Читать книгу The Coyote - James Roberts - Страница 12

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Rathburn extinguished the light in the lamp, walked swiftly to the front door, and outside. Closing the door softly he turned back up the street. He sauntered along slowly, debating his next move. Evidently the town was the last for many miles in the mountainous country east and north. Westward he would come upon many towns as the country became more and more densely populated toward the coast. Northwestward he would be able to keep within the arm of the mountains and still be in touch with civilization. But he would have to make some changes in his attire and fix that brand on his horse.

Instinctively his course brought him to the big resort he had noticed upon his arrival. The entrance doors had been closed against the chill of the night, but he could see the interior of the place through one of the windows despite the coating of dust upon the glass.

As he peered within he stiffened to alert attention and a light oath escaped him. Walking swiftly from a rear door was a tall man, the lower part of his face concealed by a black handkerchief. He held a gun in each hand and was covering the score or more patrons of the place who had risen from the tables, or stepped back from the bar, with their hands held high above their heads.

“Keep ’em there an’ you’ll be all right,” the masked man was saying in a loud voice which carried to Rathburn through cracks in the window 33 glass. “Line up down there, now––you hear me? Line up!”

The patrons lined up, keeping their faces toward the bandit.

“If anybody gets to acting uneasylike it’ll be the signal for me to start shootin’––understand?” came the holdup’s menacing voice as he moved around behind the bar.

“Open both cash drawers,” he ordered the servitor in the white apron. He covered the bartender with one gun while he kept the other pointed in the direction of the men standing in line.

Obeying instructions, the bartender took the bills from the cash drawers and laid them before the bandit on the bar. He then made several piles of silver near the bills, walking to and from the drawers of the big cash register. Continuing to do as he was told, he stuffed the bank notes and silver into the masked man’s pockets, one gun’s muzzle against his breast, the other holding the men in line at bay.

Rathburn heard footsteps on the walk close to him. He whirled and saw two men about to enter the resort. “I wouldn’t go in there,” he said sharply in a low voice.

“Eh––what’s that?”

The two men paused, looking at him questioningly.

“I wouldn’t go in there,” Rathburn repeated. “Come here an’ take a look.”

One of the men stepped to his side and peered curiously through the window.

“Bill!” he whispered excitedly. “Look here. It’s a holdup!”

The other man looked over his shoulder. He swore softly.

“I’ll bet it’s The Coyote!” said the first man in an awed voice.

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“Probably is,” said Rathburn sneeringly. “They say he was heading this way.”

“Good place to stay out of––if it’s him,” declared the second man.

Rathburn suddenly pulled back his left sleeve. “See that?” he said, pointing to his left forearm.

The two men stared at the bared forearm in the yellow light which shone through the dust-stained window. They saw a scar about three inches below the elbow.

“Looks like a bullet made that,” one of the men observed.

“You’re right,” said Rathburn, letting down his shirt sleeve. “A bullet from The Coyote’s gun left that mark.”

The men looked at him wonderingly and respectfully.

“You boys live here?” asked Rathburn.

“Sure,” was the reply. “We work in the Pine Knot Hotel an’ stables. You from the hills?”

“Yep,” answered Rathburn. “Cow-puncher an’ horseshoer an’ one thing an’ another. What’s he doing now?” He again turned his attention to the scene within the resort, as did the two men with him.

The bandit was backing away from the bar toward the rear of the room, still keeping his guns thrust out before him, menacing the men who stood with uplifted hands.

“You can tell your funny judge that I called!” he sang out as he reached the rear door. “An’ now, gents,” he continued in an excited voice, “it won’t go well with the man that tries to get out this back way too soon.”

As he ceased speaking his guns roared. The two large hanging lamps, suspended from the ceiling in the center, went out to the accompaniment of 35 shattered glass crashing on the floor. The three smaller lamps above the back bar next were cut to splinters by bullets and the place was in total darkness.

Then there was silence, save for the sound of a horse’s hoofs coming from somewhere behind the building.

Rathburn drew back from the window as a match flared within and his two companions moved toward the front door. He stole around the corner of the building and started on a run for the rear. He stopped when he heard a horse galloping toward the east end of the street behind the buildings which lined that side. He hurried behind two buildings which did not extend as far as the resort and hastened up the street. He did not once look back.

Behind him he heard shouts and men running in the street. He increased his pace until he was running swiftly for the trees where he had left his horse. From above he caught the dying echoes of hoofs flying on the trail up the foothills by which he had come early that night.

The cries down the street increased, a gun barked, and bullets whined over his head.

“The locoed fools!” he panted. “Didn’t they hear that fellow ride away?”

But the shooting evidently was of a promiscuous nature, for he heard more shots around by the rear of the place where the robbery had been committed. No more bullets were fired in his direction as he darted into the black shadows of the trees.

He quickly untied his horse, mounted, rode in the shelter of the timber to the east trail, and began the ascent, urging his horse to its fastest walking gait up the hard trail. The fleeing bandit’s sounds of retreat no longer came to his ears, but he kept on, scanning the open stretches of trail above in 36 the starlight, a disparaging smile playing upon his lips.

Back in the little town excitement was at a high pitch. Extra lamps had been lighted in the resort where a big crowd had gathered. Several men ran to the office of Judson Brown, justice of the peace, while others went in search of the constable.

When Brown failed to answer the summons at his door, some one discovered it was not locked, and the little group of men trooped in to find the justice gagged and handcuffed to his bed. They lighted the lamp and removed the gag. Then acting upon his instructions they took a bunch of keys from his pocket and unlocked the handcuffs.

He stood, boiling with rage, while they alternately hurled questions at him and told him of the holdup.

He ignored their questions as to how he came to be bound and gagged and demanded more details of the robbery.

“We took him to be The Coyote,” said the spokesman of the group. He had been one of the men the bandit had lined up. “He was tall, an’ blue or gray eyes, an’–––”

“A puncher from up north picked him out through the window,” spoke up one of the men who had encountered Rathburn outside the resort. “He’d been shot in the forearm by him once––showed us the scar. The robber was The Coyote, all right.”

“Certainly it was him!” roared Brown. “He came in here, tied me up after pulling a gun on me, an’ threatening to kill me, practically, so he wouldn’t have any trouble pulling his trick. Tried to steer me off by saying he didn’t come here to make any trouble. I knew he lied!”

The constable came in as the justice was finishing his irate speech.

“I’m going to lead this chase myself!” cried 37 Brown. “I want The Coyote, and I’m going to get him. I raise that reward to a thousand on the spot, and I know the sheriff will back me up. Get out every man in town that can stick on a horse, and we’ll catch him if we have to comb the hills and desert country till doomsday!”

Already horsemen were gathering in the street outside. Feeling was high, for Dry Lake prided itself on its record of freedom from the molestation of outlaws. The rough element, too, was strong for a man hunt, or anything, for that matter, promising excitement.

A quarter of an hour later Brown, who was accepted as the leader when emergencies involving the law arose, distributed his forces. He sent two posses of twenty men each north and northwest. A third posse of a dozen men started southward. Towns to the west were notified by telephone as was the sheriff’s office. The sheriff said he would be on his way to Dry Lake in an hour. He was amazed that The Coyote should be in his territory. He, too, wanted the outlaw, and he praised Brown for his reward offer.

Judson Brown himself led the posse of thirty men which took the east trail up the foothills. It was an hour past midnight. The moon had risen and was flooding the tumbled landscape with its cold, white light. From different vantage points on ridges high above, two men looked grimly down and saw the moving shadows of the man hunters as they took the trail.

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