Читать книгу The Man from Mustang - Max Brand - Страница 6

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After Ned Kenyon returned, the girl remained with them only a short time. When she had excused herself and said good night, Silver was left alone with his new friend. He found Kenyon overflowing with questions. It was not that the man doubted the beauty, the grace, the wonder of the girl, but it was simply that he preferred hearing Silver reassure him, because there was no other subject in the world of half so much importance to him. It was for the moment the subject that was most on the mind of Silver, also; but he wanted silence to think the thing over. He was glad when Kenyon suggested a drink.

They went across the street diagonally into the Lone Star Saloon and found a dozen men leaning their elbows on the bar. Luck favored them in finding a vacant space at the extreme end. Silver put his back against the wall.

It was the ordinary type of saloon, the room long and narrow, with a few tables against the wall, and a strewing of sawdust on the floor.

Silver had barely taken his place when he heard a voice say:

"Is that Kenyon?"

"That's him," said another. "Wanta be introduced?"

"I don't hanker to have nobody introduce me to a skunk," said the first speaker. "I'll introduce myself with the toe of my boot. Because I'm goin' to kick some new wrinkles into his spinal column."

By this time the attention of the entire saloon was focused on the fellow. He was one of the "picturesque" Western types, with blond, saber-shaped mustache, and a lean face a little too pale to belong to an honest man in this part of the world, unless he had just risen from a sick bed. He wore the finest of shop-made boots; his shirt was of yellow silk; and above all, his revolver had a handle of shining pearl. Yet it was apparently not a tenderfoot's gun worn for show, but a useful tool. The way the holster was buckled about the thigh showed that, and the low pitch of the gun, angling forward a trifle so that the butt would be conveniently ready for a whip-snap draw. If ever this fellow worked, it was fairly apparent that his business must have to do with Colt revolvers.

He was coming forward now, and Silver took heed of Kenyon as the acid test was about to be applied to him. There are few grimmer moments than that in which a man is asked to defend his personal dignity and life from the attack of an armed stranger.

Ned Kenyon turned gray with fear and shuddered, so that the heart of Silver sickened. He closed his eyes for an instant, to shut out the picture of that terror.

And this was the man that Edith Alton had said she would marry the next day?

The bartender glanced at Kenyon and then shook his head.

"What's the matter, Buck?" he asked gently. "Kenyon never makes no trouble for nobody!"

"Buck" kicked a chair out of his path. It caromed across the floor and crashed against the wall.

"That's what you say, you square-headed fool of a beer-drinking Dutchman!" cried Buck. "But I say different. And I got in mind right now to ask Mr. Kenyon to up and say is he a sneaking skunk or ain't he?"

Ned Kenyon turned around slowly. Silver half expected him to bolt for the door. Instead, his voice came out thin and sharp through the nose, but with a tone steady enough.

"I don't know you, Buck," said Ned Kenyon. "And I guess you don't know me. But anyway you look at it, I'm a peaceable fellow. I don't want trouble."

"I'm askin' you," said Buck, "are you a hound, or ain't you a hound? And if you ain't a hound, how you goin' to prove that to me? Hey?"

He thrust out his head. His lips twitched back to show the yellow line of his teeth. He was cold sober, and he was doing his best to work himself into a fighting rage.

Kenyon sighed very audibly.

"Well," he said, "I take everybody to witness that I'm not hunting for a fight. I never have in my life. I never so much as pointed a gun at any man. But on the other hand, I guess I never took water, that I can recollect, and I don't aim to start taking it now."

Silver, bewildered and delighted, could hardly believe his ears. Buck, also, was so amazed that he halted for an instant. Then a swift flash of joy crossed his face. For after this speech of Kenyon's, the fight that was to be would be in the nature of a fair battle, fairly accepted—the sort of thing which too often passes as "self-defense" west of the Mississipi.

At the same time, the men along the bar who had been looking on curiously, now scattered rapidly back toward the wall, to be out of the line of a possible gun play. The bartender prepared to duck.

It was strange to see how calmly every one took this incident. Mustang, to be sure, was "wide open"; but even if the inhabitants had not seen gun fights before, they had heard of them often enough to brace their nerves for the shock.

Ned Kenyon stood straight and stiff. The straightness pleased Silver. The stiffness told him beforehand that his friend would die.

He took Kenyon by the shoulder and gently, irresistibly, pulled him out of the way. His left elbow was leaning on the bar. He continued to lean there, at ease, with his right hand resting on his hip.

"Buck," said Silver, "if you want to talk, talk to me, will you?"

"There ain't anybody that I won't talk to," said Buck. "Who in the devil are you?"

"I'll tell you a part of what I am," said Silver. "In a way, I'm your sort of an hombre, Buck. I spend a lot of time every day practicing with my guns, just as you do. I'm an expert. I'm such an expert that I know the average fellow, who does honest work with his hands, can't possibly stand up to me. Ned Kenyon, for one instance, probably couldn't stand up to me, any more than he can stand up to you."

It was perhaps the oddest speech that was ever heard in a Western bar-room. It struck every whisper out of the air. Winter frost could not have stilled all life more completely. Only the mouth of the bartender gaped and closed again, like a fish on dry land, making its last gasp for air.

"You're goin' to put yourself in his boots, are you?" said Buck. "You're goin' to prove that he ain't a skunk? You'll have some proving to show me what you are!"

"Wait a minute, Arizona," said Ned Kenyon. "This here is mighty fine of you, but I aim to fight my own fights when they come my way."

"Take your hand away from my shoulder!" snapped Silver, sharply, so that Kenyon jumped back. "And don't speak to me again. This rat here is likely to try his teeth on me the first instant he thinks that I'm off guard. Do you hear me, Buck?"

"Hear you? Well, yes!" shouted Buck. He smote the floor with the flat of his foot and swayed forward a little. Then curses began to spill out of his mouth.

"Were you hired to do this?" asked Silver.

The cursing stopped.

"Because," said Silver, "every time you swear, it's going to be harder on you. I thought at first that I might have to pull a gun and put you to sleep, Buck. But I can see now that I won't have to go that far, because you're only cursing to keep yourself warm, and you wish, this minute, that you were out there in the street in the kind darkness."

Buck tried to laugh. "Just a big bluff and a blowhard," he cried. "And when I break him in two, you'll all see yaller!"

But no one nodded. No one smiled in sympathy with Buck's laugh. It had been too hollow and manifestly false.

"I'm going to ask you a few questions," said Silver. "If you don't answer them, I'll give you a quirting. But in the first place, I'll have to take your gun away from you. Put up your hands, Buck."

He said this so quietly, with such assurance, that the spectators gaped and craned their necks, and could hardly believe that Silver did not have his man covered.

"Why, you fool!" shouted Buck. "You think I'm crazy?"

"You don't think that," said Silver. "You know I'm right, and that I'll do what I say. You know that I'm a faster hand and a surer shot than you are, Buck. And your poor little soul is shrinking and dying in you. There's a sort of pity that grows up in me when I see you turn white around the mouth, as you're doing now. And a disgust when I see your eyes begin to roll."

He stood straight, and commanded in a harsher voice.

"Put up your hands!"

It was a frightful thing to see that armed man, that gun fighter, that slayer of men—Buck—standing wavering as though a whole regiment of soldiers had drawn a bead on him. But all that threatened him was the empty hand and the pointing finger of Silver.

"You hear me?" said Silver, and took a half step forward.

A queer, bubbling sound broke out of the throat of Buck. His mouth yawned. His lips started to frame words, and could make only a hideous gibberish.

And before the eyes of the crowd the miracle happened, and his hands started to rise from the level of his pearl-handled revolver to his hips—would he try to whip out some hidden weapon, then?—and so on to his breast, and up to his shoulders, where they fluttered for an instant in feeble revolt, but then continued until they were above the top of his head.

The sickening thing was not finished. Silver stepped forward and pulled the pearl-handled gun out of its sheath, and as he drew it, a great groan of despair came from Buck. He had allowed an act of shame to be performed on him that would make him a very legendary figure of shame, a horror of which no man would gladly speak.

Yet all of those men who watched with pale, fascinated eyes, stared less at Buck in his disgrace than at the terrible face of Silvertip as he pulled that gun out, and then laid it on the bar. And more than one man wondered, if the face of Silver were before him, if he would have had the nerve to do anything other than Buck had done.

Hypnotism was what it seemed like. No man exchanged glances with his neighbor. Each man hoped that his own horror was not being observed, and each knew that the coldness of his skin meant a definite pallor.

"You can get the gun afterward," said Silver. "I'm not going to take it and keep it. And I'm not going to harm you in any way, Buck, so long as you tell me, frankly, the name of the man who hired you for this job. You were hired, I take it?"

The jaw of Buck dropped. He gasped, "Yes! Hired! Oh—yes, I was—"

One long breath was drawn by all the men in that room. The bartender stood straight for the first time since Silver had begun speaking.

"Who hired you?" demanded Silver. "Who? A gent by the name of Alec Wilson."

"You lie!" said Silver. "Kenyon, get me your quirt, will you?"

"Not Wilson!" groaned Buck. "What I meant was, the gent that hired me was really—"

There was an open window at the side of the room. A gun glinted beyond the sill, now, and the explosion of the shot tossed the mouth of the revolver a little up into the air.

The head of Buck dropped over on his shoulder. He slumped into the arms of Silver, slipped out of them, and spilled onto the floor.