The Max Brand Megapack (256 page)

Here the way widened out into a perfect little amphitheater, with a hundred exits from the pit. Pausing in the very center of the place Ronicky looked around him in amazement; for it was like a gigantic trap, contrived with the labor of a myriad men and during countless years. Suppose that an attacking party should pour into this place, hurrying as they saw the opening before them—they would be lost, condemned to massacre. Ringing those summits in any direction, a few expert marksmen, lying in perfect security for themselves, could demolish hundreds in a few seconds. Or if they tired of bullets and wished to make a quick destruction, there were the rocks here, as everywhere, masses upon masses of rocks which only needed that one be pried loose at the top of a slope in order to send a vast volley of them thundering to the bottom.

So rapt in interest was he by the natural features of the fortifications, that Ronicky Doone allowed himself to be easily surprised by a horseman who wandered into the amphitheater from behind. When Ronicky turned his head he saw a cow-puncher sitting at ease in the saddle, twisted sideways, with one foot out of the stirrup and one hand combing his long mustaches.

Ronicky looked at him with surprise. He was like a man out of a book. This was one of those formidable-appearing punchers who are described so often in books, but whom Ronicky had never seen before in real life.

“How are you, partner?” exclaimed Ronicky.

“Hello,” said the other.

“You sure must have velvet on your hoss,” said Ronicky.

“Oh, I dunno. You was so darned set on seeing everything in here that I guess you didn’t listen particular careful. Wasn’t that it?”

“Maybe. I sure can hear him now, plenty loud.”

For, as the cow pony on which the other was mounted took a few steps into the arena, each footfall beat up long echoes, riding the overlooking slopes.

“Well,” said the stranger, “I dunno what you think about it, but I figure that
I
was sent up here on a wild-goose chase!”

“You were?” asked Ronicky.

“Yes, sir. I was told that up here the mountain was just plain climbing with outlaws and man-eaters.”

“Did you come up hunting ’em?” asked Ronicky, amused.

The other chuckled and nodded. His voice and manner by no means bore out his formidable mustaches. The one was as soft as a child’s, and the other was perfectly calm and gentle.

“Anyways,” he said, “if I
did
come up here hunting for ’em, it don’t seem no ways likely that I’ll find none—unless you’re one of ’em?”

And here he looked sharply at Ronicky, though with a smile still lingering in the corners of his eyes, as though he were willing to laugh heartily at his own suggestion, as soon as Ronicky gave him the clew.

“Well,” said Ronicky, “you can’t never tell. I might be. Just my saying no wouldn’t prove nothing, I guess.”

“I dunno,” replied the other, combing his mustaches gravely. “All them that I’ve ever knowed always get tolerable hot under the collar when they’re accused of being crooks.”

“That,” said Ronicky, “is because most of the stick-up gents and yeggs that you meet wandering around these parts are a ratty low gang. But I guess you’re new around here, eh?”

“I’m new, all right,” said the other. “I just come in from away out Denver way. I don’t just exactly fit in, I find. So I ain’t breaking my heart trying to find a job. I’m just spending a little time and money and trying to get used to new ways. “.

“You’ve made a long jump,” said Ronicky, “all the way from Denver to here!”

“I’m used to long jumps,” said the other, and a slight cloud crossed his forehead. “But go on. You was about to tell me that them that hang out up here are not the same lot of yeggs that wander around most places?”

“Sure they ain’t,” said Ronicky. “Want me to tell you why?”

“Go ahead.”

“Well, it’s a long ways to the top of this mountain, ain’t it?”

“Tolerable long.”

“And it takes a lot of muscle and patience to make the trip, don’t it?”

“Reasonable much.”

“Well, partner, all the yaller-livered crooks I’ve ever knowed hate work; and all the downright smart ones know that they got to work, for what they get, just the same as them that are living inside of the law. And all these gents that make headquarters on the top of old Mount Solomon—you can lay to it that they’re a uppish crew!”

“If it takes work either way,” said the man of the whiskers, “why don’t they stay where they won’t have to climb so far? Why don’t they just remain down below and work like the rest of us?”

“Because they like the taking of a chance,” said Ronicky. “Speaking personal, I don’t give much for a gent that won’t take a chance once in a while. And these boys up here—well, they just nacherally figure it out that they can do better by taking this sort of a chance than they can by staying below and playing the game like the rest of us do.”

“H’m,” said the other, and he scratched his chin. “You talk pretty convincing,” he chuckled after a moment. “You make it look so dog-gone different from what I was thinking that I’m half minded to try to find some of them gents and ask how about joining up with ’em. I wonder how it would be best to go about that, eh?”

“Why,” said Ronicky carelessly, “you wouldn’t have to look at all.”

The other started.

“What?” he asked.

“Sure you wouldn’t,” said Ronicky. “Why, these men up here are pretty wise, ain’t they? They want new men all the time, don’t they? Well, you can lay to it that when a man rides up to the top of Solomon Mountain, he gets a pretty good looking-over!”

“H’m,” said the other. “You don’t say! You sure talk familiar. Maybe you’ve had a pal that joined up?”

“No, I’m just using common sense.”

“Maybe you think that you and me are being spied on?”

“Maybe.”

“They’re sizing us up from behind one of them rocks, maybe?”

“Nope, they wouldn’t do that. All the looking in the world don’t help as much for sizing up a gent as it does to have a couple of words with him and see how he talks. No, sir!”

“What would they do then?”

“Oh, when a man comes up to the top of the mountain, most like they’d send out a man to see him.”

“You don’t say! Just walk a man right out and let him start in talking to you?”

“No, they’d probably put him onto a hoss and let him ride out.”

“What would he say?”

“Oh, they’s a big enough pile of things that he could say, partner. Just anything to start up the conversation. But of course they’d have to pretend to be plumb innocent. Just happened to be riding up on the top of the mountain, you see?”

“Like me, say, or you?”

“That’s right,” said Ronicky. “And to ease the conversation along he’d probably say that he come from some place a long ways off—Denver, maybe.”

The other laughed, but his eye was sober. “Well,” asked Ronicky suddenly, “what have you decided about me, partner? Will I do for a try?”

CHAPTER XXVIII

SOLOMON MOUNTAIN
MEN

While he was not at all sure, Ronicky took the chance and faced it out with the most perfect assurance. The wink which he gave the stranger was a marvel of confidence exchanged. It invited a confession better than spoken words. But the man of the long mustaches regarded him with a dull and wondering eye.

“I dunno what you’re talking about,” he said.

“All right,” answered Ronicky. “If you feel that way about it, of course I ain’t the man to bother you none. Let’s talk about something else—Denver, say.”

The other said nothing, but he continued to regard Ronicky with eyes which were so steady that they would have been impertinent had they not been so misted over with unconcern.

“Denver?” he asked. “Why, sure. I’m always glad to talk about Denver. Know any other folks from Denver?”

“Plenty,” said Ronicky.

“Let’s hear. Maybe we got some mutual friends.”

“Maybe we have. There was ‘Pete the Blacksmith.’ Did you know him?”

“Didn’t hang out with the blacksmiths much.”

“He got his name from the way he could handle a drill,” said Ronicky, staring closely at the other.

“I ain’t a miner either,” said he of the mustaches. “There was ‘Lefty Joe’, too,” said Ronicky. “I think you must have heard of him.”

He was inventing names as well as he could, such names as yeggs might have, the one with the other. But still the man of the mustaches shook his head.

“Never knowed a Lefty Joe in Denver,” he said.

“Well,” said Ronicky, determined to make one desperate rally and beat down the reserve of the other, “you ought to have knowed him. He’s a first-class inside man. I’ve seen him do everything from the making of soup to the making of the mold and the running of the soup in it.”

He of the mustaches stopped combing them for a moment.

“Look here,” said Ronicky, “I ain’t a fool. Loosen up and talk. What’s your monica?”

And like light from a great distance, a smile began to spread over the hardy features of the other. It increased finally to a rather sad-faced grin which was apparently the nearest approach to mirth of which the man was capable. A pressure of his knees brought his cow pony close to Lou. He stretched out his hand.

“Put it there,” he said. “I thought at first you were four-flushing. But I see you ain’t. I’m ‘Montana Charlie.’ Maybe we’ve met up before some place I disremember, or was I so bad that you just read right through me?”

“Bad actor?” asked Ronicky, eager to make sure that the pride of his new companion should not be injured. “I should say not. Matter of fact you were so smooth, Charlie, that I began to think that I was all wrong about you. But I
have
seen you somewhere. I disremember where. Were you working with ‘Mississippi Fatty’ three years back?”

“Nope, because three years back I was playing a lone hand and doing pretty well with it, at that. This here is the first time that I’ve ever throwed in with a gang. But I got sort of lonesome and decided that I needed a change. So that’s why I’m down here with the boys on Solomon Mountain. What do you think of it?”

“Slick as grass,” said Ronicky. “Of course I’ve heard about it a pile. But this is my first trip up, and it sure looks better than anything that they’ve said about it, and that means a lot. Eh?”

“Yep, that means a lot. We been breaking the heart of one sheriff a month, on the average, ever since we got together here. But what’s your name, partner?”

Ronicky Doone reflected swiftly. Should he give them his true name? That name was too clearly known by this time as that of a cow-puncher. Ronicky Doone was no name by which a lawbreaker would travel. On the other hand it was possible that some one might have seen him in Twin Springs. In that case he would be known. He summed up the chances. It was very possible that to assume a new name would be fatal. If they had seen him and known him in Twin Springs, then the fact that he had changed his name would be heavy evidence against him. But if he did not assume a name the chances were great that he would never see the interior dens of Mount Solomon. And that was the purpose for which he had taken this ride. Moreover it might very well be that no one from the mountain had been in Twin Springs while he was there. While they, no doubt, got daily news of everything that happened in the town, there was also no doubt that this news must be relayed to them. He determined then to run the risk and give a false name.

“I’m ‘Texas Slim,’” he said. “Maybe where you and me bumped into each other away back was out in that direction.”

“Maybe it was,” agreed Montana Charlie. “I’ve sure hunted the old Lone Star from one end to the other and got some fat pickings.”

“Sure,” replied Ronicky, nodding.

“Well,” went on Montana, “let’s get down below. And what did you think of my make-up—tell me straight!”

He fumbled at his face. The long mustaches disappeared. And at the same time it even seemed to Ronicky that some of the wrinkles of age, which doubtless only his imagination had furnished, had disappeared at the same moment. He found himself staring at the face of a man not more than thirty years old. His eyes were keen, and, as he straightened out of his lazy slouch on the horse, never had Ronicky seen the very heart of a man changed so quickly. Montana Charlie had become in a second or two a young man fairly alive with energy, and he sat in his saddle, laughing at Ronicky’s bewilderment.

“You ought to be on the stage,” Ronicky assured him. “You sure know how to make up!”

Montana Charlie was as happy as a child over the effect which he had produced.

“I pretty near come to laughing,” he said, “when you said that you’d met me in some place before.”

“Maybe I have, though,” said Ronicky. “And maybe it was just the sound of your voice or something like that that made me recognize you.”

In the meantime Montana Charlie was leading the way to the side and through a narrow passage. Ronicky turned to listen to the echoes which went chiming high above them, and when he faced the front again, the other had disappeared. He stared around him bewildered, until there was a burst of laughter immediately before him, and presently Montana Charlie appeared again from around the corner of an immense boulder.

“You see what sort of a place we got up here,” he said. “We could make a posse so sick and dizzy that it’d never find itself again after it chased us for ten full minutes. Look here!”

He beckoned Ronicky to him and showed behind the rock the opening of a high and narrow passage. It was hardly noticeable from either end of the boulder, but it was of sufficient size for horse and man to disappear into it. Montana led through the opening and checked his horse again just inside the entrance.

“If you got any doubts about belonging up here,” he said gravely, “you better come no farther, Texas. Because them that get inside of here on a bluff, sure are made sorry for it before they get out again!”

But Ronicky, having committed himself to the adventure, would not draw back again. He waved Montana on with a laugh, and the two presently rode out of the narrow passage, turned to the right into a spacious hall formed by a great cleft in the rock, with air and light filtering through in plenty from fissures above, and followed this hall until it widened suddenly into a large chamber, where Ronicky found himself in the presence of half a dozen lolling figures.