Читать книгу Stolen Gold - Frederick Schiller Faust - Страница 7

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They could turn left—up the staggering face of a rocky hill, treeless, bare, open to a sweeping rifle fire. Or else they could turn right into the stench, the mud, the puzzling mists and vapors of the marsh. Gene Salvio took the only possible course. He swung the black horse to the side and struck right into the marsh, and, as Bates followed, last of the three, a sudden uproar of voices, a sudden crash of rifle fire, told him that he had been seen.

That made their chances one point worse. He liked to estimate chances. When the crowd gathered in the street of Jumping Creek, their chances of getting away had been about one in three. After they cleared out of town and escaped the first rifle fire, they had chances of two to one in their favor. When they put the high hill behind them and swung up the easy grade of the valley that contained the railroad, they had chances of four to one in their favor. Even the sight of the pursuit in the rear only decreased their chances by a point. Then that encounter with the unseen line of riders, blocking their way, beat them down to the bottom. They had one chance in five, as they turned into the marsh. They were seen, and they had a chance in six.

Salvio called, with inimitable cheer: “We’ll get to the railroad, and we’ll gallop up the ties and laugh our heads off at those fools!”

Bates looked forward and saw Salvio riding his horse out of a depth of thick, green slime that mantled the fine creature from the ears down and altered its color completely. Salvio was the fellow with the heart and the brain. Of course, that was the trick. To reach the railroad, and then to rush down the open way at full speed, out of the marsh, and then to cut either to one side or to the other—that was the thing, that was the thing. The heart of Dave Bates rose in him. Ah, what a thing a brain is in a good man! You can have your good men, if you want; Dave Bates wanted a man with a brain; he wanted a fellow like Gene Salvio.

The marsh was a horror. It was black water and green wood. And firm, grassy ground turned into a horrible muddy wash through which the horses broke. But they floundered on, keeping right behind Gene Salvio—who had the knowing brain.

They held on. Presently the foulness of the marsh, the thickness of the trees that made a hot twilight, here, in the middle of the day, gave way to glimpses of light, and suddenly they were out on the side of the railroad grade, with Gene Salvio already cutting the wires of the big fence.

Two strands had hardly clanged apart and whipped back under the clippers of Salvio, when voices shouted to the side, and Dave Bates had a sight of a tall man with a face as thin as starvation, riding a little mouse-colored mustang out from the edge of the marsh. He had found a solid way across the marsh—there was hardly a bit of mud above the hocks of his mustang.

Bates, as he backed his horse violently, saw the stream of armed men break out behind that leader. Bates snatched out his right-hand Colt and opened fire slowly, accurately, intent to kill. He wanted to kill that tall man. He wanted to kill that mouse-colored horse. He had a strange feeling that, if he could dispose of either of them, chance would swing back to the robbers.

He steadied his gun for the third shot, when he saw something flash in the hand of that rider. The gun spoke. Bates’s right-hand gun, his old favorite, was knocked out of his hand and into a pool of black, stagnant water.

He grabbed his bruised hand between his chin and his breast and rode back through the trees, spurring his horse deep. He uttered no complaint. He was not disheartened by pain. He simply knew, calmly, that the chances were suddenly a hundred to one against them. Some people might have the frankness to admit that they had no chance at all.

Salvio’s gun was barking behind them. Voices shouted everywhere, everywhere, everywhere. Human voices talked from the ground, out of the sky. It was very true, that which Bates had said. He thought of it again. When the dummies, the honest people, do win, they hang lots of thieves from convenient trees.

With his numb hand—it seemed otherwise uninjured—Dave Bates led the way. His horse seemed to know something, and he let it have its head. Presently, it plunged into water up to its belly. That water shoaled away to knee depth. It forced its way into a hedge of thorny brush, regardless of the stickers. Bates found himself on dry ground—a little ridge that stood up in the center of the marsh. He was glad of that. If they had to die, it was better to die on good, clean ground. As he checked the horse, which stood panting, he saw something slither off into the water, almost soundlessly. He looked the other way. All his nerves gave a great leap, and then he had the sense of falling rapidly. He was not meant for the confinement of marsh ground. This bit of clean earth, and the bit of clean, blue sky over it was all he claimed. The rest was a wet hell.

Harry Quinn came up beside him. Harry’s face was gray, and his mouth was pulled back from his yellow teeth, as though he were lifting a great weight, every muscle dragging at it.

“You fool, what you stopping for?” Harry Quinn asked, and pushed his horse straight past. In a moment he stopped, however. He seemed to be listening to the voices that shouted close at hand or murmured far off. “Yeah,” he said, “I understand.” He dismounted and sat down on a rock. He was still sitting there, rolling a cigarette, when Salvio broke out of the marsh.

Salvio said: “You rat, Quinn ... are you ratting on us? Jump up and stamp on that smoke. Get down there at the other end of the dry land. I’ll take the middle. Dave, you take this end. Shoot at anything you see. They think they got us, but we’re going to show them a few tricks. Shoot at anything ... and shoot straight. Hey, Dave, did that hombre get you?”

“He lifted the gun right out of my hand. That’s all. I’m all right,” said Dave Bates.

“Get off your hoss then, and stand watch,” ordered Salvio.

Bates obeyed.

They put the horses—and the gold—in the central cluster of brush that covered the middle of the little island. Then each man sank away in a chosen place of concealment, waiting for the approach of the enemy.

But there was no approach. Bates could hear voices shouting close up, or muttering far away. But they never turned into visible humans among the trees of the marsh. For his own part, he had a nest of rocks out of which he could look to three sides; Salvio was taking charge of the center of the island, and his back.

Those voices to which Bates listened were bright with joy, ringing with the certainty of triumph. And Bates could understand. A hundred to one chance—for their lives. The gold? Well, there was nothing to that. It was simply a weight. It was worthless. It was worse than lead that could be shot out of a gun. Well, they could shoot gold out of guns, too. Bates grinned as he had the thought. Then he heard a high-pitched, nasal voice. It was not loud, but it prodded through the silence of the nearby marsh like a needle, and into Bates’s brain.

“Boys,” said the voice, “we know that you’re in there on the island. But it ain’t any good. You’re in there, and we got you. What we wanta know is this ... d’you wanta come out?”

There was no answer.

Want to come out? Of course—but there would be other things to hear.

The nasal voice went on: “We got you snug, and we got enough men to fence in this whole marsh and keep it fenced. You can live for a while on frogs and snakes. That’s all right. But after a while, you’ll get kind of sick of the mosquitoes, and the marsh water is sure hard on the stomach. What I’m saying is ... why not come out now, the way you’ll have to come out sooner or later? We’ll give you a fair break. You didn’t kill nobody. And if you march out of there now and turn in the stuff you stole, you’ll have a better chance with the jury. That there jury is goin’ to be made up of some of the men out of this party, most likely. And that jury will recommend you to the mercy of the judge. You been and done a good job, but you lost. Now pay, and pay quick, or we’ll sure raise hell with you.”

The speech ended, and Bates listened for the answer of Salvio.

Presently Salvio called out: “What’s your name?”

“Steve Balen,” called the nasal voice.

“Are you the gent that rode the measly little mouse-colored bronc’?”

“That ain’t a lookin’ hoss, but it’s a ridin’ hoss, partner,” said the nasal voice. “Yeah, I’m the man you mean.”

“Then the devil with you!” called Salvio, and followed his words with a shot that flew crackling through the woods.

Very cheerfully the voice of Steve Balen replied: “I don’t blame you, brother. If I was in your boots, I’d hope to hang on to the finish. I didn’t want to come and yarn with you like this here, but I figgered it was my duty. What I aim to wanta do is to string you up by the neck, the three of you, and I reckon we’ll have the chance to do that before the month is out.”

That ended the parley.

Dave Bates was still staggering under the impact of what he had heard, when he made out the muffled voice of Quinn, which was saying: “Hey, Gene, you ain’t gone crazy, have you?” The voice came closer, repeating: “Gene, you ain’t gone nuts, have you?”

Bates went to join the conference. It took place in the central cluster of shrubbery, near to the horses. “They’re giving us a chance, and you go and chuck it away!” said Quinn.

Salvio was very calm and restrained. He merely said: “You boys can load your stuff onto your hosses, if you want, and go out and give yourselves up. I ain’t doing it, that’s all.”

“Hey, Gene, what’s the sense?” asked Quinn.

“You tell the dummy,” said Salvio to Bates, after staring for a moment at Quinn.

“They got hanging stuff on Salvio,” said Bates, nodding his head.

“They ain’t got hanging stuff on me,” said Quinn. “Come on, Dave. We’d better get out.”

“Get where? Into jail for eight, ten years?” asked Bates.

“Better jail for eight, ten years than hell forever,” said Harry Quinn.

“Sure,” said Salvio. “Go on and get out.” He stood by the black horse, patting its wet shoulder, sneering at them both.

Well, perhaps it was better to go to hell—in brave company.

Bates said: “We started this job with three men. We’re going to wind it up with three men, I guess, Harry.”

Harry Quinn threw out a hand in an eloquent gesture and started to exclaim in protest. Then he checked himself suddenly. A realization came into his eyes. “Oh, I see,” said Quinn. “Sure, I didn’t think of that at all!” He seemed to be vastly relieved, and said to Salvio: “What about a smoke, Gene?”

“Sure, kid,” said Salvio, and smiled.

Quinn was a lot older, but Salvio had a right to call him kid, if he wanted to, thought Bates. Quinn was not very bright, but he meant well. He’d do the right thing, when it was pointed out to him. Quinn built a cigarette and lighted it, and smoked it with enjoyment.

It was very hot. Sweat began to run on all their faces, and the smell of the marsh was heavy and sick in the air. Out of the distance they could hear more horses pounding up the valley, or down it. Reinforcements were coming. The men of Jumping Creek would make a party out of this. Even the boys would sneak away from home with some old .22. It would be a great thing, for the men and for the boys. Bates could put himself outside, in their boots, and he almost smiled as he thought of it.

A mosquito bite sent a thrill of cold down the back of his neck. He struck the place with his hand and brought the hand away with a splotch of blood on it. The mosquito was a small smear of nothingness.

“You take a mosquito,” said Harry Quinn, “and it can drink its weight in blood, eh?”

“Sure,” said Dave Bates.

“Look it,” said Quinn. “Suppose that a gent could drink his weight in booze without passing out cold. That’d be the life, eh?”

Salvio was walking up and down slowly, his hands clasped behind his back, his head bent, and a little veil of mosquitoes trailing unheeded behind that head. Dave Bates listened to Quinn, but his eyes and his mind kept following the leader, step by step, blindly hoping.