Whispering Smith/Chapter 27
CHAPTER XXVII
PURSUIT
BRILL YOUNG picked up a trail Sunday morning at Tower W before the special from Medicine Bend reached there. The wrecked express car, which had been set out, had no story to tell. “The only story,” said Whispering Smith, as the men climbed into their saddles, “is in the one from the hoofs, and the sooner we get after it the better.”
The country around Tower W, which is itself an operating point on the western end of the division, a mere speck on the desert, lies high and rolling. To the south, sixty miles away, rise the Grosse Terre Mountains, and to the north and west lie the solitudes of the Heart range, while in the northeast are seen the three white Saddle peaks of the Missions. The cool, bright sunshine of a far and lonely horizon greets the traveller here, and ten miles away from the railroad, in any direction, a man on horseback and unacquainted with the country would wish himself—mountain men will tell you—in hell, because it would be easier to ride out of.
To the railroad men the country offered no unusual difficulties. The Youngs were as much at home on a horse as on a hand car. Kennedy, though a large and powerful man, was inured to hard riding, and Bob Scott and Whispering Smith in the saddle were merely a part—though an important part—of their horses; without killing their mounts, they could get out of them every mile in their legs. The five men covered twenty miles on a trail that read like print. One after another of the railroad party commented on the carelessness with which it had been left. But twenty miles south of the railroad, in an open and comparatively easy country, it was swallowed completely up in the tracks of a hundred horses. The railroad men circled far and wide, only to find the herd tracks everywhere ahead of them.
“This is a beautiful job,” murmured Whispering Smith as the party rode together along the edge of a creek-bottom. “Now who is their friend down in this country? What man would get out a bunch of horses like this and work them this hard so early in the morning? Let’s hunt that man up. I like to meet a man that is a friend in need.”
Bob Scott spoke: “I saw a man with some horses in a canyon across the creek a few minutes ago, and I saw a ranch-house behind those buttes when I rode around them.”
“Stop! Here’s a man riding right into our jaws,” muttered Kennedy. “Divide up among the rocks.” A horseman from the south came galloping up the creek, and Kennedy rode out with an ivory smile to meet him. The two men parleyed for a moment, disputed each other sharply, and rode together back to the railroad party.
“Haven’t seen any men looking for horses this morning, have you?” asked Whispering Smith, eying the stranger, a squat, square-jawed fellow with a cataract eye.
“I’m looking for horses myself. I ain’t seen anybody else. What are you looking for?”
“Is this your bunch of horses that got loose here?” asked Smith.
“No.”
“I thought,” said Kennedy, smiling, “you said a minute ago they were.”
The stranger fixed his cataract on him like a flash-light. “I changed my mind.”
Whispering Smith’s brows rose protestingly, but he spoke with perfect amiability as he raised his finger to bring the good eye his way. “You ought to change your hat when you change your mind. I saw you driving a bunch of horses up that canyon a few minutes ago. Now, Rockstro, do you still drag your left leg?”
The rancher looked steadily at his new inquisitor, but blinked like a gopher at the sudden onslaught. “Which of you fellows is Whispering Smith?” he demanded.
“The man with the dough is Whispering Smith every time,” was the answer from Smith himself. “You have about seven years to serve, Rockstro, haven’t you? Seven, I think. Now what have I ever done to you that you should turn a trick like this on me? I knew you were here, and you knew I knew you were here, and I call this a pretty country; a little smooth right around here, like the people, but pretty. Have I ever bothered you? Now tell me one thing—what did you get for covering this trail? I stand to give you two dollars for every one you got last night for the job, if you’ll put us right on the game. Which way did they go?”
“What are you talking about?”
“Get off your horse a minute,” suggested Whispering Smith, dismounting, “and step over here toward the creek.” The man, afraid to refuse and unwilling to go, walked haltingly after Smith.
“What is it, Rockstro?” asked his tormentor. “Don’t you like this country? What do you want to go back to the penitentiary for? Aren’t you happy here? Now tell me one thing—will you give up the trail?”
“I don’t know the trail.”
“I believe you; we shouldn’t follow it anyway. Were you paid last night or this morning?”
“I ain’t seen a man hereabouts for a week.”
“Then you can’t tell me whether there were five men or six?”
“You’ve got one eye as good as mine, and one a whole lot better.”
“So it was fixed up for cash a week ago?”
“Everything is cash in this country.”
“Well, Rockstro, I’m sorry, but we’ll have to take you back with us.”
The rancher whipped out a revolver. Whispering Smith caught his wrist. The struggle lasted only an instant. Rockstro writhed, and the pistol fell to the ground.
“Now, shall I break your arm?” asked Smith, as the man cursed and resisted. “Or will you behave? We are going right back and you’ll have to come with us. We’ll send some one down to round up your horses and sell them, and you can serve out your time—with allowances, of course, for good conduct, which will cut it down. If I had ever done you a mean turn I would not say a word. If you could name a friend of yours I had ever done a mean turn to I would not say a word. Can you name one? I guess not. I have left you as free as the wind here, making only the rule I make for everybody—to let the railroad alone. This is my thanks. Now, I’ll ask you just one question. I haven’t killed you, as I had a perfect right to when you pulled; I haven’t broken your arm, as I would have done if there had been a doctor within twenty-five miles; and I haven’t started you for the pen—not yet. Now I ask you one fair question only: Did you need the money?”
“Yes, I did need it.”
Whispering Smith dropped the man’s wrist. “Then I don’t say a word. If you needed the money, I’m not going to send you back—not for mine.”
“How can a man make a living in this country,” asked the rancher, with a bitter oath, “unless he picks up everything that’s going?”
“Pick up your gun, man! I’m not saying anything, am I?”
“But I’m damned if I can give a double-cross to any man,” added Rockstro, stooping for his revolver.
“I should think less of you, Rockstro, if you did. You don’t need money anyway now, but sometime you may need a friend. I’m going to leave you here. You’ll hear no more of this, and I’m going to ask you a question: Why did you go against this when you knew you’d have to square yourself with me?”
“They told me you’d be taken care of before it was pulled off.”
“They lied to you, didn’t they? No matter, you’ve got their stuff. Now I am going to ask you one question that I don’t know the answer to; it’s a fair question, too. Was Du Sang in the penitentiary with you at Fort City? Answer fair.”
“Yes.”
“Thank you. Behave yourself and keep your mouth shut. I say nothing this time. Hereafter leave railroad matters alone, and if the woman should fall sick or you have to have a little money, come and see me.” Smith led the way back to the horses.
“Look here!” muttered Rockstro, following, with his good eye glued on his companion. “I pulled on you too quick, I guess—quicker’n I’d ought to.”
“Don’t mention it. You didn’t pull quick enough; it is humiliating to have a man that’s as slow as you are pull on me. People that pull on me usually pull and shoot at the same time. Two distinct movements, Rockstro, should be avoided; they are fatal to success. Come down to the Bend sometime, and I’ll get you a decent gun and give you a few lessons.”
Whispering Smith drew his handkerchief as the one-eyed man rode away and he rejoined his companions. He was resigned, after a sickly fashion. “I like to play blind-man’s-buff,” he said, wiping his forehead, “but not so far from good water. They have pulled us half-way to the Grosse Terre Mountains on a beautiful trail, too beautiful to be true, Farrell—too beautiful to be true. They have been having fun with us, and they’ve doubled back, through the Topah Topahs toward the Mission Mountains and Williams Cache—that is my judgment. And aren’t we five able-bodied jays, gentlemen? Five strong-arm suckers? It is an inelegant word; it is an inelegant feeling. No matter, we know a few things. There are five good men and a led horse; we can get out of here by Goose River, find out when we cross the railroad how much they got, and pick them up somewhere around the Saddle peaks, if they’ve gone north. That’s only a guess, and every man’s guess is good now. What do you think, all of you?”
“If it’s the crowd we think it is, would they go straight home? That doesn’t look reasonable, does it?” asked Brill Young.
“If they could put one day between them and pursuit, wouldn’t they be safer at home than anywhere else? And haven’t they laid out one day’s work for us, good and plenty? Farrell, remember one thing: there is sometimes a disadvantage in knowing too much about the men you are after. We’ll try Goose River.”
It was noon when they struck the railroad. They halted long enough to stop a freight train, send some telegrams, and ask for news. They got orders from Rooney Lee, had an empty box car set behind the engine for a special, and, loading their horses at the chute, made a helter-skelter run for Sleepy Cat. At three o’clock they struck north for the Mission Mountains.