Читать книгу Jim the Conqueror - Peter B. Kyne - Страница 6

Table of Contents

Roberta stuck her red head out of the window. “Hey! Hey!” she called. “We’re silly.”

“Your apology is accepted,” Glenn Hackett called up to her, without showing himself.

“It’s a terrible thing to have to hate a human being so,” Roberta decided, and closed the window. Then she went downstairs and found Glenn Hackett and Crooked Bill in the library enjoying old-fashioned Bourbon whisky cocktails.

“Have one, honey?” her guardian asked coaxingly. “A tiny one?”

“No, thank you, Uncle Bill. Give my share to Mr. Hackett. He’s going to need it to give him courage to face the future.”

“Bah!” Mr. Hackett replied rudely. He caught a wildly approving wink from Crooked Bill and decided to leap in over his head. “Sour grapes,” he added—a bit viperishly, Roberta thought.

Roberta smiled with exceeding politeness, but there was coolness in the smile. Crooked Bill noticed her chin had gone up about a quarter of an inch. “You remind me, Glenn, of the soldiers who volunteered in the late war,” she retorted.

“How come?” Crooked Bill queried innocently. He was a very mischievous and malevolent old man and knew from experience that Glenn Hackett was about to walk into one, as the saying is. Hence, he thought he owed himself the enjoyment of watching it land, notwithstanding the fact that his sympathies were all with Hackett.

“Naturally I would, Bobby. I volunteered. I saw my duty and did it nobly.”

“You’re a pig,” Roberta charged sweetly, “and that isn’t the answer.”

“Well, then, you tell one,” Crooked Bill urged.

“What’s the use? Mr. Hackett isn’t interested.”

“Of course he is. Aren’t you, Hackett?”

“Oh, mildly. Let it fly, Bobby.”

“Because you lacked the courage to wait for the draft.”

He was nonplused, and no man can be nonplused and not show it. Roberta’s silvery laugh rang through the house. “Let’s be good friends, Glenn,” she said in her most ingratiating and fascinating manner. “You are so intelligent one can’t help being attracted to you, and usually you’re very nice. Really, if your bank account should ever be brought to the sear and yellow leaf you should set up as a fortune-teller and mind-reader.”

“I thought I had read yours correctly. I see now I did not.”

“Indeed, you did. You’re marvelous.”

“You’ll marry me when I get ready to marry you,” he charged amiably.

“Why, you tell jokes, don’t you?”

“Time!” Crooked Bill saw that the issue was far from clarifying. “No more of these lovers’ quarrels, Roberta. Glenn is staying for dinner. You’ll join us, of course, honey?”

“Why, certainly, Uncle Bill. How delightful, Glenn!”

Any man who thinks he can outfence a woman is a fool, and suddenly Glenn Hackett realized he was all of that. Such realizations always disturb a manly man. “If I remain for dinner, Mr. Latham, I fear I’ll not be able to do justice to your excellent cuisine. Therefore, with your permission, Bobby, and yours, sir, I’d like to motor back to town.”

Crooked Bill was upset. “Hell’s fire!” he exclaimed, using his most formidable oath. He had placed his money, so to speak, on young Hackett and now the ingrate was running out on him, to employ a colloquialism. He was prepared to enter a vigorous protest, but the maid, entering with a telegram, rendered that impossible.

“A telegram for you, Miss Roberta!”

“Thanks, Minna. May I?” With uplifted brows to her uncle and his guest, she commenced to tear the envelop.

“She’s very polite, no matter what her other faults may be,” Hackett remarked to Crooked Bill. Roberta ignored him and read aloud:

LOS ALGODONES, TEXAS,

JUNE 21, 1925.

MISS ROBERTA ANTRIM, HILLCREST, DOBBS FERRY, N. Y.

YOUR UNCLE TOM HAD AN ARGUMENT WITH A COWMAN YESTERDAY STOP THERE WILL BE A FUNERAL TOMORROW STOP I GOT YOUR ADDRESS BY FRISKING UNCLE TOM ON WHOSE PERSON I FOUND YOUR LETTER TO HIM OF THE SECOND INSTANT STOP IF YOU INSIST I WILL SEND HIM TO YOU CHARGES PREPAID STOP HOWEVER IF YOU WILL TAKE THE ADVICE OF A WELL-INTENTIONED STRANGER YOU WILL PERMIT HIM TO AWAIT THE TRUMP OF RESURRECTION IN THE LAND HIS SHEEP MADE FALLOW STOP IF YOU HAVE ANY INTEREST IN HIS ESTATE I SUGGEST YOU TAKE STEPS TO PROTECT IT STOP IF UNABLE TO DO THIS IMMEDIATELY WIRE ME AUTHORITY AND I WILL TAKE CHARGE OF IT STOP MOST USUALLY I AM HONEST STOP REFERENCE FEDERAL TRUST COMPANY EL PASO.

JAIME MIGUEL HIGUENES

“Hell’s fire!” Crooked Bill’s voice was the first to break the silence when Roberta had finished reading this remarkable communication. “It’s true. There is a God that marks the sparrow’s fall—and your Uncle Tom was a bird!”

“Well, now that he’s dead, Uncle Bill, you might be charitable and speak kindly of him. At least he was my last of kin,” Roberta chid the old man.

“All right, honey, I’ll not say another word.”

Glenn Hackett thought the situation, while a bit clouded, deserved the customary consideration. “I’m very sorry, Bobby,” he said.

“That’s kind of you, Glenn. Unfortunately I never knew Uncle Tom—had never seen him, that is, I never had opportunity to develop an affection for him, so really the news of his death comes to me with something of the same interest with which one learns that the Ameer of Afghanistan has been assassinated—again! It’s too bad, of course, but really poor Uncle Tom wasn’t a very lovable character, I’m afraid.”

“He was a turkey buzzard,” Crooked Bill declared with finality. “Roberta’s paternal uncle,” he went on to explain for the benefit of Hackett. “There was something unstable about the whole Antrim tribe. Roberta’s father went in for the nigger minstrels and Tom took to associating with sheep. I reckon the old bandit must have been worth considerable, and so far as I know, Roberta, you’re his next of kin. So it looks as if you’re in the sheep business in Texas.”

Roberta read the letter again. “Judging by the name of the sender of this telegram, Jaime Miguel Higuenes, it would appear that Texas boasts at least one very intelligent, very thoughtful, very frank and very humorous Mexican. He expresses himself like an educated American. Uncle Bill, you spent a great many years down there. Do you happen to know the Higuenes family?”

Crooked Bill’s face had worn his most crafty smile while Roberta was speaking, but now it was blank and expressionless. “It’s been twenty-five years since I operated in Texas, Roberta. Higuenes! Higuenes! I can’t seem to remember anybody by that name.”

“It would appear,” Roberta decided presently, “that I have need to engage a lawyer to investigate Uncle Tom’s estate.” She glanced with frank interest and approval at Hackett.

“Certainly. Of course,” Crooked Bill agreed, and thought more kindly of Uncle Tom for having provided an opportunity for these two to forget their recent differences and be friendly again in the name of business. “Hackett is the very man.”

“Hackett isn’t,” that harassed person declared with finality. “Jaime Miguel Higuenes is. That man is honest and fearless. I can tell that much from his telegram. Also he gives bank references. If you desire, Mr. Latham, I shall telegraph the bank he mentions.” He made Roberta a slight, deprecatory bow. “I am venturing to presume that you are going to entrust your Uncle Bill with the details of this case. It would be confusing and annoying to you to have to attend to it personally.”

“Certainly, Glenn. Uncle Bill is the natural and inevitable bearer of all my burdens.”

“If the bank’s reply would seem to indicate the advisability of requesting Higuenes to take charge of your Uncle Tom’s estate for the present, may I send him a telegram, signing your name, and requesting him to do so, Roberta?”

Roberta was rereading the telegram. “I think,” she declared, “that Jaime Miguel Higuenes must be a perfectly fascinating person. In twenty-three words he gives one the whole dramatic story of a bloody shooting scrape out on the range and gives one the impression—in fact, the conviction—that the result was no surprise to him and that he is not sorry the tragedy occurred! He is resourceful, not squeamish and has initiative, because in the pursuit of information he dared to pick a dead man’s pocket. He is kind and friendly and thoughtful and wants to help a person he has never seen, and he is a man of substance and takes a justifiable pride in his personal and financial standing.”

“Oh, those Spanish dons are as proud as Lucifer,” Crooked Bill assured her.

“He is also good-natured and easy-going, otherwise he would not bother himself with the probably thankless task of protecting the interests of a stranger—and an American at that. Probably he acted thus because I am a woman, which proves he is gallant and chivalrous.”

“A sort of knight-errant,” Crooked Bill murmured maliciously, and Hackett shot him a look of displeasure. “Well, Mexicans, of whatever class, are very polite to a lady. They always make a great to-do about women. The chances are this Higuenes is an educated half-breed Aztec Indian.”

“I don’t believe it,” Roberta declared with conviction. “I’m sure he’s pure Castilian and most delightful.”

“Probably older than Cortez,” Crooked Bill hazarded.

“Nonsense, Uncle Bill. He’s young. Of course he is. There’s a note of careless youth in this telegram, and I’m surprised that you have overlooked it. He is very handsome, with raven-black hair and white teeth; he is about six feet tall, has small hands and feet, and sings and plays the guitar under ladies’ windows. When he greets a lady he bows over her hand and kisses it, oh, so lightly and respectfully! I adore men like that.”

Glenn Hackett fidgeted uncomfortably. He knew he was under fire, but from ambush. However, he decided to try a chance shot. “If he should ever meet you, Bobby, he would undoubtedly fall in love with you. And of course you’d tease him on, for the mere joy of the conquest, and when he awakened to the true state of affairs his love would turn to hatred and he’d tuck you away in the local cemetery with your late Uncle Tom.”

“That’s right, Hackett. A girl can’t play fast and loose with her Mexican sweetheart. They have their women trained down there and lead them in the way they should go. I wish Higuenes had informed us who killed Cock Robin. He merely says it was a cowman.”

“I wonder if he got hurt?” Roberta murmured.

“Does it matter particularly?” For a reason he had not even tried to analyze, but which had been born of a subconscious resentment of the man who had made it possible to interject Jaime Miguel Higuenes into Roberta Antrim’s thoughts, Glenn Hackett spoke.

Ten thousand cunning imps peeped for an instant from Crooked Bill’s old eyes. “No, he didn’t get hurt—at least, not very badly.”

“How do you know?” Hackett demanded, and Roberta looked at her uncle inquiringly.

“I don’t know. I just feel it, bud. Did I ever tell you that I am the seventh son of a seventh son and that I was born with a veil?”

“No, you did not, and this is the first I have heard of it.” Roberta challenged. “I believe you know Jaime Miguel Higuenes.”

“I couldn’t make an affidavit to that, Roberta. I cannot recall having met him or even heard of him, so help me!”

“You’re somewhat mysterious.”

“That’s why he’s called Crooked Bill,” Hackett informed her.

“I’m not at all mysterious,” the old rascal protested.

“I know you’re not, Uncle Bill. You’re perfectly obvious, but you adore appearing mysterious.”

And just then the butler entered to announce dinner. “Better reconsider your decision and break bread with us,” Crooked Bill urged their guest.

“Yes, do,” Roberta pleaded.

“Thank you, I think I shall not.” Then to the butler: “Harms, will you be good enough to get my hat and coat and telephone the garage for my car?”

When Glenn Hackett’s car had rolled away down the driveway, Crooked Bill turned to his ward. “Round two for little Bright-eyes. I’m placing my money on the red.”

“Who,” the girl demanded firmly, “is Jaime Miguel Higuenes?”

“I don’t know, honey. I can only suspect, and some day I’ll verify my suspicions and tell you.”

“Please tell me your suspicions now, there’s a dear,” and Roberta smiled her most coaxing smile and put her arms around Crooked Bill’s neck.

“Ah,” he murmured, “a man can struggle along under a mystery but it drives a woman crazy. A moment ago you stated I adore being mysterious. Honey, I’m an old man with only you and my love of appearing mysterious making life worth the living, so I’ll not tell you what I suspect and you are perfectly powerless to drag it out of me. Moreover, you’ve treated that boy scandalously, because he’s much too fine a young fellow to be accorded the same treatment the sprays of sweet clover you’ve been accustomed to, have received at your hands.”

“Don’t scold,” Roberta pleaded.

“Then don’t try to pry out of me things I cannot tell you.”

“For two cents,” Roberta threatened, “I’d go down to Los Algodones and investigate Jaime Miguel Higuenes personally.”

“If you do you’ll get the surprise of your sweet young life, my dear.”

Roberta’s brown eyes danced. Nobody knew better than Crooked Bill how she cherished surprises. Figuratively speaking she would swim a muddy river if a surprise awaited her on the opposite shore.

“I think I should go down to Uncle Tom’s funeral,” she suggested. “I’m the last of the Antrims and it would be rather indecent of me to permit strangers—and not very sympathetic strangers, I fear—to bury him.”

Crooked Bill was always practical, even if mysterious. “I wouldn’t do that, honey. I’m afraid Uncle Tom won’t keep until you get there. I have never heard of ice or undertakers in Los Algodones, and as for hermetically sealed caskets, there just aren’t any. I have a friend down there, however, and I’ll wire him to attend the obsequies and send flowers for you and a wreath of cactus for me.”

“Why have you always disliked Uncle Tom so?”

“Because you’re his niece, not mine, and he’s never showed the slightest interest in you, except to send you five dollars at Christmas and on your birthdays; because I staked the unholy wretch in the cow business and he sold out the cows, refused to pay the loan, went to Mexico where I couldn’t collect and set up in the sheep business; because he was ornery from birth and looked it; because, from the day I married your aunt until the day of her death Uncle Tom grafted off me on the strength of the fact that I was a relative-in-law; because it was his nature to approach every proposition in life from the side or the rear, never from the front. Your father was not what I would call a mental giant, Roberta, but he was kind and amusing and on the square, whereas your Uncle Tom was a throwback, a black sheep.”

“Every family has them,” the girl defended.

“Well, honey, you haven’t yours any more!”

The following evening Glenn Hackett, having recovered marvelously from his indisposition of the day before, called for dinner. “The bank gives the man Higuenes most flattering recommendations, Mr. Latham,” he announced. “He has plenty of cash and worldly assets and his record is clean. He is known as a man of honor and can be trusted implicitly.”

Crooked Bill nodded, as if this report was not a matter of surprise to him. Hackett resumed:

“I cannot go to Texas to attend to this matter of yours, Roberta. It will be necessary to engage a lawyer down there to handle your affairs there, and I suppose Higuenes can direct you to a good one. I imagine you will have to proceed to Los Algodones immediately, and I suggest that when you do you provide yourself with a birth certificate and affidavits proving your relationship to the deceased.”

“I shall start tomorrow,” Roberta decided, and added maliciously: “I can hardly wait to meet that adorable Jaime Miguel Higuenes!”