fair and square. I am willing to consult you about ranch matters; I'll come to you for advice, if you'll let me; I'll try to keep the ranch up to time and"—with a smile—"in my hands and out of yours. That's a good sporting proposition. But as for Blenham——"
"Put him back as foreman and I'll talk fair with you. I want Blenham back here, Stephen. Understand that?"
"And," cried Steve a trifle heatedly at last, "I tell you that I am going to run the ranch myself. And that I don't like Blenham."
"Damn it," cried the old man violently, "hear the boy! Don't like Blenham, huh? Goin' to run the ranch yourself, huh? Why, I tell you it's as good as mine right now! How are you goin' to pay your men, how are you goin' to buy grub for 'em, where are you goin' to find runnin'-expense money? Go an' tell folks you're mortgaged to me for fifty thousan' dollars an' see how much they'll stake you for on top of that. Or come over my way an' try to borrow some more, if you think I'm an easy guy. Why, Steve Packard, you—you're a tomfool!"
"Thanks," said Steve dryly. "I've heard that before."
"An' you'll hear it again, by the Lord! In ten languages if you'll find men talkin' that many lingos. Here I come chasin' all this way to be decent to you, to see if there ain't some way to help you out——"
"Help me out of my property," amended Steve. "I can't remember anything else you offered to do for me!"
"I said it once," shouted his grandfather, his two big fists suddenly clinched and lifted threateningly; "you're a howlin' young ass! That's what for a man you've turned out to be, Stephen Packard. Come here empty-handed an' try to buck me, would you? Me who has busted better men than you all my life, me who has got my hooks in you deep already, me who ain't no pulin' ol' dodderin' softy to turn over to a lazy, shiftless vagabond all I've piled up year after year. Buck me, would you? Tuck in an' fire my men, butt on my affairs— Why, you impudent young puppy-dog, you: I'll make you stick your tail between your legs an' howl like a kiote before I'm done with you!"
Steve looked at him hopelessly; he might have expected this all along though he had hoped for amity at least. If there were to be a conflict of purpose he could have wished that it be conducted in friendly fashion. But when did Hell-Fire Packard ever clasp hands with the man he opposed in anything, when did he ever see a business rival without cloven hoof, horns, and spiked tail?
"I am sorry you look at it that way, Grandy. It is only natural that I should seek to hold what is mine."
"Then hold your tongue, you young fool!" blazed out the old man. "But don't ask me to hold my hand! I'm goin' after you tooth and big toe-nail! If Ranch Number Ten ain't mine in all partic'lars before you're a year older I want to know why!"
"I think," said the grandson, fighting with himself for calmness and quiet speech, "that any further business I can take up with your lawyer. Past due interest——"
"Lawyer?" thundered Packard senior. "Since when did I ever have call for law an' lawyers in my play? Think I'm a crook, sir? Mean to insinuate I'm a crook?"
"I mean nothing of the kind. A mortgage is a legal matter, the payment of interest and principal——"
"Guy Little!" called the old man. "Guy Little! Goin' to stay under that car all day?"
The mechanician promptly appeared, hands and face greasy and black and took his place on the running-board.
"All ready, sir," he announced imperturbably.
With half-a-dozen strides his master reached the car; in as many seconds the powerful engine was throbbing. The screaming horn gave warning, the quiet herds in the valley heeded, lifted their heads and stood at attention, ready to scamper this way or that as need arose. The wheels turned, the car jolted over the inequalities presented by the field, swerved sharply, turned, gathered speed and whizzed away toward the valley road.
Three times before they shot back into the mouth of Blue Bird Cañon the mechanician fancied that his employer had spoken; each time listening, he failed to catch any other sound than that made by the engine and speeding wheels. Once he said, "Sir?" and got only silence for an answer.
He shook his head and wondered; it was not Packard's way to mumble to himself. And again, ready to jump for his life as the big car took a dangerous turn, his eyes glued to the sheer bank a few inches from the singing tires, he caught a sound through the blast of the sparton which surely must have come from the driver's lips.
"What say?" yelled Guy Little.
No answer. He caught a fleeting glimpse of a farmer at the head of his two plunging horses where the man had hurriedly got them out of the way and up the flank of the mountain. They raced on. And again, surely Packard had said something.
"Talkin' to me?" called Little.
Then, for just a wee fraction of a second, Packard drew his eyes from the road and his look met the mechanician's. The old man's eyes were shining strangely.
"Damn it, Guy Little," he boomed out boisterously, "can't a man laugh when he feels that-away?"
And it suddenly dawned upon Guy Little that ever since they had left Ranch Number Ten the old man had been chuckling delightedly.
The little town of Red Creek had an individuality all its own. It might have prided itself, had it any civic sense whatever, upon its aloofness. It stood apart from the rest of the world, at a safe distance from any of its rival settlements, even drawn apart as though distrustfully from its own railroad station which baked and blistered in the sun a good half-mile to the west. Grown up here haphazardly long before the "Gap" had been won through by the "iron trail," it ignored the beckoning of the glistening rails and refused to extend itself toward the traffic artery.
More than all this, Red Creek gave the impression, not in the least incorrect, of falling apart into two watchful sections which eyed each other suspiciously, being cynically and unsociably inclined. Its main street was as wide as Van Ness Avenue and down the middle of it, like a border line between two hostile camps, sprawled a stream which shared its name with the town.
The banks here and there were the brick-red of a soil whose chief mineral was iron; here and there were screened by willows. There were two insecure-looking bridges across which men went infrequently.
For the spirit which had brooded over the birth of Red Creek when a sheepman from the north and a cow-man from the south had set their shacks opposite each other, lived on now; long after the old feuds were dead and the whole of the grazing lands had been won over to the cattle raisers, a new basis for quarrels had offered itself at Red Creek's need.
Much of this Steve Packard knew, since it was so in his time, before he had gone wandering; much he had learned from Barbee in a long talk with him before riding the twenty-five miles into the village. Old Man Packard had drawn to himself a host of retainers since his interests were big, his hired-men many, his wages generous. And, throughout the countryside across which he cast his shadow, he had cultivated and grown a goodly crop of enemies, men with whom he had contended, men whom he had branded sweepingly as liars and thieves and cutthroats, men whose mortgages he had taken, men whom, in the big game which he played, he had broken. The northern half of Red Creek was usually and significantly known as Packard's Town; the southern half sold liquor and merchandise, offered food and lodging, to men who harbored few friendly feelings for Packard's "crowd."
Hence, in Red Creek were two saloons, confronting each other across the red scar of the creek; two stores, two lunch-counters, two blacksmith shops, each eying its rival jealously. At this time the post-office had been secured by the Packard faction; the opposition snorted contempt and called attention to the fact that the constable resided with them. Thus honors were even.
Steve Packard rode into town in the late afternoon, his motive clear-cut, his need urgent. If Blenham had stolen his ten thousand dollars for which he had so imperative a call now, then Blenham had been the one who had replaced the large bank-notes with the small; there was the chance that Blenham, just a week ago to-night, had gotten the dollar bills in Red Creek. If such were the case Packard meant to know it.
"There are things, Barbee," he had said bluntly, "which I can't tell you yet; I don't know you well enough. But this I can say: I am out to get Blenham's tag."
"So'm I," said Barbee.
"That's one reason you've got the job you're holding down right now. Here's one point though, which it's up to you to know; I very much suspect that for reasons of his own Blenham hasn't set foot for the last time on Ranch Number Ten. He'll come back; he'll come snooping around at night; he'll perhaps have a way of knowing the first night I'm away and come then. There's something he left there that he wants. At least that is the way I'm stringing my bet. And while I am away you're foreman, Barbee."
A flickering light danced in Barbee's blue eyes.
"Orders from you, if Blenham shows up at night——"
"To throw a gun on him and run him out! The quickest way. To-night I want you to squat out under a tree and keep awake—all night. For which you can have two days off if you want."
"If I thought he'd show," and the boy's voice was little more than an eager whisper, "I couldn't sleep if I tried!"
Then Packard had spoken a little about Red Creek, asking his few questions and had learned that Blenham had his friends in "Packard's Town" where Dan Hodges of the Ace of Diamonds saloon was an old pal, that "Whitey" Wimble of the Old Trusty saloon across the street hated both Hodges and Blenham like poison.
"Us boys," added Barbee, "always hung out at the Ace of Diamonds, bein' Packard's men. After now, when I go on a rampage, I'm goin' to make frien's across the street. Friends sometimes comes in handy in Red Creek," he added smilingly.
The road, as one comes into Red Creek from the east, divides at the first bridge, one fork becoming the northern half of the intersected street, the other the southern half. Steve Packard, filling his eyes with the two rows of similar shacks, hesitated briefly.
Until now he had always gone to the Packard side; when a boy he had regarded the rival section with high contempt, looking upon it as inferior, sneering at it as a thoroughbred might lift lip at an unworthy mongrel. The prejudice was old and deep-rooted; he felt a subtle sense of shame as though the eyes of the world were upon him, watching to see him turn toward the "low-down skunks an' varmints" which his grandfather had named these denizens of the defamed section.
The hesitation was brief; he reined his horse impatiently to the left, riding straight toward the flaunting sign upon the lofty false front of the Old Trusty saloon. But short as was his indecision it had not ended before he had glimpsed at the far end of the street the incongruous lines of an automobile—red racing type.
"Boyd-Merril. Twin Eight," thought Packard. "So we'll meet on the same side after all, Miss Terry Pert!"
There were seeds of content in the thought. If it were to be range war between him and his grandfather, then since obviously the Temples had already been drawn into contention with the old man Packard, it was just as well the fates decreed that he and Terry should be on the same side of the fence, the same side of the fight, the same side of Red Creek.
He tickled his horse with a light spur; despite the manner of their last encounter he could look forward with something akin to eagerness to another meeting. For, he told himself carelessly, she amused him vastly.
But the meeting was not just yet. He saw Terry, jauntily, even saucily dressed, as she came out of the store and jumped into her car, marked how the bright sunlight winked from her high boots, how it flamed upon her gay red scarf, how it glinted from a burnished steel buckle in her hat band. As bright as a sunbeam herself, loving gay colors about her, across the distance she fairly shone and twinkled.
There was a faint shadow of regret in his eyes as she let in the clutch and whizzed away. She was headed down the street, her back to him, driving toward the remote railroad station. Off to the north he saw a growing plume of black smoke.
"Going away?" he wondered. "Or just meeting some one?"
But he had come into Red Creek on a business in no way connected with Terry Temple.
He had figured it out that Blenham, if it had been Blenham who had chanced on Bill Royce's secret and no longer ago than last Saturday night, would have wasted no time in acquiring the one-dollar bills for his trick of substitution; that if he had come for them to Red Creek that same night, after post-office and stores were closed, he would have sought them at one of the two saloons; that, since currency is at all times scarce in cattle towns in the West, he might have had to go to both saloons for them.
Packard began investigations at the Old Trusty saloon whose doors stood invitingly open to the faint afternoon breeze.
In the long room half-a-dozen idle men looked up at him with mild interest, withdrawing their eyes briefly from solitaire or newspaper or cribbage game or whatever had been holding their careless attention as he entered.
A glance at them showed him no familiar face. He turned to the bar.
Behind it a man was polishing glasses with quick, skilful hands. Steve knew him at once for Whitey Wimble. He was a pronounced albino, unhealthy-looking, with overlarge, thin ears, small pale eyes, and teeth that looked like chalk. Steve nodded to him and spun a dollar on the bar.
"Have something," he suggested.
Wimble returned his nod, left off his polishing to shove forward a couple of the glistening glasses, and produced a bottle from behind him.
"Regards," he said apathetically, taking his whiskey with the enthusiasm and expression of a man observing his doctor's orders. "Stranger in Red Creek?"
"I haven't been here," Steve answered, "for several years. I never saw the town any quieter. Used to be a rather gay little place, didn't it?"
"It's early yet," said Whitey, going back to his interrupted task. "Bein' Saturday, the boys from the ranches will be showin' up before long. Then it ain't always so quiet."
Packard made his cigarette, lighted it, and then said casually: "How are you fixed for dollar bills in your strong-box?"
"Nary," returned Whitey Wimble without troubling himself to look into his till. "We don't see overmuch rag money in Red Creek."
"Guess that's so," admitted Steve. "They do come in handy, though, sometimes; when you want to send a dollar in a letter or something of that kind."
"That's a fac', too; never thought of that." Which, since he never wrote or received letters, was no doubt true.
"Men around here don't have much use for paper money, do they?" continued Packard carelessly, his interest seeming to centre in his cigarette smoke. "I'd bet a man the drinks nobody else has asked you for a dollar bill for the last six months."
"You'd lose," said Whitey. "I had three of 'em in the drawer for a coon's age; feller asked me for 'em jus' the other night."
"Yes?" He masked his eagerness as he thrust a quarter forward. "The drink's on me then. Let me have a cigar."
Whitey also took a cigar, indicating friendliwise the better box.
"Who was it asked you for the paper money?" Steve went on. "He might have one he doesn't need."
"It was Stumpy Collins. The bootblack across the street."
"I'll look him up; yesterday he had them, you say?"
Wimble shook his head, gave the matter his thought a moment, and said:
"It was las' Saturday night; I remember 'cause there was a right smart crowd in an' I was busy an' Stumpy kep' pesterin' me until I 'tended to him. He won't have nothin' lef by this, though; it ain't Stumpy's way to save his money long. Firs' time I ever knowed him to have three dollars all at once."
From the Old Trusty Steve went across the street, leaving his horse in front of Wimble's door where there was a big poplar and a grateful shade. Crossing the second of the two bridges he turned his eyes toward the railroad station; the red touring-car stood forth brilliantly in the sunshine, a freight train was just pulling in, Terry was not to be seen.
"She'll eat before she starts back home," he thought, hastening his stride on to Hodges's place, the Ace of Diamonds. "I'll see her at the lunch-counter."
Tucked in beside the Ace of Diamonds was a bootblack stand, a crazy, home-made affair with dusty seat. The wielder of the brush and polish was nowhere in evidence. Steve passed and turned in at the saloon door, wishing to come to Hodges, Blenham's pal. For it required little imagination to suspect that it had been Hodges at Blenham's behest, or Blenham himself, who had sent Stumpy across the street to the Old Trusty.
Here, as in Wimble's place, a few men loitered idly; here as there the proprietor stood behind his own bar. Hodges, a short, squat man with a prize-fighter's throat, chest, and shoulders and a wide, thin-lipped mouth, leaned forward in dirty shirt-sleeves, chewing at a moist cigar-stump.
"Hello, stranger," he offered offhandedly. "What's the word?"
"Know Blenham, don't you?" asked Steve quietly. "Works for old man Packard."
"Sure, I know him. What about him?"
"Seen him lately?"
"Ten minutes ago. Why? Want him?"
Packard had not counted on this, having no idea that Blenham was in town. He hesitated, then said quickly:
"Hasn't left yet, has he? Where is he now?"
"Down to the depot. Trailin' a skirt. An' some skirt, too, take it from me."
He laughed.
Steve wanted suddenly to slap the broad, ugly face. Since, however, he could formulate no logically sufficient reason for the act, he said instead:
"Maybe I'll see him before I pull out. If I don't, ask him if he lost a wad like this?"
Fleetingly he flashed the little roll of banknotes before Hodges's eyes.
"Greenbacks?" asked Hodges. "How much?"
Packard laughed.
"Not so all-fired much," he said lightly. "But enough to buy a hat!"
"If hats are sellin' ten dollars or under?" ventured Hodges.
Packard affected to look surprised.
"What do you know about how much is in this roll?" he demanded innocently.
"One-dollar bills?" said Hodges. "Ten of 'em?"
"You don't look like a mind-reader."
"Well, you're right about the wad bein' Blenham's. Leave it with me, if you want. I'll see he gets it. There ain't enough there for a man to steal," he added reassuringly.
"How do you know it's Blenham's? If he told you that he had lost it he'd have told you where. What's the answer; where did I pick this up?"
"Blenham didn't say he los' nothin'. But I know it's his because he got most of them bills from me."
"Tell me when," and Packard held the roll in a tight-shut hand, "and I'll leave them with you."
"Las' Saturday night," said Hodges, after a brief moment of reflection.
Packard tossed the little roll to the bar.
"There's the money. Tell Blenham I thought it was his!"
He turned to the door, his blood suddenly stirred with certainty: Blenham had stolen the ten thousand dollars, and the theft had been committed no longer ago than last Saturday night. Just a week—there was the chance——
"Hey, there," called Hodges. "Who'll I say lef this? What name, stranger?"
Steve turned and regarded him coolly.
"Tell him Steve Packard called. Steve Packard, boss of Ranch Number Ten."
And Dan Hodges, dull wit that he was, felt that something was wrong. The look in the stranger's eyes had altered swiftly, the eyes had grown hard. Steve went out. As he reached the sidewalk he glimpsed a red automobile racing townward from the station. Behind it, riding in its dust, came Blenham.
Steve Packard, walking swiftly, reached the west bridge just before the front tires of Terry's car thudded on the heavy planks. He glimpsed Blenham jogging along behind her and knew that Blenham had seen him.
But his eyes were for Terry now. She, too, had recognized him with but a few yards separating them. She gave him a blast of her horn warningly, and, slowing down no more than was necessary for the sharp turn, came on across the bridge. He read it in her eye that it would be an abiding joy for Miss Terry if she could send him scampering out of her way; the horn as much as said: "You step aside or I'll run you down!"
With no intention of going under the wheels, Steve waited until the last moment and then jumped. But not to the side as Terry had anticipated. Obeying his impulse and taking his chance, he sprang up to her running-board as she whizzed over the bouncing planks of the bridge, grasping the door of her car to steady himself. The feat safely accomplished, he grinned up into Terry's startled eyes.
"We meet again," he laughed sociably. "Howdy!"
Her lips tight-pressed, she gave her attention for a moment to her wheel and the rutty road in front of her. Her cheeks were red and grew redder. Perhaps a dozen men, here and there upon the street, had seen. She had meant them to see; it would have tickled her no little to have had them note Steve Packard flying wildly to the side of the road while she shot by. She had not counted upon him doing anything else.
"Smarty!" she cried hotly.
"Smart enough to climb out from under when an automobile driven by a manslaughter artist comes along," he chuckled, sensing an advantage and drawing a deep enjoyment from it. "Don't you know, young lady, you've got to be careful sometimes? Now, if you had run over me——"
"Serve you right," sniffed Terry.
"Yes, but think! Running over a man who hasn't had time to take his spurs off yet, why you stood all kinds of chances getting a puncture! You don't want to forget things like that."
Terry bit her lip, stepped on the throttle, swung across the street, made a reckless turn, and brought up in front of the lunch-counter.
"Do you know," remarked Packard lightly, ignoring the fact that she had answered him with only the contempt of her silence, "you remind me of my grandfather. Fact! You two have the same little trick of driving. Wonder what would happen if you and he met on a narrow road?"
"At least," said Terry, eying him belligerently, "he is a man, if he is a scoundrel. Not just a hobo!"
"Oh, I didn't mean to call you a scoundrel! Nor yet to say that you struck me as mannish. Of course——"
"Oh, you make me sick!" cried Terry. And she flashed away from him, going into the lunch-room.
He followed her with speculative eyes. Then he glanced across the street. Blenham had dismounted in front of the Ace of Diamonds and was watching. As Packard turned Blenham went into Hodges's saloon.
"Wonder what he'll have to say when Hodges hands him his roll?" mused Packard.
Well, he had accomplished his purpose. He had done all that he had hoped to do in Red Creek this afternoon, had assured himself that his suspicions against Blenham were justified by the fact and that the theft was only a week old. He went back slowly to his horse in front of the Old Trusty. But his eyes were frowning thoughtfully.
What would be Blenham's next move? What would Blenham do, what would he say when Hodges gave him Packard's message? Might he, in an unguarded moment, give a hint toward the answer of that other question which now had become the only consideration: "Were the larger banknotes still hidden at Ranch Number Ten or had Blenham already removed them?"
Instead of mounting to ride away, Packard hung his spurs upon his saddlehorn and turned again into Whitey Wimble's place.
The late afternoon faded into dusk, the first stars came out, Whitey Wimble lighted his lamps. Steve, advised of the fact by the purr of a motor, knew when Terry left the lunch-room and drove to the store for a visit with the storekeeper's wife. Was she going to remain in town overnight? It began to look as though she were.
Across the street Hodges came out and lighted the big lamps at each side of his doorway. A cowboy swung down from his horse and went in, his spurs winking in the lamplight as though there were jewels upon them. A buckboard pulled up and two other men went in after him. A voice in sudden laughter boomed out. Saturday night had come. As Whitey Wimble had predicted, the boys were showing up and Red Creek stood ready to lose something of its brooding afternoon quiet.
Once again Packard crossed the bridge and made his way along the echoing wooden sidewalk to the Ace of Diamonds. A dozen saddle-horses were tied at the hitching-rail. Among them was Blenham's white-footed bay. Up and down the street glowing cigarette ends like fireflies came and went. In front of the saloon a number of men made a good-natured, tongue-free crowd, most of whom had had their first drinks and were beginning to liven up as in duty bound on a Saturday night.
A four-horse wagon came rattling into town from the east to pour out its contents, big, husky men, at Hodges's door. Among them Packard recognized one man. He was the lumber-camp cook from whom he had gotten coffee and hotcakes the other day, that morning after he had refused to accept Terry's cool invitation to breakfast.
"I'll have to look in on those fellows tomorrow," he thought as they shouldered past, boisterous and eager. "Grandy's sure had his nerve cutting my timber with never so much as a by-your-leave."
Their foreman was with them; one glance singled him out. He was of that type chosen always by old man Packard to head any one of the Packard units, a sort of confident mastery in his very stride, the biggest man of them, unkempt and heavy, with a brutal face and hard eyes. Joe Woods, his name. Packard had already heard of him, a rowdy and a rough-neck but a capable timberjack to the calloused fingers of him. He followed the men into the saloon.
At his place behind the long bar was Hodges, busy filling imperative orders, taking in the money which he counted as good as his once it left the paymaster's pocket. But it struck Packard that the bartender did not appear happy; his face was flushed and hot, his eyes looked troubled. Now and then he flashed a quick look at Blenham who stood leaning against the bar at the far end, twisting an empty whiskey-glass slowly in his big hand, staring frowningly at nothing.
"Hodges is a fool and he has just been told so!" was Steve's answer to the situation.
"Hi, Blenham!" called big Joe Woods. "Have a drink."
"No," growled Blenham, deep down in his throat. "I don't want it. I——"
His eyes, lifted to the lumber-camp boss, passed on and rested on Steve Packard. He broke off abruptly, his look changing, probing, seeming full of question.
"Get the money I gave Hodges for you?" asked Packard, coming into the room. "The ten one-dollar bills that you left behind you?"
"They wasn't mine," said Blenham quickly, his hand hard about the whiskey glass, his manner vaguely nervous. "I tol' Dan to give 'em back to you."
Steve smiled.
"Funny," he said carelessly. "Hodges said——"
"I made a mistake," called Hodges sharply. "I got Blenham mixed up with some other guy. I don't know nothin' about this here." He slammed the little roll down on the bar. "Come get it, if you want it." Packard promptly stepped forward, taking the money.
"I figured there was a chance to make ten dollars, easy money, if I just walked across the street for it," he said, looking pleasantly from Hodges to Blenham. "Sure, I want it. It's luck-money; didn't you know? You see, when a man loses anything he loses some of his luck with it; when another man gets it, he gets the luck along with it. Thanks, Blenham."
Blenham made no answer. His eyes were bright with anger and yet troubled with uncertainty. The uncertainty was there to be recognized by him who looked keenly for it. Blenham did not know just which way to jump. From that fact Steve drew a deep satisfaction. For there would have been no reason for indecision if Blenham knew that he had those other, bigger bank-notes, safe.
At the rear of the long room a man was dealing cards for seven-and-a-half. As though to demonstrate the truth of his boast about "luck-money" Steve stepped to the table, the roll of bills in his hand. He was dealt a card. Without turning it up to look at it he shoved it under the ten banknotes.
"Standing?" said the dealer.
Steve nodded.
"Playing my luck," he answered.
The dealer turned lack-lustre eyes upon Steve's card, then upon his own which he turned up. It was the four of clubs.
"I've the hunch that will beat you, pardner," he said listlessly. "But I'll come again."
He turned another card, a deuce.
"That'll about beat you," he suggested. He leaned forward for Steve's card. "Unless you've got a seven in the hole."
And a seven it was; the bright red seven of hearts. The dealer paid, ten dollars to Steve's ten.
"Come again?" he asked.
"Not to-night," returned Packard. "I took just the one flutter to show Blenham."
He turned and saw that Blenham had already slipped quietly out of the room. Dan Hodges, his face a fiery red, was just coming back from the card-room. With him was the big timber boss.
"Tin-horn!" shouted Joe Woods at Packard. "Quitter!"
A quick joy spurted up in Steve Packard's heart; he was right about Blenham. Blenham, filled with anxiety, had gone already, would be rushing back to Ranch Number Ten to make sure if the ten thousand dollars were safe or had been discovered already by the rightful owner. He had slipped away hurriedly but, after the fashion of a careful, practical man, had taken time to confer with Dan Hodges and had commissioned Joe Woods to hold Packard here. And so, though he could not remember of having ever run away from a fight before, Steve Packard was strongly of that mind right now.
"Joe Woods, I believe?" he said coolly, his mind busy with the new problem of a new situation. "Boss of the timber crew on the east side of Number Ten? I was planning on riding out to-morrow for a word with you, Woods."
"So?" cried Woods. "What's the matter with havin' that word to-night?"
"Haven't time," was the simple rejoinder. "I'm about due across the street now; at Whitey Wimble's place."
"Which is where you belong," growled Woods, his under jaw thrust forward, his whole attitude charged with quarrelsome intent. "Over at the White Rat's with the rest of the Willies!"
The ever-ready Packard temper was getting into Steve's head, beating in his temples, pounding along his pulses. He had never had a man bait him like that before. But he strove to remember Blenham only, to take stock of the fact that this was a bit of Blenham's game, and that any trouble with another than Blenham was to be avoided at this juncture. So, though the color was rising into his face and a little flicker of fire came into his eyes, he said briefly:
"Then I'd better go across, hadn't I? See you in the morning, Woods."
But there is always the word to whip the hot blood into the coolest head, to snare a man's caution out of him and inject fury in its stead, and Joe Woods, a downright man and never a subtle, put his tongue to it. On the instant Packard gave over thought of such side issues as a man named Blenham and hidden bank-notes.
He cried out inarticulately and leaped forward and struck. Joe Woods reeled under the first blow full in the face, staggered under the second, and was borne back into the tight-jammed crowd of his followers.
The men about him and Packard withdrew this way and that, leaving empty floor space to accommodate the two pairs of shuffling boots. Joe Woods wiped his lips with the back of a big, hairy hand, saw traces of blood, and charged. The sound of blows given and taken and of little grunts and of scraping feet were for a space the only sounds heard in Hodges's saloon.