Читать книгу The Border Kid - Frederick Schiller Faust - Страница 11
ОглавлениеHe Hunts by Night
No dweller in the southwest can be without some information concerning gun brawls, but though Ricardo had heard of battles before, he never had seen or heard the slayer confess as had Charles Perkins. With solid satisfaction Perkins related the killings. He had smashed the head of a watchman at a bank—a treacherous man, it appeared, but even that hardly made the slaying less brutal. Then he had gone to the home of the man who had dared to trap him, and had shot down that unfortunate in cold blood on the threshold of his house.
From the grim, contented face of Perkins, Ricardo looked to William Benn to see some signs of horror or bewilderment as a result of this narrative, but there was no trace of such a reaction. With gathered brows, Benn stared at his companion, but at the same time the corners of his mouth were tilted in that smile which had grown so familiarly hateful to Ricardo in the past few days. Afterward, to be sure, Benn changed his manner a little.
“Did anybody spot you?”
“I think the greaser girl might have known me,” said the other carelessly.
“You think? Then you’re down for murder!”
“Not the first,” answered Charlie with a shrug of his shoulders.
“The first since you’ve been pulling with me,” said Benn. “Charlie, I don’t run things that way, and——”
“You don’t run things that way,” sneered Perkins. “You don’t kill! No, you don’t publish it, you mean to say. Man, man, do you think I’m all blind or half fool and that I don’t know? I tell you, Bill, I know about the story of the Black Friday in Tucson when you started with Steve Chalmers——”
“Shut up!” snapped William Benn.
He was rigid with anger, and Perkins nodded with a grin.
“That’s under your skin, I take it!” said he.
“When they run down your trail, what if they come here?” asked Benn.
“They’ll never run down my trail. They never do.”
“ ‘Never’ is a long word, Charlie.”
“D’you want me to retire, Bill?”
“You retire from me,” said Benn.
Perkins rose.
“You make that final?” he snapped.
“I make that final.”
“Darn you, then,” answered Perkins, “I’ll give you your split! And then I’ll——”
He drew out his wallet as he spoke, but William Benn raised his hand.
“I don’t want your money,” said he.
“My money?” echoed the other in astonishment.
“Your money. I don’t want any of your money, because I don’t want any of your luck.”
“My luck has never taken me up the river,” said the other with satisfaction.
“It’ll take you up Salt Creek, though, one of these days,” remarked Benn. “I don’t like your way of working. Four men died for the fifteen thousand you have in your pocket there.”
There had been proof enough that William Benn was a criminal, a bank robber, a planner of one could hardly say how many other crimes. And from the talk of Perkins it was more than apparent that Benn had dipped his hands deep enough in the blood of his fellows, and yet as he stood before Perkins and disclaimed any share in that money which was so soaked with human blood, the heart of Ricardo warmed toward the big man who was his master.
Perkins merely sneered.
“This makes me seventy-five hundred in,” he said.
“I suppose it does,” answered Benn contemptuous. “You don’t remember that Mat had a wife?”
“And what about her?” asked the other, harshly.
“Doesn’t she come in for the share he would have had?”
“Darn him and her both,” answered Perkins. “You take care of your own charities. I’ll take care of mine. Mat was a bungler. I always told you he was a bungler!”
William Benn lifted his long, bony forefinger.
“Every dead man is a bungler,” said he. “Some day men will be calling you a fool, too! But I’m tired of the talk and I’m tired of you. Get out, Charlie. I never want to lay eyes on you again.”
This he said without passion, but Ricardo held his breath. For, after all, this was defiance of one who had two murders freshly upon his hands. The light of a third murder showed green in the eyes of Perkins as he watched Benn.
Finally he broke out: “You can’t bluff me and sham me, Bill. I don’t take water from you. And I dunno but that I got as good a right to this here house as you have!”
“Are you going to brave me out like this, in my own house?” asked Benn savagely, striking twice on the top of the veranda table in the violence of his anger.
“And what if I do?” asked the other, growing more cool as Benn grew hot. “What if I do stand up to you? You don’t like that, do you? But I tell you, Billy, you don’t mean nothing to me. I’ve seen them that turned pale when they heard the mentioning of your name. I’ve seen them that could never meet your eye. But I ain’t that way. I stand up to you. I meet your eye right now. There ain’t a thing about you that means anything to me!”
As he delivered this defiance in a tone of contempt, sneering broadly and openly, Ricardo wondered with all his heart; for even that cold-eyed man, Perkins, fresh from his crimes and reeking from his murders, still seemed to him a mere name, a mere ghost of fear compared with the unspeakable terror that surrounded Benn.
He flinched as he clung to the sill of the window, waiting for a flash of fire to dart from the hand of the master of the house—while the other man pitched headlong to the floor, dead.
However, nothing like this happened. But the door behind Perkins suddenly framed the enormous form of the Negro, Selim, who slipped in like a vast stalking cat, picking up his feet with anxious care and placing them toes first, and holding his vast hands in readiness.
Perkins looked suddenly like a mere child, gesticulating on a stage, pretending to be a man, compared with the monster behind him.
William Benn said: “You’re a brave fellow, Charlie, to stand up to me like this. I suppose you’re inviting me to a fight. Is that it?”
“If you’ve got more heart in you than any mangy dog,” declared Perkins, “how else could you take what I’ve said to you?”
“But,” said Benn, “I never waste my time on murdering fellows like you. I leave you to others. All right, Selim. Take him.”
He made a little gesture as he spoke the last words, and before they were out of his mouth, Selim leaped lightly from behind. There was no time for Perkins to take warning except by some electric premonition of the danger that was flying towards him. But now he whirled suddenly, reaching for a gun—and found himself wrapped around and around by the huge arms of the Negro.
There was a writhing, a long, gasping groan, and then—as Ricardo grew sick and his head swam—William Benn went on: “Don’t kill him, Selim. I don’t want to kill him.”
For answer, Selim tossed the helpless form of his victim across his arm. He pointed an eloquent finger at Benn and then drew it across his throat.
“He hunts by night,” said Selim.
His meaning was perfectly clear.
“He hunts by night,” smiled Benn. “But at the same time, he knows that my house is full of cats all ready to catch such rats as he. Take him away, Selim. I’ll go with you!”
Selim turned and went from the veranda, and William Benn went after him, lighting a cigarette.
So that odd scene came to an end, and Ricardo Perez leaned back against the wall and, clutching at the vine, he drew in long breaths and made sure that he was not going to faint after all. For when the tension had ended, he felt it most of all.
His head cleared rapidly, however, for the cool wind up the valley was fanning the mists from his brain, and he was able to think matters over with some degree of precision. Quite enough had been said for him to realize why he had been wanted by Benn in the first place. He was to be the food which Benn fed into the mouth of danger, as he had fed the last two, in charge of Perkins. And after some preliminary training, he would be put to work on crooked business of some sort. That very day, had not his master urged him to begin to practice the use of the revolver?
There was a peculiar temptation to remain in the house, return quietly to his room and to bed, and then let affairs take their own course. Since William Benn intended to use him for no good end, was it not true that he was justified, on his side, in letting matters drift as they would and then separating himself from Benn at the critical moment, while his hands still were free?
But, he began to see, as he thought the matter over and recalled the devilish smile and the bloodless face of Benn, that once thoroughly committed to the hands of that monster it would be extremely difficult to break away from him thereafter.
So thought Ricardo, at least, and with that he made up his mind to leave at once. He would only return to his chamber and put together a bundle of necessities for the journey. After that, he certainly would not attempt to so much as take a horse, but would strike off on the long homeward journey on foot.
So he set about climbing back up the roof, and found that he was so thoroughly chilled and unnerved that he once or twice almost lost his grip and ended his life on the instant.
However, he was naturally active and sure, and so at last he had his hands on the sill of his window and drew himself in to safely.
There he leaned against the wall for a moment, breathing hard, and finally collected himself and lighted his lamp. No sooner was the chimney pressed down into the guards and the flame turned up than he knew that he was not alone in the room. Something waited in the farther corner, and watched him with serious eyes!
