The Max Brand Megapack (230 page)

His glance turned upon her swiftly, and he nodded; but then his eyes traveled past her again and toward those groups of gamblers, flashing from face to face as though he found the twelve an intricate and dangerous study. Why was that? she wondered.

“I’ve come to tell you, Ronicky,” she went on, “that our troubles are ended. Jack Moon is going to let dad leave in the morning. In fact, we can leave now, if we wish!”

“You can?” cried Ronicky, in such a tone of amazement that she stared at him. “Then—then how quick can you get going?”

“But we’re not going to go until the morning.”

Ronicky sighed. “I thought not,” he muttered. “I s’pose Moon told you it’d be better to wait till there was some light on the trails over the mountains. He’s deep!”

“You hate him blindly,” insisted the girl. “But that isn’t the point. In the morning I may leave without having a chance to see you again. Now that you’ve taken up this terrible life, I suppose I’ll never see you again after tomorrow!”

“I sure take it kind,” said Ronicky, but his voice was cold, “that you’ve wasted any time thinking about that.”

“Oh, Ronicky,” cried the girl, “I know you’re close to hating me for things I’ve said to you in the last few days, but it’s always been because it hurt me to see you go the way you’ve gone. But to the end of my life, Ronicky, I’ll keep hold on my first impression of you, generous and brave, and kinder than any man who has ever come into my life. I want you to know this before I see you for the last time!”

To her surprise, the tribute merely made him smile, and there was no gentleness in his face.

“You ain’t seeing me for the last time,” he declared. “And—Heaven willing—tomorrow ain’t going to be the last day, either. Jack Moon’ll see to that.”

“You think he doesn’t mean what he’s promised? That he’ll keep us after all?”

Ronicky merely smiled. And she was angered again.

“You hate him,” she said fiercely, “merely because you know that he sees through you; and that—that’s contemptible! I came here to tell you how sorry I am that you’ve gone the way you are going—but now I only have to say that I scorn your suspicions—and I scorn you!”

But as she turned away she saw that he still was paying no heed to her but kept his eager, intent gaze fixed upon the gamblers.

The ending of that interview had been marked by Jack Moon, and when he saw the girl toss her head and turn away he smiled with satisfaction. It meant that his most daring scheme had met with perfect success. Only by using Ronicky Doone as a foil had he been able to worm his way into the confidence of the girl. Now he was on the high road to success. That road was a difficult and long one to travel, even now. But much might be done with caution and steady diplomacy. Great problems still confronted him. Hugh Dawn must be disposed of. And terrible Ronicky Doone must be brushed from the way. Most difficult of all, the girl must listen to him when he decided to talk as he had never yet talked to any human being.

There would be time for these things. Meanwhile, the last few minutes had brought about a state of affairs for which he had been watching and waiting.

The gambling had ceased to be a gay and noisy affair. The exuberance of spirits which naturally followed the finding of the gold had gradually died away, and the silence of the gaming hall now brooded over the little groups, each squatted cross-legged about saddle blankets. The winner now dragged in his stakes with a glint of the eye. The loser saw his gold go with a savage out-thrust of the lower jaw.

The losers were more numerous than the winners. Silas Treat had almost cleaned out the entire stakes of his own group. Baldy McNair had well nigh emptied the pockets at another blanket. Indeed, in each group there gradually came to be one corner toward which there was a steady drifting of profits. There was a natural reason. The best gamblers had avoided one another’s company, and each had selected a place where he would have a chance for uninterrupted fleecing.

In only one place had things gone amiss, and that was with the most expert gambler of all, Bud Kent. The little bow-legged, broad-shouldered fellow ordinarily was a steady winner, and this night he saw a chance to win, at his own blanket, a hundred thousand dollars in better than cash. So, with glinting eyes, he had settled to his task. But fate, called luck among gamblers, was against him. His three of a kind was invariably topped by a higher three. And once a flush was beaten by a higher flush! When he bluffed, someone was sure to call him. When he nursed the betting cautiously in the beginning to keep from betraying the real strength of his hand, someone was sure to call him, and his winnings were paltry. And at length, plunging his last four pounds of metal on a full house, he lost his final scrap of the treasure and rose from the blanket—broke!

Not a word, not a glance followed him. The remaining three shifted their places a little and closed the gap which he had left, as well-drilled soldiers close the gap where a comrade falls in the charge. Each of the three had shared in the plundering of Bud; each of the three was confident he could keep on winning from his companions. But Kent went gloomily to the leader.

“You seen that?” he said, in a deep voice of disgust.

“I seen it.” The chief nodded.

“Can you beat it?”

“Hard luck,” said Jack Moon, who knew perfectly what was coming.

“Well, sir,” went on Bud Kent, “there lies a hundred thousand in gold, and if I hadn’t hit that last streak of bad luck I’d of cleaned the whole thing up. Eh?”

“Maybe you would,” said the leader.

“Maybe? I’d of been sure to! Ain’t I played with all these gents time and again and always trimmed them? They can’t sit in the same game with me. Only the luck held steady for them and steady against me. But a couple more hands would of changed things. Luck? I never seen it hold like this! See that brace of bullets and the three nines I held? And four measly deuces come out and beat me!”

He groaned at the thought.

“If you was to back me,” he said suddenly, “I could clean out the whole mess. If you was to back me, I’d split the winnings with you, Jack.”

“Thanks,” said Jack Moon soberly.

“I’d make it two parts for you and one part for me,” persisted Bud Kent.

“I can’t do it, Bud,” said Moon as kindly as possible. “You know how it is with me. If I backed you, then the next fellow who went busted would come and ask me to back him. And then the next and the next. Of course you and me know that it’s different with you. We know that you sure can gamble. But the other boys wouldn’t see it that way. They’d think that because I backed you I ought to back them. They’d accuse me of playing favorites. That’s clear, ain’t it, Bud?”

“But you wouldn’t have to say anything,” suggested Bud. “Just slip me a handful of the stuff and—”

“They’d know where you got it. Nobody but me would stake any of the boys. If you think I’m wrong, go around to some of the other blankets and ask some of the fellows for a handout. See what you get!”

“I know,” grunted Bud Kent, and he rolled his eyes savagely at his former companions. “I’ll make ’em pay sooner or later,” he declared. “The swine! Not a one in the crowd that’ll stake me!”

“What about Hugh Dawn?” suggested the leader.

Bud Kent looked up at him sharply. But Jack Moon, having dropped his sinister suggestion, was staring idly up to the dark of the sky.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

Moon is Baffled

The silence continued through a breathless moment.

“D’you mean it?” gasped Bud Kent at last.

“Mean what?” said Jack Moon, and his eye was innocent as the eye of a child.

Bud Kent considered his master. The moods of Jack Moon, he knew, were variable as the moods of the west wind. Other members of the crowd strove, from time to time, to find the meanings hidden in that implacable and cunning mind, but Bud Kent, the oldest member of the crew, had ceased striving to find the clue to the riddle. What Moon thought was his own property, and it was dangerous to attempt to read two meanings into his words. But now Bud scanned the face of the master and hungered for knowledge. What was the significance of that short phrase of a moment ago?

“You think,” said Bud at length, very slowly and very cautiously, “that Hugh ain’t got much use for his money?”

“I dunno,” said the leader, as carelessly as ever. “I ain’t asked him about it.”

“It might take a lot of persuading,” said Bud Kent, “and I ain’t much at talk.”

“Sure you ain’t,” said the other. “So you better arrange it so’s there won’t be no need for chatter.”

Bud Kent moistened his Ups, parted them to speak, changed his mind, and finally managed to whisper: “Chief, talk out. I don’t foller you exactly.”

“How to stop talk?” replied the leader casually. “Any fool knows that. What mostly keeps a gent from talking?”

“Being persuaded, I guess.”

“Think you can persuade a man out of thirty thousand dollars?”

Bud swallowed hard.

“I dunno,” he said desperately. “You might stop a gent by gagging him.”

He grinned, so that this last suggestion might pass in lieu of a jest if need be. But Jack Moon kept an entirely sober face. All the time he was watching the effect on Bud Kent. He was as interested as the scientist who watches the insect wriggle under the touch of acid.

“Gagging?” said he. “That’s a fool idea.”

“What is your idea?” asked Bud.

“Look here. I had to promise Dawn his share before I could find out where the gold was, didn’t I? And then I gave him the gold, didn’t I?”

“Sure.”

“But I ain’t his guardian, am I? After giving the stuff to him, I don’t have to stay up all night to guard it, do I?”

“No, no!” breathed Bud, beginning to see the light.

“It sure ought to be clear to you, Bud, that it don’t make me any too happy to see a skunk like Dawn, that’s left the crowd once, get away with all that loot.”

“That’s clear, chief.”

“Then, if a gent was to slip in soft to Hugh’s hut and grab the coin—”

“With three other men sleeping around him?”

“I’ll see that he sleeps alone tonight. They ain’t any need of guarding him. He thinks he’s extra safe with us now!”

“Ah!” murmured Bud.

“What you want is a stake,” went on Jack Moon. “Tonight ain’t the only night for poker. They’ll be another and then another, until the gold is all collected up in the hands of two or three of the boys. Well, Bud, you’re soft moving and silent. If you was to slide in and take the stuff, it wouldn’t make me extra mad. But mind this: They’s no harm to come to Hugh Dawn!”

Bud Kent replied with a broad grin, nodded, and then said suddenly: “But suppose he makes a kick about his money in the morning when he finds it’s gone? Suppose they search for it and find it in my saddlebags?”

“If you’re enough of a fool not to bury it, son, I suppose they would find it in your saddlebags.”

Bud Kent waited to hear no more, but, nodding to his chief with a whispered word of gratitude, he sauntered back to watch the game he had just left.

On and on to midnight the game continued, but by this time the terrific labors of the last two days began to tell. The gold fever was dying out, and, without this stimulant to keep them going, heads began to nod and eyes began to grow filmy. Seymour and Craig by this time were also broke; they joined Bud Kent as a gallery to watch the others. But at length, by mutual consent and almost at the same moment, the games were broken up and the gamblers staggered hollow-eyed toward their shacks. Here Jack Moon, who had been waiting for this moment, assigned them swiftly to their separate lodgings. He kept his promise to Bud, steering the others away from the hut of Dawn. The pretext was easily found—no use waking up a sleeper when there was plenty of room in other huts. One shack for the girl, one for her father, and the other structures afforded room for thrice the whole number of men.

Meanwhile Ronicky waited until the leader was out of sight. Then he glanced about the clearing. Other than himself, every man in the crowd was busy with getting into his blankets—all except the two outposts detailed to keep watch south and north, unfailing precautions which the bandit chief never overlooked. But the clearing itself was the very apotheosis of peace. Not a voice sounded, not a footfall was to be heard. All was dull quiet, and Ronicky turned his back on the scene, entered the hut, and straightened out his own blanket.

One by one the breathing of the men in the hut became more deep and regular. He himself imitated the same sound and lay back, veiling his eyes with the lids and only peering out through the curtain of lashes. The silence grew more and more deep, it seemed to him. The heavier sound of Treat’s breathing sounded above the hushed chorus of the others. Someone was snoring in a nearby hut. But beyond and above was the silence.

It was, indeed, too quiet. It was the quiet of a snare, an illusion, a trap. And one of those impulses, which no man can really explain, came to Ronicky. An hour had passed since he lay down, and still sleep was far from his eyes. At length, with the softness of a guilty man who dreads oversight, he drew back his blanket and sat up. Finally he rose to a crouching position, stole to the door, and looked out onto the clearing.

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

Two Against Twelve

He saw nothing at first, and he was about to dismiss his foolish fears when something stirred near the hut in which the girl slept. Ronicky Doone was instantly alert. Staring fixedly, he saw the thing again.

It was the form of a man crawling in an almost prone position so that the ground shadows well nigh covered him from the most searching view. Suspicion had been like a searchlight to pick out the figure for Ronicky Doone. Ordinarily, he would never have seen it.

The fellow, whoever he might be, had just crawled out of sight behind the shack of the girl. Ronicky slid back to his blankets, buckled his cartridge belt about him, and, blessing the fact that he had no riding boots to encumber his stockinged feet, he stole again to the door, prepared to stalk toward the hut of Jerry Dawn.

But as he reached the door again, the figure reappeared on the nearer side of the girl’s hut and crawled on until it passed behind the next shack, that where Hugh Dawn slept, and, though Ronicky waited an ample time, the stalker did not reappear. Then suddenly it flashed across the mind of the watcher that Hugh Dawn slept alone in that shack this night! Was there some ulterior purpose in the kindly insistence of Moon that Hugh be allowed to sleep on, undisturbed by the coming of others in his shack?