Читать книгу Winner Take All - Evans Larry - Страница 2

So to the tanks; but here at least was a little luck. The tub was full and over-flowing; he would not have to cause the agent to swear by swinging round the nozzle and wasting of his water. And something besides sagebrush and sand to look at, too. For upon the tracks stood a train; a train packed very full with men whose faces showed white at the windows,—indoor men, Eastern men,—and a private car at the end of the string.

All men! Well, that would be the special train, come through from the other coast; the prize-fight special,—and the last section, at that. There was no man up the tracks with a red flag to guard against a pile-up. And they also looked bored; they must have been standing there quite a while. And hot. So, you see, his plight was not so bad! He didn't have to breathe that air and sit in a slippery red-plush seat. Not much!

He went to the drip, serenely careless of the thousand eyes upon him; he drank and clicked to Girl o' Mine, his mare. She pricked up her ears and approached a step or two; she tossed her head and whinnied; she was afraid of the drip and spatter of the overflow.

He drank again.

"See," he said, "it'll not hurt you. Plain water—that's all—awful plain! Sure, you're unstrung—but that's nothing. So am I. We both been under a strain. But I'm not asking you to do anything I'll not do myself. See, I'm drinking it—just plain water! There—what'd I tell you? See!"

The mare had edged nearer, eagerly, while he talked. She was very thirsty, though fearful. And at length his voice reassured her; she thrust her velvet nostrils into the tub.

Then he seated himself upon a foundation timber of the tank and rolled a cigarette. His toilet could wait. He wasn't going to ride into Reservoir and advertise his straits,—not to a lot of half-breeds and Mexicans and worse. He could wait; years and years of time were before him. For, vindictively, he wasn't going to provide a spectacle for those eyes at the windows to watch either; eyes hungry to look upon anything—anything—if only it wasn't empty desert. Not even the spectacle of a scarecrow making himself neat and clean,—not him! Let 'em suffer and be bored. He was bored himself!

He smoked and meditated, and presently a shadow fell athwart his lap. Another horseman was arriving, and he was creating not mild interest but a veritable stir at the windows. For he was different, oh-so-different! He drew the eye with his magnificence. His chaps were new and so was his shirt and his hat had cost thirty dollars. And Blue Jeans could almost hear them exclaiming as they crowded to the panes.

This was the real thing! You bet! No fringy-panted scarecrow upon a horse too good for him—stolen probably at that. Well, I guess not! This was a bit of the real West—the old West. Look at them spurs. Silver—solid! A regular cowboy!

And the newcomer had been quick to sense this too. He was on his way out from Reservoir, traveling north. Of course he would be traveling north—the Dee & Zee lay in that quarter—and this magnificence was the Dee & Zee superintendent. More than that, his horse was fresh up from the stable, and the stable hands were not accustomed to sending a horse out thirsty into the desert, but he did not now pause to consider this. He felt the eye of that whole train upon him, its approval, its admiration, and his importance grew. He couldn't help it; he played up to his audience. Some men invariably will, with the eye of the world upon them. They're made that way.

Just for an instant the sight of that familiar figure, quiet there before him, had given him an unpleasant start. The little matter of unpaid back wages had crowded to mind and simultaneously a realization that in numbers he was no longer superior, and therefore not equal in other essentials. Just for an instant—and then the fact of the train reassured him. Blue Jeans, hardy though he undoubtedly was and in desperate need of cash, would scarcely venture force so publicly. It would look to be nothing but rankest hold-up and robbery. And when Blue Jeans, having out-thought him and arrived already at the same depressing conclusion, let his regret show in his face, the superintendent swelled some more. It appeared quite safe.

"Back that horse away from that bucket," he directed. It was the voice of authority commanding the urchin on the curb; of seasoned seniority chiding the heedlessness of the stripling of twenty-two.

"Can't you see that my beast wants water?" Blue Jeans was deeply offended. Such opulence in anyone at such a moment would have seemed a needless taunt; that chance had selected the superintendent to flaunt it was surplusage of insult. Yet he could not even resent the superintendent's gesture, wide-flung and arrogant to all beholders. Again the superintendent looked to have the right of it. He clicked to Girl o' Mine and she came to him, out of the way, like an obedient puppy.

And then began the performance for the benefit of the car windows, and which the car windows enjoyed. This picturesque son of the real West, this colorful figure in new chaps and new shirt and thirty dollar hat, tried to ride his horse up to the tub. And the horse would not go. In the first place the horse was not thirsty; in the second place, like Girl o' Mine, he was exceedingly afraid. Yet in the beginning, when the Dee & Zee superintendent scratched him with the solid silver spurs by way of comforting him, he merely rose on his hind legs, but no nearer the tank.

At any other time the superintendent, who was not an unusual fool, would have done the wiser thing; he would have dismounted and led his animal. But now, even though he might have bested his own vanity in spite of the car windows, Blue Jeans would not permit it. Blue Jeans had been quick to see where this might lead and spoke with malicious calculation.

"I thought your horse wanted water?" he drawled, as the superintendent paused to consider his course. "Pshaw! He ain't so plumb crazy for it!"

That settled it. It grew instantly furious and cruel. The superintendent no longer merely scratched with the rowels; he drove them home. And the roan horse plunged and bucked and staggered.

It was hot and the sawing bit raised quickly a white slaver. The roan wasn't a bad horse at heart; he was frightened at something he couldn't understand. He tried to break and run. But at his bad heart the superintendent wasn't even a man, and no damned bronco was going to have his way with him. He rounded him back and sent him full at that tinkling, dreadful drip once more. So the roan fought on, till tumult rose within the cars.

This was real! This was regular! One wiser than the rest—one who thought himself schooled in the vernacular, because he had once witnessed a Frontier Week celebration at Cheyenne—seized upon this opportunity to air his vocabulary.

The sashes had been left closed to exclude sand and cinders. He tugged one open now and sent forth his voice.

"Hi yi yi-i-p," he shouted. "Ride him, cowboy!"

And the superintendent rode him! Rode him till the slaver turned red and the spurs were a torture to the raw torn flanks. Rode him till his eyes rolled white and crazed. For the superintendent had gone mad too, mad with vain rage. He laid his rope across the roan's dripping withers; it did not help; it was inadequate. With staring eyes he cast about for a more efficient weapon. Then he drew his gun from its holster.

"You won't, eh, you—?" he panted, foaming a little himself. "You won't, eh? Try that! Maybe that'll persuade you!" And holding the long blue sixshooter by its barrel, he struck the roan heavily with the butt just behind the eyes. Immediately the roan stood stock-still and slowly closed his eyes. A less strong-hearted horse would have sunk to the ground. But the superintendent was blind now to the pass to which he had brought his mount.

"Maybe that'll persuade you! Maybe that—" He mouthed the words thickly and would have struck again.

But just then Blue Jeans struck him.

Blue Jeans took his gun away from him. How weak is that poor word! Took? It would not have been so simple a recital had not the weapon been reversed in the superintendent's hand for the hazing of the roan. The train would have been treated otherwise to a bit of the real West indeed, for the superintendent was beyond all sane thought or discretion. Blue Jeans took his gun away from him. As the superintendent would have thrust it into his face to fire he struck the out-stretched wrist with the edge of his stiffened hand, and it fell to the ground.

Then Blue Jeans took the superintendent from the saddle.

And now the train rocked and roared. This was not novelty, but it was good. This was what they had come West to see, but better—better! Better fifty times over than the tame affair which the world's championship heavy-weight bout at Denver had turned out to be. This was a fight. You said it—a fight!

The superintendent fought with wasteful fury; Blue Jeans with a cold hatred of his cruelty—a cold and bitter hatred of his opulence. The superintendent struck him once with a wild, wide swing. Once—only once. For he hugged to the superintendent after that and those wild swings went past. And he jabbed! And jabbed! And jabbed!

After a while the foeman would have clinched, but Blue Jeans prevented that. That would not do; the superintendent was heavy and he was slight. So from a position always before his own face his fists battered the other man's features blank. And he tore that new shirt, and trampled on the thirty dollar hat; and the chaps grew old and dingy from constant falling and rising.

Later the superintendent rose less readily; later still he did not rise at all. Then Blue Jeans watered his horse for him and led it where he lay. With a heave he tossed the once pretty puncher into the saddle,—he was pretty no longer. He returned his gun. But he broke that weapon and extracted the shells before he gave it back.

"There it is," he told the beaten man, and instantly a light leaped to the half-closed eyes.

Blue Jeans read it.

"Oh, it ain't loaded. See!" And he flung afar the handful of cartridges.

"It ain't loaded, and don't you load it, either. Don't you try to load it, till you're out of sight. Don't you even think to try to load it. If you do—if you do—"

He went back to his seat on the timber.

And the train rocked no more. It became instead loquacious.

"Didn't I tell you?" it demanded. "Didn't I say so, the minute I spotted that moving-picture scenery! You didn't think real cowboys dolled up like that, did you? You did? My Gawd! But that other bird—look at him! Sure—smoking his cigarette as if nothing had happened. Bet he rolls 'em with one hand! Bet he rolls 'em with one hand, going at a gallop! And dressed for business all the while! Gentlemen, you're looking at a cowboy!"

And the wise one—the one who had been in Cheyenne during Frontier Week—capped it all, nonchalantly. He'd never hoped to have such a happy chance to display his vocabulary.

"One bad hombre," he declared. "One bad hombre!"

Oh, but they were loquacious! They forgot the heat and delay; they would have risen to a man and gone out to him who sat, back toward them, on the timber base of the tank, only they were afraid that the train might pull out without them. So they had to be content with watching him while they continued to tell each other what good offhand judges of human nature they were.

Not so, however, in the private car at the end of the row of coaches. No noise had come from its occupants during even the worst, or the best, of it. First tense attention and then when it was over and the superintendent had ridden away, three pairs of eyes which, turned upon each other, were startled, questioning.

One of the men was tall and fat, and prosperous to the casual eye, as he most surely must have been offensive to the fastidious. One of them was short and fat, with pointed ears that made him look quite fox-faced. And the other was a reporter. From his appearance one would have said I hope, and truly, that only pursuit of his calling could have brought him in such company.

These three, then, sat for a time and looked eloquently at each other. They were not loquacious about it, not verbally; and finally the tall fat one heaved himself from his seat.

"I've got a hunch," he declared, "and God never forgives a man who doesn't ride one." Certainly he was a strange person to be mentioning God so complacently.

"Pull the bell cord if that fool engineer tries to start without me." And he left the car.

So presently another shadow fell athwart Blue Jeans' lap. He did not bother to raise his head this time, however; he was nursing a bruised hand and craved solitude. The fat man stood and looked down at him until he realized that the other was likely never to look up, unless he did something besides impose his plainly unwelcome presence upon him. Therefore he cleared his throat—"hm-m-m."

"Don't hm-m-m me," snarled Blue Jeans promptly. "And get out of my light."

In his own way the huge man was a genius, for surely nothing else could have accomplished it.

"Warm, isn't it?" he commented; and at that inanity Blue Jeans raised his head.

The huge man had his first fair view of the other's fine hard youth; and while he observed the self-possessed eyes and long nose, acquisitive and courageous, Blue Jeans devoted the interval to a counter-scrutiny. He scanned the newcomer from head to foot, silk hose and hair-line suit and expensive panama. The rings upon those pudgy fingers held longest his wandering eye, the blue-white fortune in the burnt-orange cravat. But all this seemed to kindle no approval.

"Prosperous!" he muttered bitterly. "Prosperous! And yet I don't hate you like I did that superintendent. Just as much maybe, but not just the same.… Go away!"

But the huge man smiled and stood his ground until finally Blue Jeans slanted his head at him, wickedly, and fell to talking again.

"I could pluck that stone from out your tie that easy!" And his voice held no assurance that he would not act upon his words. "Just as easy! Yes, and I could beat you over the head with my gun—oh, sure I've got one!—just like he beat that roan horse, and strip your pockets and be clean away before one of those"—he nodded over his shoulder at the train—"could think to call for help. And thinking to call for help would come quicker to them than thinking to help without calling. And Girl o' Mine would carry me clear in five minutes."

He paused remorselessly, as if to let this sink in, but out of the silence, "I don't scare easily," the huge man said.

"Pshaw! I'm not telling you to try to scare you," Blue Jeans scoffed. "I'm telling myself how simple it could be—and wondering why I don't do it!"

"I can tell you that," answered the Easterner. "Because you're honest."

But that was not subtle, and he realized the flattery had been ill-chosen, even before Blue Jeans flared, which was almost instantaneously.

"Don't you tell me I'm honest! Don't you dare even hint I am! It's honesty brought me here."

The huge man laughed gently. He'd made one mistake; few could accuse him of repeating in stupidity. He took accurate stock of the symptoms; set his sights upon what he surmised must be the bull's-eye of Blue Jeans' discontent; waited a nicely balanced moment, and fired.

"How," he inquired in a tone both mild and unsensational, "how would you like to earn two hundred dollars?"

But the shot did not take effect as he had expected it to. Instead of snapping back Blue Jeans' curly head sank a little lower. Though his inward start at the query had been great his outward display of emotion was scarcely visible. For perceiving that this was a deliberate attempt to arouse his interest, he dissembled it and exhibited no interest at all.

"I balk at murder," he replied with careful indifference and no flicker of jocularity. "And it would have to be that, to earn that much money. Two hundred dollars is a fortune; so's one; so's fifty. But I'm kind of particular that way—though the offer is liberal—it is so! I admit that, but I—"

He would have gone on rambling had not the other stopped him.

"Sure, it's a nice bunch of coin." And then, daring to be facetious himself, though adhering still to his admirable and just-formed plan of not disclosing too much at once:

"You'd not have to kill him, you know. Half of what you did to your friend on the roan horse would be plenty and to spare."

"He was no friend of mine," Blue Jeans corrected coldly. "We'd just barely begun to get acquainted."

"Lucky for him!" Indeed, despite his personality, the huge man had a lively wit.

"A life-long friendship would have proved fatal!"

It made Blue Jeans' eyes twinkle though it warmed them not at all. He didn't like the fat man and he wasn't going to try. But when the latter showed no readiness to go back to the important topic which he had himself introduced, he found anxiety overcoming his resolution to remain unconcerned.

"You were speaking intimately of two hundred dollars," he drew it back tentatively.

And then the huge man knew that it was best to be precise.

"For eighteen minutes' work," he explained. "Six rounds with young Condit, at Estabrook, on the tenth."

"Me!" Blue Jeans blurted his surprise, it was so far from the sort of proposition he had been prepared to hear. In spite of his habiliments the Easterner was no new type to him, and he had been ready to dismiss him and his project, whenever it should develop, with a satisfying frankness which could not have been admitted here. But this tripped him,—stripped him momentarily of his self-possession.

"Me!" he deprecated. "Pshaw! I'm no box-fighter! I don't box!"

"Sure you don't," the huge man agreed, eagerly and instantly. "That's what I saw as I watched you from the window, arguing with your fr—your acquaintance. The whole world is full of box-fighters who box. You'll look years and years, however, before you'll find one who will fight."

Blue Jeans had learned to make his decisions quickly, and to abide later by their results without complaint. Swift and sudden, that was the better way. But here was no step to be taken ill-considered. He wasn't sick of cowpunching; he hadn't had half enough of it; he'd never have enough. But he was sick of punching other men's cattle. And he'd been maturing lately, getting full-grown ideas into his head. There wasn't any future for him, or for any man, hellin' around the country. But if a man was to settle down,—that was the Dream!

And he knew the place,—back of Big Thumb Butte. Good pasture; not too big, but enough for any bunch he was ever likely to own. Some fence; some buildings; both in a sad state but reclaimable by a handy man. And water! The finest water in all the country, and it never failed. And cheap! Cheap if one kept one's mind on relative values and off one's own financial troubles; cheap if one didn't pause to recollect that six bits, at the moment, would have been a prohibitive price.

He'd got his eye on that place lately; that's why he had tried so hard with the Dee & Zee; that's why he had been over-anxious at poker. He'd even figured how, by being saving and eating nothing to speak of and drinking nothing at all, he could save up half the price in about twenty years. But he'd be old in twenty years, past forty, and tottering and toothless without doubt. Unless Opportunity—was this Opportunity?

He didn't like that game—not much—not at all! But, then, he didn't know much about it; he could judge only by externals, by the clique who made it their profession. And he'd liked none of them any better than he did this huge Easterner standing before him, waiting for an answer.

But if this was Opportunity—he didn't have to mix—he could herd by himself, as he had at the Dee & Zee. And it was the best water in the county, and somebody, pretty soon, was going to see the possibilities in that valley and snap it up. And then where'd he be? He wanted to become a solid citizen; he wanted to amount to something now.

He raised a chill, gray-green eye.

"You can say on," he gave leave calmly.

But the huge man drew a slip of cardboard from his pocket instead, and wrote upon it. It seemed to be one of a stock for such emergencies, for it bore no engraving.

"If you'll carry this to Harry Larrabie, he'll understand. He'll give you what you need and send you against Condit Saturday night. Short notice for you, I know, but you look to be in shape." He glanced at the lean length.

"One hundred and twenty-eight?"

"Thirty-two," said Blue Jeans, and somehow resentfully.

"Fine—fine! Well?"

Blue Jeans had learned to make decisions with suddenness. He gave this one, however, a full five seconds' consideration. Then he reached out and possessed himself of the card.

"Scratch Blake and send bearer against Condit Saturday. If he looks as good to you as he has to me, keep him busy. Some day I may have employment for him myself."

It was signed with the single letter D.

"There are no strings to it, after Condit?" Blue Jeans asked finally.

"None—if you want to quit. None."

"Then what is there in it for you?"

Blue Jeans had been schooled to be skeptical concerning any act masking as purely philanthropic. But the huge man wisely disclaimed such motives.

"Maybe you won't want to quit,—not right away." He had taken accurate account of the symptoms. Everybody wanted money, but this man's desire, he discerned, though great, was curbed and disciplined. It was not feverish, as if ambitious merely of a few days of debauch in town. It was controlled, and fixed and steady.

"You'll find other two hundreds waiting," said he.

"That's your gamble?"

"That's my gamble."

Again the card.

"There's no sum mentioned here."

Keenly the huge man's regard played over him. A scarecrow without question,—poverty had had shabby sport with him,—but honest. You couldn't mistake it. The large man's flattery had been ill-chosen, yet well-founded. He drew two one hundred dollar bills from a folder and handed them to Blue Jeans.

"That'll let you buy some clothes, too," he said, and largely. And this largeness was his second bad mistake.

Blue Jeans had risen, and as they stood side by side, one thing was now strangely emphasized. Travel-soiled as he was, and tattered and marked with signs of conflict, Blue Jeans was the cleaner of the two, the more wholesome, and immaculate. For what he was stood out upon the huge man in every fold of flesh.

And Blue Jeans was at no pains to hide his distaste. He was no prude—no sissy—but somewhere every man had to draw the line. And every man should draw it before the state of his soul did such things to lips and eyes. Therefore, and because of the other's condescending largeness, his reply was cold.

"I'd better," he said, without thanks. "When a man goes into a doubtful business he'd ought at least to dress respectable. He owes it to himself to look his best."

The level dislike in the other's tone disconcerted the huge man not at all. He was wise enough to drop it there. But it set him thinking as he retraced his way to the private car.

The fox-faced man and the reporter who was monosyllabic were waiting for his return.

"How much?" This from Fox-face, avidly. He had seen money change hands.

"Two hundred. He was stony!"

"He did look hungry." This from the reporter, ruminatingly.

"I sent him on to Larrabie."

"Bet you a hundred that Larrabie never sees him!"

"I'll take that," said the reporter.

But Fox-face, perceiving better ones, changed the terms of his proffered wager.

"Bet you a hundred you never hear from him, even if he does meet Condit." He hurled this at the huge man, disdaining the reporter. "Bet you you've not heard from him in three years—in five!"

"There's too many sure things in this world," opined the huge man, calm under Fox-face's challenge with something like contempt, "to bother with a gamble." He squinted a moment in thought.

"But when we pull into Shell you'd better wire Larrabie to be discreet. If he wants to know who D. is, better advise Larrabie to call me 'Denver'—'Denver' Smith will do. Just a disinterested party."

And at that Fox-face was instantly, visibly consumed with curiosity. The reporter looked almost as though he understood.

"He might not approve of me," he chose to be downright, and enlighten Fox-face at the same time. "He doesn't now, as it is." And then he laughed softly, as if at himself.

"It's funny, too. I suppose he's like all of them, drunk every pay-day while his money holds out, and a familiar face at every brothel. And yet from the way he looked at me—" He shook his head, not in anger but amiable meditation. "It's funny," he repeated, and let it go at that.

So it remained a conundrum to Fox-face. The reporter, however, was now sure that he had understood. He was sorry that he had not gone out to speak to Blue Jeans himself. And now the fat man was speaking again.

"He'll go to Estabrook, and he'll earn his two hundred. No room for doubt. But beyond that—" he shook his head. He could talk frankly to the reporter, for he never talked for publication.

"He looked honest—but it was a bad hunch, I'm afraid. I'm not so certain but what he would prove to be too honest, for any practical purpose, if he ever did come through."

"You've seen the last of him," stated Fox-face omnisciently.

But they hadn't. Blue Jeans was invisible for a while, then he reappeared, and the water from the tank overflow had done much for man and beast. He looked almost neat, and very shining and clean. And the huge man, the reporter observed, must have been mistaken about the brothels. Blue Jeans was no prude—no sissy—but a man had to draw the line somewhere. Wherefore his lips did not puff and sag, his eyeballs were not mottled.

His neckerchief had been newly knotted, with a flourish; his discouraged boots wiped free of dust. And the mare, Girl o' Mine, had also found refreshment. She drooped no longer; she even arched her neck and buck-jumped a little, when he put his weight in the stirrup.

"You, too," he chided her, though gravely, for he was not pleased, not happy in the course to which he had committed himself. "You, too," he chided. "Oh, you brazen huzzy! There's nothing like it—nothing in all the world like ready cash to make a female frivolous!"

He turned her across the tracks.

"We'll not linger long in Reservoir," he spoke again aloud, and the mare threw back one ear to listen. "Just long enough to eat and sleep, and then we'll start overland to Estabrook. That's sensible! That's better than squandering money on a railroad ticket."

Certainly the prospect to which he was bound irked his pride; hurt him definitely in his self-respect. But with this frugal reflection his spirits rose a little. He'd not have to be like them; he'd not mix with that clique; he'd herd alone. And save his money! That was it. There was the Dream again!

His spirits rose. With the whole train watching him he rode from sight without even putting up a hand in farewell to those at the private car windows. And at that, without realizing it, Fox-face—for that—began hating him.

Once across the tracks Blue Jeans clicked to Girl o' Mine. She swung to a canter.

"Trip along, honey," he bade her, his serenity almost restored. "Trip along, and watch your step. Remember you're bearing a capitalist!"