Читать книгу The Winds of Chance - Rex Beach - Страница 6

The Countess Courteau had been first to arise; she was fully dressed and the sheet-iron stove was glowing when her companions roused themselves. By the time they had returned from the lake she had breakfast ready.

"Old Jerry is going to be awful sore at missing this court function,"

Mr. Linton told her during the meal. "He's a great ladies' man, Old

Jerry is."

"Perhaps I shall meet him."

"You wouldn't like him if you did; nobody likes him, except me, and I hate him." Linton sighed. "He's a handicap to a young man like me."

"Why don't you send him home?"

"Home? Old Jerry would die before he'd turn back. He'd lift his muzzle and bay at the very idea until some stranger terminated him. Well, he's my cross; I s'pose I've got to bear him."

"Who is Mr. Linton?" the Countess inquired, as she and Pierce left the village behind them.

"Just an ordinary stampeder, like the rest of us. I think."

"He's more than that. He's the kind who'll go through and make good. I dare say his partner is just like him."

Phillips approved of the Countess Courteau this morning even more thoroughly than he had on the evening previous, and they had not walked far before he realized that as a traveler she was the equal of him or of any man. She was lithe and strong and light of foot; the way she covered ground awoke his sincere admiration. She did not trouble to talk much and she dispensed with small talk in others; she appeared to be absorbed in her own affairs, and only when they rested did she engage in conversation. The more Phillips studied her and the better acquainted he became with her the larger proportions did she assume. Not only was she completely mistress of herself, but she had a forceful, compelling way with others; there was a natural air of authority about her, and she managed in some subtle manner to invest herself and her words with importance. She was quite remarkable.

Now, the trail breeds its own peculiar intimacy; although the two talked little, they nevertheless got to know each other quite well, and when they reached the Summit, about midday, Phillips felt a keen regret that their journey was so near its end.

A mist was drifting up from the sea; it obscured the valley below and clung to the peaks like ragged garments. Up and out of this fog came the interminable procession of burden-bearers. The Countess paused to observe them and to survey the accumulation of stores which crowned the watershed.

"I didn't dream so many were coming," said she.

"It's getting worse daily," Pierce told her. "Dyea is jammed, and so is

Skagway. The trails are alive with men."

"How many do you think will come?"

"There's no telling. Twenty, thirty, fifty thousand, perhaps. About half of them turn back when they see the Chilkoot."

"And the rest will wish they had. It's a hard country; not one in a hundred will prosper."

They picked their way down the drunken descent to the Scales, then breasted the sluggish human current to Sheep Camp.

A group of men were reading a notice newly posted upon the wall of the log building which served as restaurant and hotel, and after scanning it Pierce explained:

"It's another call for a miners' meeting. We're having quite a time with cache-robbers. If we catch them we'll hang them."

The Countess nodded. "Right! They deserve it. You know we don't have

any stealing on the 'inside.' Now, then, I'll say good-by." She paid

Pierce and extended her hand to him. "Thank you for helping me across.

I'll be in Dyea by dark."

"I hope we'll meet again," he said, with a slight flush.

The woman favored him with one of her generous, friendly smiles. "I hope so, too. You're a nice boy. I like you." Then she stepped into the building and was gone.

"A nice boy!" Phillips was pained. A boy! And he the sturdiest packer on the pass, with perhaps one exception! That was hardly just to him. If they did meet again—and he vowed they would—he'd show her he was more than a boy. He experienced a keen desire to appear well in her eyes, to appear mature and forceful. He asked himself what kind of man Count Courteau could be; he wondered if he, Pierce Phillips, could fall in love with such a woman as this, an older woman, a woman who had been married. It would be queer to marry a countess, he reflected.

As he walked toward his temporary home he beheld quite a gathering of citizens, and paused long enough to note that they were being harangued by the confidence-man who had first initiated him into the subtleties of the three-shell game. Mr. Broad had climbed upon a raised tent platform and was presenting an earnest argument against capital punishment. Two strangers upon the fringe of the crowd were talking, and Pierce heard one of them say:

"Of course he wants the law to take its course, inasmuch as there isn't any law. He's one of the gang."

"The surest way to flush a covey of crooks is to whistle for old Judge

Lynch," the other man agreed. "Listen to him!"

"Have they caught the cache-robbers?" Phillips made bold to inquire.

"No, and they won't catch them, with fellows like that on the committee. The crooks hang together and we don't. If I had my way that's just what they'd do—hang together. I'd start in by bending a limb over that rascal."

Phillips had attended several of these indignation meetings and, remembering that all of them bad proved purposeless, he went on toward the McCaskey brothers' tent. He and the McCaskeys were not the closest of friends, in spite of the fact that they had done him a favor—a favor, by the way, for which he had paid many times over—nevertheless, they were his most intimate acquaintances and he felt an urgent desire to tell them about his unusual experience. His desire to talk about the Countess Courteau was irresistible.

But when he entered the tent his greeting fell flat, for Joe, the elder

McCaskey, addressed him sharply, almost accusingly:

"Say, it's about time you showed up!"

"What's the matter?" Pierce saw that the other brother was stretched out in his blankets and that his head was bandaged. "Hello!" he cried. "What ails Jim? Is he sick?"

"Sick? Worse than sick," Joe grumbled. "That money of yours is to blame for it. It's a wonder he isn't dead."

"My money? How?" Phillips was both mystified and alarmed.

Jim raised himself in his blankets and said, irritably: "After this you can run your own pay-car, kid. I'm through, d'you hear?"

"Speak out. What's wrong?"

"Jim was stuck up, that's what's wrong. That's enough, isn't it? They bent a six-gun over his head and grabbed your coin. He's got a dent in his crust the size of a saucer!"

Phillips' face whitened slowly. "My money! Robbed!" he gasped. "JIM!

Who did it? How could you let them?"

The younger McCaskey fell back weakly; he waved a feeble gesture at his brother. "Joe'll tell you. I'm dizzy; my head ain't right yet."

"A stranger stopped him—asked him something or other—and another guy flattened him from behind. That's all he remembers. When he came to he found he'd been frisked. He was still dippy when he got home, so I put him to bed. He got up and moved around a bit this morning, but he's wrong in his head."

Phillips seated himself upon a candle-box. "Robbed!" he exclaimed, weakly. "Broke—again! Gee! That was hard money! It was the first I ever earned!"

Joe McCaskey's dark face was doubly unpleasant as he frowned down upon the youth. "Thinking about nothing except your coin, eh? Why don't you think about Jim? He did you a favor and 'most lost his life."

"Oh, I'm sorry—of course!" Phillips rose heavily and crossed to the bed. "I didn't mean to appear selfish. I don't blame you, Jim. I'll get a doctor for you, then you must describe the hold-ups. Give me a hint who they are and I'll go after them."

The younger brother rolled his head in negation and mumbled, sullenly:

"I'm all right. I don't want a doctor."

Joe explained for him: "He never saw the fellows before and he don't seem to remember much about them. That's natural enough. Your money's gone clean, kid, and a yelp won't get you anything. The crooks are organized and if you set up a holler they'll get all of us. They'll alibi anybody you accuse—it's no trick to alibi a pal—"

"Isn't it?" The question was uttered unexpectedly; it came from the front of the tent and startled the occupants thereof, who turned to behold a stranger just entering their premises. He was an elderly man; he possessed a quick, shrewd eye; he had poked the tent flap aside with the barrel of a Colt's revolver. Through the door-opening could be seen other faces and the bodies of other men who had likewise stolen up unheard. During the moment of amazement following his first words these other men crowded in behind him.

"Maybe it 'll be more of a trick than you figure on." The stranger's gray mustache lifted in a grin that was not at all friendly.

"What the blazes—?" Joe McCaskey exploded.

"Go easy!" the intruder cautioned him. "We've been laying around, waiting for your pal to get back." With a movement of the revolver muzzle he indicated Phillips. "Now then, stretch! On your toes and reach high. You there, get up!" He addressed himself to Jim, who rose from his bed and thrust his hands over his bandaged head. "That's nice!" the stranger nodded approvingly. "Now don't startle me; don't make any quick moves or I may tremble this gun off—she's easy on the trigger." To his friends he called, "Come in, gentlemen; they're gentle."

There were four of the latter; they appeared to be substantial men, men of determination. All were armed.

Pierce Phillips' amazement gave way to indignation. "What is this, an arrest or a hold-up?" he inquired.

"It's right smart of both," the leader of the posse drawled, in a voice which betrayed the fact that he hailed from somewhere in the far Southwest. "We're in quest of a bag of rice—a bag with a rip in it and 'W. K.' on the side. While I slap your pockets, just to see if you're ironed, these gentlemen are goin' to look over your outfit."

"This is an outrage!" Jim McCaskey complained. "I'm just getting over one stick-up. I'm a sick man."

"Sure!" his brother exclaimed, furiously. "You're a pack of fools! What d'you want, anyhow?"

"We want you to shut up! See that you do." The old man's eyes snapped. "If you've got to say something, tell us how there happens to be a trail of rice from this man's cache"—he indicated one of his companions—"right up to your tent."

The McCaskeys exchanged glances. Phillips turned a startled face upon them.

"It isn't much of a trail, but it's enough to follow."

For a few moments nothing was said, and meanwhile the search of the tent went on. When Pierce could no longer remain silent he broke out:

"There's some mistake. These boys packed this grub from Dyea and I helped with some of it."

"Aren't you partners?" some one inquired.

Joe McCaskey answered this question. "No. He landed broke. We felt sorry for him and took him in."

Joe was interrupted by an exclamation from one of the searchers. "Here it is!" said the man. He had unearthed a bulging canvas sack which he flung down for inspection. "There's my mark, 'W. K.,' and there's the rip. I knew we had 'em right!"

After a brief examination the leader of the posse turned to his prisoners, whose hands were still held high, saying:

"Anything you can think of in the way of explanations you'd better save for the miners' meeting. It's waitin' to welcome you. We'll put a guard over this plunder till the rest of it is identified. Now, then, fall in line and don't crowd. After you, gentlemen."

Pierce Phillips realized that it was useless to argue, for his words would not be listened to, therefore he followed the McCaskeys out into the open air. The odium of this accusation was hard to bear; he bitterly resented his situation and something told him he would have to fight to clear himself; nevertheless, he was not seriously concerned over the outcome. Public feeling was high, to be sure; the men of Sheep Camp were in a dangerous frame of mind and their actions were liable to be hasty, ill-considered—their verdict was apt to be fantastic—but, secure in the knowledge of his innocence, Pierce felt no apprehension. Rather he experienced a thrill of excitement at the contretemps and at the ordeal which he knew was forthcoming.

The Countess Courteau had called him a boy. This wasn't a boy's business; this was a real man-sized adventure.

"Gee! What a day this has been!" he said to himself.