Читать книгу The False Rider - Макс Брэнд - Страница 5

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The stage driver seemed to be a fool. He insisted on going forward to look at his near leader. The masked man warned him grimly:

"Brother, if you budge one more step, I'll shoot a few inches inside that first slug."

The driver turned and scowled at him. He was a big fellow, that driver. He had rusty red hair and a big, saber-shaped mustache.

"I ain't got a gun," he said. "I was reachin' for a chaw of tobacco a while back, not for a gun. Go and fan me for a Colt, if you wanta, but I gotta see if you been and murdered Molly."

With that, he walked right past the leveled gun of the robber and went to the dead horse. The rifle of the masked man hesitated just as his mind must have hesitated. Then he said:

"Perhaps you're right, old-timer. Now, boys, kindly turn your backs, while I make a change."

The "change" consisted of tossing the rifle aside and at the same instant pulling out a revolver. This weapon he held only hip-high and did not aim with his eye on the sights. There were no sights, in fact, and instead of curving a forefinger around the trigger, the right thumb of the robber rested on the hammer of his gun. It was perfectly plain that here was a fellow who knew how to fan a revolver, and such men are not the ones to take liberties with.

Everybody in that party seemed sufficiently experienced to know all about the trick and the quality of the man who can perform it. Not one of the passengers attempted violence with the robber. All turned their backs obediently, and the highwayman went down the line, clapping the muzzle of the gun against the spinal columns, while with a marvelously rapid left hand he "frisked" every pocket. No pocket, in fact, was too secret for him to find it. He threw on the ground everything he secured—guns, wallets, knives—except the big, fat gold watches, which he dropped into his own pockets. He found stickpins and gold cuff links. Everything was secured with wonderful skill and rapidity by this master hand.

Then he told the youngest of the party to climb up behind the stage and cut the straps that held the baggage. Down into the road tumbled the luggage. A cloud of dust rose, and with it groans from two or three of the unlucky passengers.

"Sorry, boys," said the robber. "I have to go through this stuff to see what's what, but nothing is going to be spoiled on purpose. I want valuables, not clothes, and if you'll send back here for the stuff after an hour, you'll collect what's left. If anyone tries to come back before an hour, I'll show him that when I touched the driver on the shoulder, I was doing it on purpose—not missing my mark. I'm a man of a quiet temper, fellows, but I'm apt to lose hold of myself if any of you rush back to this place. Driver, cut loose that off leader. He only imbalances your team now, and besides I need him."

The driver, without a word, unhooked the off leader, pulled the harness off it with his left hand—the right hung helpless from his wounded shoulder—and unhooked the double-trees from the fifth chain. Then he paused and looked down at the dead gray mare.

"There's a mare," said the driver, "that never said 'No.' There's a mare that knew every curve of the road from here to Crow's Nest. I been drunk behind her, and she's made better time when I was drunk than when I was sober. If a gent had the sense to use the brake, she had the sense to take the curves. There's a mare, boys, that was a lady, and I loved her."

He came back toward the stage. One of the men offered to tie up his wound.

He answered: "Climb up there and haul on the brake for me, when I speak up. I'll take care of the line. I don't need no doctor till I get to Crow's Nest. I dunno that I wanta be touched by any one of the seven skunks that'll let one crook stick 'em up. There's too much yaller poison in your systems. I wouldn't wanta risk some of it runnin' into mine."

Tears were on his face as he spoke. He let them roll, unheeded. He climbed back into the seat, and the rest of the men prepared to follow. The youngster of the lot got up to handle the brake. Then the voice of the robber said:

"You, there—back up! You stay with me!"

All turned. The muzzle of the revolver definitely picked out Duff Gregor from the lot.

"You want me?" exclaimed Gregor, with a chill in his soul.

"You!" said the robber. "And keep your hands up! If you try to move, I'll plaster you. You fool, I know you!" What did that mean?

With dull eyes, Gregor watched the stage start off. With ringing ears, he heard the departing curses which the passengers hurled behind them at the robber.

The masked man knew him? Well, there was a great deal in this life of Gregor. There was enough to fill ten columns of fine print, and nothing but facts mentioned. Some victim of a card game, someone who had been "rolled" by Gregor when the victim was drunk?

The stage rumbled out of view behind the next bend of the road. Then the highwayman came up and shoved the muzzle of his revolver into Duff's middle. He said, in a voice which emotion made ring like a bell: "I've had you in my hands twice. This is the third time, and it's the last. Don't you know me?"

"I don't know you," said Gregor.

There was silence.

"You're changed," said the highwayman. "You're almost so changed that I wouldn't know you. But I really believe that you don't recognize me. If I were you, I'd know by the voice alone, but if you want to see my face, take a look at it, Jim Silver!"

With that he ripped the mask away.

Gregor's starting eyes stared into a finely made face, a long, handsome face. It had a sensitive, a mobile and almost delicate look, except that there was something infinitely cruel about the mouth and the bright, steady eyes. And the long, silken hair flowed back after the style that so many artists affect.

"It doesn't look so good to you, Jim, eh?" said the stranger. "It doesn't seem possible that the great Jim Silver would shove up his hands in a stage-coach and let any one man rob him, eh? But here you stand, ten seconds from death, Jim! I can't believe that it's the end of the long trail, at last. And if I hang for this tomorrow, I'll die a happy man!"

And Gregor knew, with wonderful certainty, that he was, in fact, hardly a scant ten seconds away from the future world. He had to think fast, and his mind was luckily one that fear stimulated and did not benumb.

"Brother," he said, "you got me wrong. I've got a shadow over my face just now, but lemme turn west into the light, and then see if I wear the scars of Jim Silver."

"Ah?" said the other, and started violently.

He took Gregor by the left shoulder and turned him hastily toward the west, where the light fell more closely on his face. Then he snarled with disgust and rage.

"I should have known!" he said. "I should have guessed it wasn't Jim Silver standing for a one-man play like mine. But who gave you a face so much like his?"

"Brother," said Gregor, "my face may be like his, but I've never made one phony dime out of the resemblance."

"It's not so like, either, now that I take another look," said the robber. "I suppose that hope was making me blind. But," he added, "you're close enough to turn your face into a mint! At least, it would be good for a million in this part of the world!"

"Because I look like Silver?" said Gregor. "Hold on, old-timer. A little confidence work, you mean? Maybe, in the end, I'm going to be glad that you stopped that stage. All at once some ideas seem to begin to soak into my brain."

There was silence between them, each man reading the mind of the other.

"What's your lay?" asked the robber shortly.

"Anything," said Duff Gregor, with a frankness which he felt would do him no harm, under the circumstances. "Anything from a jimmy to a gun is good enough for me, and I know how to make a mold with yellow soap and run the soup in it, if you come to cases."

There followed another silence, then the stranger asked: "Have you got an idea who I am?"

"Not the foggiest idea," said Gregor. "You might be Barry Christian, for all I know."

"Might be?" said the other. "Everyone knows my face has been published up and down the land. Everyone knows the publishing of it—and Silver's dirty work—has started me on the road like a common tramp of a stick-up artist. But if you have half an eye in your head, you'll see that I am Christian."