"Yes," insisted Billy Wingo. "And what"s more, I"ll lend you a suit of my clothes and my white hat and my red-and-white pinto. Which there ain"t another paint pony colored like mine in this county; and just to make it a fair deal, I"ll wear your buffalo coat and your fur cap, and I"ll ride one of your horses,--that long-legged gray, I guess, will be all right."
The judge"s face wore a curiously mottled pallor that gave it the hue of a dead fish"s belly. "Are you insane?" he gasped.
"Not me," denied Billy Wingo. "It"s like I said. I"m gambling with you. I guess we understand each other, Judge. Ain"t it luck, you and I being about of a size? Dressed up in my clothes with that white hat and all, you"d have to excuse anybody for mistaking you for me.
Ca-a-areful, Judge, careful. Don"t do anything we would be sorry for.
And don"t take it so to heart; perhaps he"ll miss you."
For a s.p.a.ce he considered the judge, then he said:
"I guess we"re ready for Riley, now."
Despite his professional calm the judge almost bounced out of his chair. "Riley! Where----"
"In the kitchen with the door open," explained Billy. "He didn"t go with Shotgun and Reelfoot a-tall--that is, not far. Only round the house to the back door. Reelfoot wasn"t completely successful in separating me from my deputies. You didn"t catch me whispering in Riley"s ear while he was getting ready, did you? I thought maybe you wouldn"t. Your back was turned. Moral: Never turn your back when there"s a mirror behind you. Riley, you"d better come in now."
Whereupon there was a noise of bootheels, and Riley entered and smiled cheerfully upon the discomfited judge.
"Howdy, your honor," said Riley Tyler.
The judge made no acknowledgment of the greeting. He continued to gaze before him with a set and stony face.
"Riley," said Billy Wingo, without, however, removing his eyes from the judge, "I guess we"ll need another witness. I wonder if you could get hold of Guerilla Melody."
Riley nodded and went out.
"And that"s that," said Billy Wingo, smiling.
The judge"s hands gripped the arms of the chair. "You know that the man Melody is an enemy of mine," he said in a shaken voice.
"I know that he is an honest man," returned Billy Wingo.
"I won"t go," the judge declared feebly.
"You said that before," said Billy Wingo, in no wise moved. "You"ll go all right. Yes, indeedy. Do you wanna know why? I"ll tell you. You see, Judge, I know what I"m up against. I know that the only barrier that stands between me and the graveyard is the lead in this gun. I like life. I enjoy it. Besides, I"m too young to die and too sinful and all that. Therefore it"s my business to see I ain"t cut off in the flower of my youth, _et cetera_. You"re considerably older than me, Judge, considerably. The gray is in your hair like frost on a punkin, and the devil has drawn two mighty mean lines down from your nose to the corners of your mouth, and the crows have messed up your eye-corners too, for that matter, and may the Lord have mercy on your soul, you miserable sinner, because I won"t--if you don"t do exactly what I tell you to do. It"s my life or yours, and it"s not gonna be mine."
"Baby talk," said the judge, but there was no conviction in his tone.
"You think so? Aw right, let it go at that. Here"s the rest of the baby talk: The first false move you start to make between now and the time I"m through with you, you get it."
"You wouldn"t dare!"
"Wouldn"t I? Call me and see. No trouble to show goods."
The judge hesitated. It was obvious that he was of two minds. He chose the safer course--for the present.
"There is a law in this country--" he began.
Billy Wingo leaned forward, his chin jutting out. His eyes were unpleasantly cold. They matched his voice when he spoke.
"Don"t talk to me of the law," he said. "It"s you and your friends that have made the law in Crocker County a spectacle for decent men.
Law! You"ve dragged the statutes in the mud till you can"t tell "em apart from the turnips underground. Law! You"ve prost.i.tuted your office for a little filthy money here, there and everywhere, till it"s a wonder you"re able to live with yourself. How do you do it? Don"t you ever get tired of your own stink, you polecat?"
This was too much. The judge was, after all, a human being. He had his pride, such as it was, and courage of a kind. He threw himself sidewise, and at the same time his right hand flipped up under his coat tail, flipped up and flipped out.
There was a flash and a roar and a spirtle of smoke. The judge"s six-shooter was wrenched from his fingers and sent spinning across the room. The judge remained upon the floor. There was no feeling in his right hand. But his right arm felt as if it had been struck with a spike-maul.
The acrid smoke rose slowly toward the ceiling.
"You can get up, Judge," Billy Wingo said calmly.
The judge rose slowly and collapsed into the chair he had so abruptly vacated. He held his right hand before his face and waggled it.
Stupidly he looked at it. The flesh of the trigger finger was slightly torn. It bled a little.
"The bullet didn"t touch you," said Billy. "The trigger guard did that when the gun was twiddled out of your hand. The lead hit the frame in front of the cylinder. Wait, I"ll show you." He crossed the room to where the judge"s six-shooter lay, picked it up and brought it to the judge for his inspection.
"See how I trust you," said Billy sardonically, holding up the judge"s six-shooter within ten inches of the judge"s eyes. "You could almost grab this gun out of my hand if you felt like it. I really dunno but what I hope you"ll feel like it."
But the judge did not feel like it. He perceived without difficulty the gray splotch on the frame of the six-shooter that marked the spot where Billy Wingo"s lead had struck, and he felt absolutely no inclination to gamble further with fate. Not he. No!
Billy tucked the judge"s six-shooter into his waistband and ran a hand over and under the jurist"s outer clothing.
"You might be carrying a derringer or something," he murmured in apology.
But he found no other weapon, and he returned to his seat to await the arrival of Riley Tyler and Guerilla Melody.
CHAPTER TWELVE
THE TRAP
Guerilla Melody regarded the judge without expression. "Huh," he grunted. "Huh."
The judge did not look at him. He had cheated Melody in a cattle deal the previous year and had since found himself unable to look Melody in the eye. Some villains are like that. They are usually of the cheaper variety.
"It"s good and dark now," observed Billy Wingo, "and the moon will rise in another hour. We don"t want it to be too high when we strike the Walton ranch. Why the smile, Judge? Oh, I know. You think we"ll be seen by one of your friends when we"re leaving, and he"ll get to the ranch ahead of us. I doubt it, Judge. You know we ain"t going by way of Main Street. No, we"re going out back of the corral. The cottonwoods grow right up close to the back of the corral, and if we lead our horses and hug the posts, there ain"t much chance of anybody seeing us. No. Come along, Judge, lessee how my clothes fit you."
Within the quarter-hour they rode out of a belt of cottonwoods into the Hillsville trail, three wooden-faced men and the wretched judge. The latter rode in front, with head bowed on hunched shoulders.
Where the snow permitted they trotted, but most of the time they were forced to walk their horses. Four times before they reached the draw leading to the Walton ranch they floundered through drifts that powdered the horse"s shoulders.
At the mouth of the draw the trail to Walton"s was clotted with the tracks of a few ridden horses.
"I guess," remarked Billy Wingo, "that Skinny Shindle came this way all right when he brought that note from Walton"s."
The judge shivered, but not with cold. He was very miserable and looked it.
The moon lifted an inquiring face over the rim of the neighboring ridge and threw their shadows, thin and long, across the green-white snow.