He stretched forth a hand, and breathed an inward curse. There was certainly a chair not a foot from his face. Taking care not to make a sound he lifted the chair by one leg and lobbed it through the air in the general direction of the district attorney. The results were immediate. The chair arrived, the district attorney squawked, and the man in the bedroom fired again, not according to the orders of the district attorney, but toward the spot where the chair had fallen.
Billy pulled trigger at the flash of the other"s gun. Then he began to crawl toward the bedroom door. He was a thorough believer in the doctrine of "getting in where it"s warm." He succeeded beyond his expectations. The occupant of the bedroom, who had removed his boots, tiptoed around the door jamb and stepped on Billy"s hand.
Both guns exploded simultaneously. What happened next has never been clear in Billy"s mind. He only knows that his head rang like a struck bell at the shot, and burning powder grains stung his ear and neck. He fired blind. A voice above his head cried aloud on the name of G.o.d, a hot and sweaty body collapsed upon him, and he dragged himself out from under precisely in time to glimpse the district attorney who, having torn open the door into the hall, was silhouetted for an instant against the dim radiance emanating from the kitchen.
Billy hunched his right shoulder, took a snapshot, and drove an accurate bullet through the right leg of the district attorney.
"He"s comin" around," said Shotgun Shillman. "You shot too high, Bill.
Y"ought to held lower, and you"d drilled his heart or anyway, a lung.
Now he"ll be a invalid nuisance for a while, like Rale."
"If I"d known you"d be so upset about it, I"d obliged you, Shotgun,"
returned Billy sarcastically. "As a matter of fact, I wanted both of "em alive. You can"t try dead men.
"That"s so," a.s.sented Shotgun. "But what a waste of time, when-- Oh, all right, all right, Bill. Have it your own way. You"re the dog with the bra.s.s collar, even if you do have to sleep in the jail till the warrants against you are annulled."
"What"s Jack trying to do?" Riley Tyler asked. "Here, take that out of your mouth!"
It was Billy who reached Jack Murray first. He s.n.a.t.c.hed the wadded ball of paper from Jack before he could close his teeth over it. Jack groaned.
"I didn"t mean to hurt you," apologized Billy. "But I had to grab your jaw. You were so quick."
"You didn"t hurt me," snarled Jack Murray. "It was somethin" else."
"What is the thing?" queried Guerilla Melody.
Billy smoothed out the crumpled wad. It appeared to be a letter and a promissory note.
"I forbid you to read that!" cried the district attorney, attempting to drag himself across the floor toward Billy. "That letter is personal and my private property!"
"You lie quiet," directed Riley Tyler. "If you go busting those bandages open, I"ll bust you. Lie back, lie down, and take it easy.
There"s nothing for you to get excited over. Everything"s all right.
Yeah. That"s the boy. Do as Uncle says."
"What"s the writing, Bill?" inquired Shotgun. "Read her off."
Billy read:
JUDGE HIRAM DONELSON, Hillsville.
DEAR SIR:--The man who killed Rafe Tuckleton is the county prosecutor Arthur Rale. Rale owed Tuckleton five thousand dollars on a note and couldn"t pay it. Rafe wanted his money. Early in the evening on the day he was killed, Tuckleton came to Rale"s house where I was at the time, and demanded payment. He brought the note with him. Rale refused and they quarreled. Tuckleton had been drinking. Before Tuckleton left, he said he was going to the Walton ranch. After he left, Rale told me he had planned some time ago to kill Tuckleton and get the note back at the first opportunity. This looked like a good opportunity. Rale showed me a butcher knife. He said it was just like one at the Walton ranch. He had cut Tom Walton"s initials on the handle so it would be like it. Rale said he had tried to get the original knife, but had not been able to. This one he had fixed up had to do. He said when his knife was found on Rafe"s body, everybody would think Hazel Walton had killed him, and n.o.body would believe her if she said the knife wasn"t hers. He had it in for Hazel anyway, he said, and by rubbing out Rafe and laying the blame on her, he"d win two bets at one throw. Suppose they found the regular Walton knife, I said. Rale said it wouldn"t make any difference. Anybody might know she could easy have two knives. Well, he offered me two hundred dollars cash to kill Rafe with this knife. I wouldn"t do it, so he had a couple of drinks and said he"d kill Rafe himself. He asked me to go with him. I went, and we hung around Walton"s till Tuckleton came out, and then we followed him, and Rale stopped him down the draw and said, I"ve got the money for you, Rafe. And Tuckleton got off his horse and then Rale stepped up close to him and let him have it. He stuck the knife in him a couple of times after Tuckleton was down and wriggling round. When Tuckleton was dead, Rale took the note out of Tuckleton"s pocketbook, and I held Rale up and took the note away from him. I thought maybe I might want to show him up some day, or sell it to him or something, when he got hold of some money. I was going to make him pay for it, one way or another.
Here is the note he took off Tuckleton.
The district attorney will tell you who I am if I don"t, so I haven"t any objections to signing my name. I"ll be in Old Mexico by the time you read this, anyway. So long, and give Rale what he deserves.
Yours truly, (Signed) JACK MURRAY.
Billy handed the letter and the Rale note to Shotgun Shillman, who folded both carefully and slipped them into an inner pocket of his vest. "And did you hear Rale say these were his private property?"
Shotgun Shillman nodded happily. "Even without "em, there is enough evidence to hang him. But there"s nothing like swinging a wide loop if you want to rope two at a clatter."
Billy"s eyes followed Shotgun"s side glance at Jack Murray. "You needn"t look at me thataway," snarled Jack. "I"m no snitch! I only wrote that letter to throw a scare into Rale. I"d never have sent it to the judge a-tall!"
"Maybe you"re no snitch," Billy flung back, with deep disfavor, "even if it does look like it, but you were skunk enough to let an innocent girl be blamed for murder."
"That was different. She hadn"t ought to horned in on what was none of her business. If she hadn"t-- Oh, h.e.l.l, what"s the use? Gimme a chew, somebody."
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
THE LONG DAY CLOSES
"Well," observed Sam Prescott, "folks will be sending Bill to Congress next. Directly or indirectly, he sure has put a crimp in county politics."
"Yes," a.s.sented his daughter, "now that the grand jury have indicted Craft, Larder, Murray and Rale, there isn"t anything left of the Crocker County ring but the hole."
"Maybe now Hazel will make it up with him."
"Maybe." With some indifference.
"Shucks, and he used to like you, Sally Jane."
"But I never liked him--enough." This with more indifference.
"More fool you. Bill"s going to get there, and you can stick a pin in that."
She bounced up from her chair and ruffled her father"s grizzled hair.
"I"d rather stick a pin in you, Samuel. Where did Hazel go?"
"Room, I guess. I don"t know what"s got into the child. She didn"t eat enough breakfast for a fly."
"She has been acting pretty meaching the last few days. I"ll go see what"s the matter."
Sally Jane found Hazel folding up her clothes as fast as she could fold. The bureau drawers were empty. Everything was on the bed.
"What on earth--" began Sally Jane.
"I"m going home," said Hazel, keeping her face turned away.
The direct Sally Jane cupped a hand under Hazel"s chin. "Let me see something. I _thought_ so. What"s the matter?"
"Nothing," declared Hazel, beginning to sniff a little.
"Then why don"t you tell him so?"