Pulling up at the dead steer, they dismounted and, leaving Gallagher examining the carca.s.s, Ellis walked on down the draw and released his prisoner, snapping the handcuff back on the wrist again.
"Get yu" over to th" beef an" set down," he ground out curtly.
The rancher looked up at their approach. "Howdy, Shorty," he said quietly, with a grim nod, which salute the other returned sullenly, with a brazen stare, sitting down resignedly, with his manacled hands clasping his knees. Benton, rolling a cigarette, looked interrogatively at Gallagher.
"Well," he queried.
"Sh.o.r.e _looks_ like one o" mine," answered that worthy; "but-"
His speech was suddenly interrupted by the rustler. Throughout his capture he had remained as mute as a trapped wolf. Now he broke in with:
"Yes, but yu" cain"t _swear_ it"s yores." And the sneering taunt conveyed a meaning that was not lost on his listeners.
For a moment or two the Sergeant scanned the faces of the two men, a lazy, tolerant smile playing over his hard features as he fumbled inside the breast of his stable-jacket.
"Oh, he cain"t, cain"t he?" he drawled mockingly. "No, but _I_ can, my strawberry blonde. Here"s a letter for yu", Gallagher," he continued, grinning. "Reckon I"ll let Shorty read it first, though." And, unfolding the flap of hide, he carelessly held it up for that gentleman"s inspection.
With starting eyes and a ghastly imprecation the prisoner gazed at the missing link, fear, anger, and astonishment flitting in turn over his evil visage.
"Why, why-" he stuttered.
"Yes, _why_-" Ellis finished for him sarcastically. "_Why_ do yu" aim to start in chokin" poor coyotes to death with other people"s brands?"
He handed the sticky piece of evidence over to Gallagher. "Double H.F.,"
he said. "That"s yore brand all right, ain"t it, old-timer?"
The rancher nodded wonderingly.
"Yu"ll find it fits into th" cut-out all hunkadory," the Sergeant added.
"Satisfied?" he queried presently. "All right, then." And, in the set formula that the Law prescribes, he proceeded to formally charge and warn his prisoner. This duty ended, he sank down with a lazy yawn and, rolling a fresh cigarette, tossed it good-naturedly over to the captive, with a match along.
"Have a smoke, Shorty," he observed, with an indolent, meaning smile. "I guess yu" sh.o.r.e needs one."
The three men smoked meditatively awhile, amid a silence that was eventually broken by Gallagher.
"Playin" it up kinder mean on me, ain"t yu" Shorty?" he remarked bitterly. "I reckon I"ve always treated _yu"_ white."
The shackled man, with sullen, averted eyes, gave a hopeless shrug.
"Didn"t aim to put it over on _yu"_ in particular, Barney," he mumbled in a low voice. "I was just a ridin" past here, casual like, lookin" for some horses, when I see this steer a tryin" to catch up to th" bunch with a broken leg. I kin pay yu" for it," he added defiantly. "An" if yu"-"
"_Payin"_ don"t go on a job like this," interjected the Sergeant sharply. "Even if Barney _was_ willin".... Case is out of his hands.
Besides, if yu" can afford to pay for beef yu" ain"t obliged to rustle it.
"Broken leg," he continued, with an incredulous grin. "Yes, an" I guess it ain"t hard to figure _what_ broke it. I"ve seen th" way yu" rope an"
throw-lots of times. _Casual!_ What? Oh, mighty b.l.o.o.d.y _casual_! A skinnin" knife. A block an" tackle an" a butcher"s cleaver in a gunny-sack an" that big cottonwood to sling th" beef up to out o" reach of th" coyotes till yu" could come around with a wagon an" team for it after dark. What? _Casual_, eh? ... well, I should smile."
A lull followed this sally. Presently Shorty raised his head.
"My shootin" at that there coyote, it was, I guess, as fetched yu"?" he inquired gloomily. "I was down at th" creek, gettin" a drink, an" when I was comin" back I see him with somethin" in his mouth."
Ellis nodded and blew out a smoke ring with dreamy reflection.
"Aye, that an" other things," he drawled, slowly. ""Member makin" that crack about a certain red-coated, yaller-laigged stiff whose goat yu"
was a goin" to get, like th" feller"s before him? ... A little bit-not much-I _don"t_ think. Yu" ain"t got no Corporal Williamson here. I"ve been a-layin" for yu" ever since, an" now I reckon it"s yu" for th"
goat."
Gallagher, listening amusedly, uttered his low, barking laugh.
"Goat!" he chuckled softly. "Goat!" The expression seemed to tickle his imagination greatly. "Don"t often get it put over yu", Sargint, I"ll gamble."
"Oh, I don"t know," said Benton lazily. "Do sometimes." He wriggled into a more comfortable position. "Talkin" o" goats," he continued, with a dreamy smile of reflection, "just for th" sake of a yarn I"ll give myself away.
"It was two winters back-when I was stationed at G.o.ddard," he began. "I caught a feller there fixin" up another man"s calf-all same Shorty, here. I got th" owner to identify th" hide an" locked th" feller up.
Inspector Purvis happened to be down that day inspectin" detachments, so I rustled up another J.P. and got them to commit this gink. I mind his wife came to see him that night, an" kinder out of respect for her feelin"s I kept out o" hearin" while they chewed th" rag. Next evenin"-I had a case on durin" th" day-I drives to th" station with him to catch th" eight-thirty East-bound, usin" a wagon an" team I"d borrowed. We had to pa.s.s _his_ place on th" way, an" he says to me, kinder simple like: "Corporal,"-I was a corporal then-"I"ll most-like be awaitin" trial some time an" I"ll be wantin" some clothes. I fixed it up with th" woman last night to have "em ready when we come past. D"yu" mind stoppin"?" "All right," I says, never suspicionin" nothin", for he seemed a sorter homely, foolish kind o" "mossback." Sure enough, when we comes opposite his place, out comes his wife with a big, fat gunny-sack. Puts it in th"
wagon. Cries, an" kisses him, an" says "good-by." It was a bitter cold night, I mind, an" I had my fur coat collar turned up high "round my face, an" my cap pulled down. Presently, when we was about half ways there, he starts in to groan an" shiver up against me. "What"s up?" I says. "Cramps," says he, still groanin". "Gosh, but I"ve got "em bad."
There was some straw in th" bottom of th" wagon, an" thinkin" it might ease him some if he lay down a bit, I helped him over th" seat into th"
box, an" he lay down amongst th" straw, with his gunny-sack for a pillow-_mine_, with th" calfskin exhibit in it, alongside me on th"
off-side of th" seat. Havin" cuffs an" leg-shackles on him I knew he wouldn"t be fool enough to make any kind of a breakaway, especially as he really seemed sick, so I didn"t watch him particularly close, an" we jogged along through th" dark. He still seemed pretty bad when we made th" station, so I got him a slug of whiskey an" we boarded th" train. I handed him over at the guardroom, when we got into th" Post-locked up my gunnysack, an" beat it back on th" West-bound that was late that night.
I didn"t want to be around th" Post next day for fear Mickey, th" S.M., might keep me in for duty. Well, the case came up about three months later at th" Supreme Court.
"Mr. Man hires him a lawyer an" pleads "not guilty," as bold as bra.s.s.
As I figured I had th" case all hunkadory I only had one witness-th"
owner of th" calf. I goes into the box an" gives my evidence an" pulls out th" hide exhibit to identify. A red an" white one I"d put in an" a red an" white one I pulls out, but I well-nigh had a fit when I saw th"
brand on it. It was th" prisoner"s _own_. I looked like a proper fool, I guess, with th" mossback an" his "mouthpiece" both givin" me th" "ha, ha." Luckily for me, Inspector Purvis happened to be in court an" of course his statement that everything had been in order at th"
preliminary trial when he committed th" man was accepted by the judge, an" after a hard fight with th" defending counsel-who, of course, wanted to proceed right then an" there-we got th" case set over, an" started in to investigate. "Twasn"t much use, though. They-th" prisoner, his wife, an" th" lawyer-put it all over us-easy. Yes, _sir_, they had th" bulge on us, all right, an" they knew it. Case was dismissed at its second hearing through lack of evidence-th" judge intimating, however, that he was satisfied that there"d been some funny work somewhere, though, under th" circ.u.mstances he had no alternative but to give th" prisoner th"
benefit of th" doubt. Th" O.C., Purvis, an" th" lawyer, well-nigh crucified me with their remarks. Been mighty careful ever since, yu"
bet!
"A constable named Mason nailed him later, though, for stealing a horse.
He had him dead to rights an" made a better job of things than me. My "rube" got three years. I had charge of th" escort when we took him, along with some others, up to th" "Pen." It was then that he told me the whole business. He"d fixed it up with his wife th" night she come to see him in th" cells. When she came out with that gunny-sack, she"d put one of their own calf-hides in on top of his clothes. That"s what made th"
sack look so big. How in h-l he ever managed to snake _my_ sack from alongside me on th" seat-without me feelin" him-swop them two hides, an"
then put it back again, was a corker, but he managed it, somehow, an"
dropped th" real "un on th" trail, where his wife, followin" us up in th" dark on a saddle-horse, snaffled it an" took it home in quick shape an" burnt it."
This story, delivered with the Sergeant"s characteristic humorous, arrogant abruptness, caused his listeners-in spite of the gravity of the circ.u.mstances attending its telling-considerable amus.e.m.e.nt. It was a curious anecdote for a man to relate of himself, especially in the midst of the somewhat grim situation under which they were met, but it was quite in keeping with Benton"s strange, complex character.
The three men lay silent awhile after this, each busy with his own reflections. Presently Gallagher, who was gazing absently at the scar on the policeman"s cheek, said quietly:
"It was yu" killed "Slim" Cash.e.l.l, over to Pitman, wasn"t it, Sargint?"
At the question the lazy good humor died out of Benton"s face strangely.
Bleak and inscrutable became his expression on the instant-lowering and sinister. His far-away, ruthless eyes began to glow with their peculiar baleful light. It was the sun suddenly enveloped by a storm-cloud.
"Aye," he said darkly, and a long pause ensued. "It was me or him," he went on, in a cold, even, pa.s.sionless voice. "An" my way o" thinkin"
_an"_ actin" at such show-downs is th" same, I reckon, as old Israel Hands"-a certain gentleman o" fortune in a book I guess yu"ve never read, Barney.... "Him as strikes first is my fancy; dead men don"t bite; them"s my views-amen, so be it." ... He had his chance, anyway, an" he left me his card, which I"ll pack to my grave," he ended significantly, touching the scar.