Читать книгу The Mustang Herder - Max Brand - Страница 8

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Rendell heard the shot fired and saw Sammy fall; and the big storekeeper came hobbling down the steps in haste, moving himself sidewise on account of his stiffened, ruined hip. And yet he had agility and strength enough left in his body to lean and lift poor Sammy in his arms. He carried him to the porch of the store and laid him out in the shade. All one side of Sammy's head was running blood, and big Rendell made no effort to bind the wound or examine it. Death seemed only too certain.

But he busied himself fumbling through the pockets of Gregg, and at length he stood up with an oath and turned upon Cumnor, who sat his saddle sullenly nearby, keeping one gloomy eye upon the disappearing mustangs down the street as though he wanted very much to ride after them, and yet not daring for shame to ride away from his victim so soon.

Such a hasty flight might well turn self-defense into murder, even in the lenient eye of the public opinion of Munson. "D'you know that he didn't carry no gun, d'you know that, Cumnor?" asked Rendell.

"How should I know that?" growled Cumnor.

"By the look of him, for one thing, I should say," said the storekeeper. "The devil, man, you ain't blind!"

"I ain't no mind reader, though," said Cumnor.

"D'you need to read minds to see that he ain't a wild fighting type?"

"He was talking pretty big," rumbled Cumnor.

"He was talking for his rights," said Rendell. "And nothing more'n his rights."

"Look here," said Cumnor. "Who made you the judge and the sheriff in this here county?"

"Why," cried Rendell, "if it comes right down to that, I'm due to prove that I can handle myself as well as though I was a judge and a jury. I may of busted up my ribs and my hip, Cumnor, but darned if my gun fingers and my gun wrist ain't about as supple as they ever was."

But Mr. Rendell had built up a not inconsiderable reputation in the days before he retired to the quiet of his store, and Cumnor was in no haste to see the storekeeper make his threat good. So the rancher was extremely pleased to see an opportunity to make a change of conversation, and pointing past the other he said: "What's all the shoutin' for, Rendell? Are you talkin' about a dead man or one that's only been scratched a mite and taught a lesson?"

Rendell whirled about and saw Sammy Gregg, with a hand laid against the side of his head, propping himself up on the other arm.

Instantly the big fellow was at work examining and dressing the head wound, and Cumnor, glad to be away from this place, spurred off to look after his mustangs so recently purchased. He had barely veered around the corner at the farther end of the street when who should he see before him but the tall form and the handsome face of Chester Ormonde Furness, mounted upon a magnificent, dappled-gray horse, a gelding with a stallion's wild eye and crested neck.

The heat of the recent scene was still in Cumnor, or perhaps he would not have ventured as much as he did, for the men of that region had not forgotten and were not likely ever to forget how Mr. Furness had burned his name in the bar at Mortimer's saloon. Cumnor, however, was in the humor for a hasty action at this instant, and he reined his horse abruptly in front of Furness.

"Furness," he sang out, "when you sold me those six horses an hour ago, did you know that I was buying trouble with them, too?"

"My dear fellow," said Furness, "I have no idea what you're talking about, I'm sure. Except that I know you got the pick of the herd. You paid fifty dollars a head for horses that might have brought sixty-five in any market about here."

"Aye, and suppose that I was to ask you for a bill of sale—and the records of the transfers of those horses, Furness."

"Records?" echoed Furness, frowning like one in pain. "Why, Cumnor, the word of the man from whom I bought those animals wholesale was enough for me, I'm sure."

"What man?" snapped Cumnor. "What man did you buy them from, I'd like to know?"

Mr. Furness grew exceedingly cold. And he straightened himself in the saddle. Upon his hip he rested his ungloved right hand. A very odd thing about Mr. Furness was that though he never rode forth without his gloves, yet he was rarely or never seen to wear leather upon that supple right hand. Indeed, constant exposure had covered it with a very handsome bronze that made his well-kept finger nails look almost snowy white in contrast.

And he said to the rancher: "I trust that I don't understand you, Cumnor."

"The devil," said Cumnor. "I'm talking English, ain't I?"

Then Cumnor saw that the deadly right hand of Furness was resting on his right hip—resting there lightly, as though poised for further movement.

Mr. Cumnor regretted with all his heart that he had been so extremely hasty in making remarks upon the financial principles of Furness. The latter was saying, coldly: "Really, Cumnor, this is extraordinary. I don't know that I can tolerate this even from you, my dear Cumnor!"

Mr. Cumnor saw that he had come to a point in which it was far better to walk backward than to continue straight ahead, and he remarked gravely: "I think that if you ride down the street, you'll find a man at the store of Rendell with a bullet wound in his head. I wish that you'd ride down there and hear that fellow talk!"

He said no more about sale records and deeds of transfer, but he reined his horse to the side again, and spurred away in the pursuit of the six mustangs. Mr. Furness cantered his big gray gelding down the street to the store of Rendell and dismounted there and looked into the store.

What he saw was young Sammy Gregg leaning against the counter with a very white face, a face almost as white as the bandage which was tied around his head. And the color of face and bandage was set off by a spreading spot of crimson that was soaking through the cloth.

"How are you now, kid?" Rendell was asking.

"I'll do fine," said Sammy Gregg. "Ah, there's a man that I want to talk to." He started up and confronted big Furness.

"Furness," he said, "I had nearly two hundred head of horses stolen from me this morning. Five men did the trick. They killed my chief helper, and they scared two more of them nearly to death. I've seen six of those horses that were stolen. No doubt about them. I know them as well as I know my own hand. On account of those horses I've just been shot down. Well, Cumnor did the shooting, and Cumnor says that he bought those horses from you!"

Mr. Furness bit his lip and then drew in his breath with a sound which was very much like the moan of wind through thin branches. He sat down upon a stool and he removed his hat and mopped his forehead.

"Stolen horses! Good Lord!" said Mr. Furness. "No wonder the scoundrels were willing to sell those horses to me for twenty-five dollars apiece!"

"Was that what they asked?"

"That's it. Twenty-five dollars. And of course I knew that almost anything decent in the line of a horse will sell for fifty dollars a head! I saw a quick profit. Heavens, youngster, it never came into my head that the horses might be stolen. You see, I'm almost as much of a greenhorn around here as you are! I paid cash for the horses and landed the whole lot of them."

"I suppose that I ought to be sorry for you, then," said Sammy. "Because I'm afraid that I'll have to claim the entire lot of them!"

"I wish you luck," said Furness. "I wish you luck, upon my soul of honor. But I'm afraid that you'll have to do a tall bit of scrambling for them! Not thirty minutes ago three horse traders who were bound north came up with me and looked the lot over and they offered me forty dollars a head spot cash. The profit was too good to be true. A quick turnover better than a long deal, you know. I took that money and they split the herd into three chunks and rattled them off through the canyons to the north."

Mr. Gregg clutched his hands together. "North! Aye, north!" he said. "They're bound for Crumbock and seventy-five dollars a head!"

"Eighty dollars, my friend," put in the gentle voice of Mr. Furness. "The price is going up at Crumbock."

Mr. Gregg groaned. "Will you tell me what the five thieves looked like?"

"There were only two that I saw anything of."

"Well?"

"They were very well mounted, for one thing."

"Not on mustangs?"

"No, there was a lot of hot blood in the horses they were riding. Long- legged steppers, they were!"

"I saw them and I watched them move," sighed Sammy. "Yes, they're fast! But what of the two men?"

"I could pick them out from any crowd for you, Gregg," said the big fellow, "and I should be delighted to do so. Delighted! One was rather young; the other middle-aged. Both Mexicans. The older fellow has a pair of scars that look like knife-work on his right cheek. He must have had a passage with some left-handed man!

"The younger chap is distinguished for a very long chin and an overshot lower jaw. Unmistakable, both of them! We'll get up some posters to spot them, you might offer a reward. Yes, by Jove, I'll put myself down for a hundred on that same reward! I want to help you out, Gregg. I sympathize with you, my friend!"

And he stood up and clapped a kindly hand upon the shoulder of the smaller man and then turned to leave the store. He had reached the door before Sammy had the courage to cry out: "Just one minute, Mr. Furness."

The big man turned with a pleasant smile.

"You see," said Sammy, "a man can't keep the proceeds from the sale of stolen goods."

"I don't understand," said Furness.

"I mean, Furness," insisted Sammy, "that the money that was paid to you for those horses really belongs in my pocket!"

Mr. Furness laughed, but without much conviction. "I see that you're a wit," said he. "But after all, that's rather a queer joke!"

He stepped away from the door of the store, and his whistle came blithely back to them. Sammy, with an exclamation, started to run in pursuit, but the quick hand of the storekeeper caught him and held him back.