Читать книгу Gunman's Gold - Max Brand - Страница 5

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HE now understood, perfectly. Halpin and Powell had developed some theory about the trend of their strike of ore. They thought that the vein would be due to crop out again in a certain place, and when they passed that place, they had stopped with the consent of Jack Reynolds to dig a bit. There was no hurry. Their millions were waiting for them all the time!

So they had opened up a perfectly useless prospect hole. And he, Lee Swain, had killed two men in vain!

He felt no remorse, only a touch of alarm.

He was certain that his idea had been good, but he was troubled because he had worked in vain. He had done everything perfectly, down to the shooting of the two. But luck had played cruelly against him. Somewhere in the distance lay that treasure- trove which the pair had discovered. Not even Jack Reynolds would know just where it was. There were certain black rocks in the Owens Desert, that contained wire gold. That was all any one could say. But there were tens of millions of black rocks in the Owens Desert. How could the treasure be located?

It was all a waste. He, Lee Swain, would eventually begin to prospect the entire surface of the desert for the right place. No doubt the little shaft of the prospectors had been filled in, and the first blow of wind, like that which was beginning now, would promptly sweep away all traces of the coming and going of men.

He went rapidly back to his horse and mule, mounted, and struck the trail for Deerfoot.

The next morning he entered it and called at the sheriff's house. The sheriff was gone!

He thought of another man, grim, stern, ever with a face set toward law and order, a true type of the vigilante.

His name was Pringle, and on Pringle little Lee Swain called.

He said, when he stood in the kitchen, watching the thin clouds of smoke that rose from the griddle on which Pringle was frying flapjacks:

"Pringle, I've run into a bad thing."

"Yeah, there's a lot of bad things around, here and there," said Pringle.

"Two dead men in the Owens Desert," said Swain.

Pringle tossed the flapjacks, and exclaimed with pleasure as they all landed properly on the other side, on the face of the griddle. Some of the wet dough had splattered on the floor, some upon the shirt front of Mr. Pringle, but that did not in the least diminish his pleasure in the proper flipping of the hot cakes.

"Two dead?" said he.

"I was lining out for the Willejee Mountains," said Lee Swain, his thin face very sober. "And I was traveling hard, with my head down, as you might say, because the Owens is a hot place, and I wanted to get across it as soon as possible. I'd heard a good many tales about gold in the Willejees, and I wanted to have a look for myself."

"Fool's gold in the Willejees, that's all," said Pringle.

"Perhaps," said the other. "And, as I was going, I saw among some rocks, a pile of earth, and beside the pile of earth, two men, one lying on top of the other. I went over and had a look. Men don't lie still in the sun—the sort of sun you have on the Willejee. No, sir! Well, each of these fellows had a reason for lying still. A bullet hole right between the eyes."

"Each of 'em?" said Pringle.

"Yes, both."

"Right between the eyes?"

"Yes."

"Good shooting," said Pringle. "They killed each other, eh?"

"That's what I thought, but there wasn't a gun near either of 'em."

"Hello!"

"No, not a sign of a gun."

"That's funny," said Pringle.

"It seemed so funny to me," said Swain, "that I turned around and trekked back for Deerfoot. I've been riding all night."

"Yeah?" murmured Pringle. "Sit down and tackle this stack of hot cakes, then. I'm one of the champeen flapjack throwers in this neck of the woods. That's what I claim, and that's what I hold to. I ain't got any maple sirup. But I got some brown sugar melted down, that's pretty nigh as good. Lay a tooth into them, and tell me are they tender!"

Lee Swain was hungry, and he sat down to eat. He was thankful that such men as Pringle could be found.

As he ate, he issued new bits of information—such as the fatness of the face of Powell, and the red hair and the scarred forehead of Halpin.

"Well, one thing," said Pringle, "I know who the dead men are. Another thing. I know who killed 'em. A third thing, I'm goin' to bust myself to catch the hound that murdered 'em."

"You know?" said Lee Swain.

"Coupla jailbirds that I seen around Deerfoot, some time back," said Pringle. "One is Powell, and the other is Doc Halpin. And the gent that killed 'em is the one that rode out of town with 'em yesterday morning. His name is Jack Reynolds!"

"Old enemies, maybe?" said Lee Swain.

"Swain," said Pringle, "you're a smart man. Everybody knows that. But maybe you ain't been around here long enough to understand what a gunman is."

"I have some ideas," said Swain. "But go ahead and enlarge."

"A gunman," said Pringle, "is a fellow who knows how to shoot a whole lot straighter and faster than ninety-nine men out of a hundred. And when he gets to the point where he knows how good he is, he loses his temper easy. And then he happens to kill a man. Self-defense, you see?"

"I see," said Swain.

"And then he kills another, and another, and it's still self- defense. And a lot of half-witted dummies, they look up to the man-killers a lot, and give 'em preference, and pretty soon man- killing, it gets to be a kind of an honorable career for the gent that's fast and straight with a gun."

He finished a second griddle load of flapjacks, and sat down to consume them in his turn.

"And so," said Pringle, "it goes on till a gent, he can't give over the pleasure of just killin' for the sake of killin'. The more that are dead, the better he likes it, and the deader they are, the liver he feels. And it's that way with Jack Reynolds. He wasn't a bad kid when he come out here. But he was just too dog- gone good with a revolver. That made him a killer."

"But why should he kill the pair of them?" asked Lee Swain.

"Why, I dunno," said the other. "Maybe one of 'em said that it was a hot day, and it was a hot day. And Mr. Reynolds, he didn't think so, and he killed one for holdin' a different opinion, and then he went and killed the other, just to keep his hand in. It don't take much cause to kill a man. Not if you're free and easy with a gun!"

"I'm learning things that may do me good," said Lee Swain.

"That's where you got brains," said Pringle. "Most tenderfeet, you know, think they're old-timers, after they've gone and raised their first crop of calluses, out here."

"Well," said Swain, "I stopped at the sheriff's house, and he wasn't there. So I came here to you, Pringle. You have the name of being the leading man in Deerfoot, when it comes to keeping the place in order. For my part," he added, "I'm used to seeing the law enforced, Pringle, and I don't mind saying that I would bend every effort to that end. The West, I'm afraid, takes the matter of human life a little too carelessly!"

"It does," agreed Pringle. "I'm finishing my breakfast, and then I'm rounding up the best men that I can find in town. I'll need 'em, too, on the trail of that Reynolds. Because he's a mean kind in a pinch. You may be hearin' news, before very long."

Lee Swain went back to the hotel, and told again, and yet again, the story of what he had seen. He said that he was upset, and that he would abandon his idea of a trip to the Willejees, for the time being.

Then he went to bed, and slept the round of the clock.

He was perfectly placid, when he roused himself. There would be no sign of him that other men could trace.

He was thoroughly satisfied, and his satisfaction increased as he ate his breakfast.

As he pondered upon the past event, he decided that perhaps he had done all for the best.

He would prospect the Owens Desert. He would tap every rock, if need be, until he found the right place. And when he found it, he would know how to develop his claim! He would enrich himself in the course of a single year. He would make himself a figure in the nation.

He was assured, in a deep and heartfelt way, that success could not help but come to a man who planned as carefully as he had planned, and he could not help smiling when he thought how easily he had put Pringle on the false trail.

Well, Reynolds was a gunman, and no matter what happened to him, he would deserve his fate!

Not only was the conscience of Lee Swain clear, but he had a sense of virtue, added to his well-being. Two jailbirds, and a gunman—it really did not matter!

It was not until the next day that he heard of the results of the posses' work.

Very fine results they were, too!

For, heading down the trail toward the Owens Desert, in the midst of a tangle of mountains, the posse had run straight into young Jack Reynolds, who had seemed to expect no enemies, and had ridden straight into the arms of his hunters!

When he was arrested, impromptu, however, he fought with a ferocity that proved his guilt!

He had shot and seriously wounded two men; a third was badly hurt. Then he had been knocked over the head, and so secured.

They were bringing him back to the town of Deerfoot to hang him before the crowd, was the message that the town received from Pringle. But the return trip would be slow, very slow, on account of the wounded men, who could only be carried a few miles a day. In the meantime, let the telegraph carry the good news across the country.

When he heard this, Lee Swain smiled. He almost laughed. For he knew that there is no way to close the book on a crime except to punish with conviction some one supposed to be guilty of the deed.

Not for an instant did he remember that glass of beer which he had failed to drink in the Best Chance Saloon!