Part 9

With a slash of his knife Brick cut through the leather and salvaged the bullet, which was so badly battered that it was impossible, except by weight, to tell what caliber it had been.

“Well,” said Grant dryly, “there ain’t much question about it bein’ a bullet-hole.”

“Yeah, it is a bullet-hole,” admitted Leach, although he did not seem greatly concerned over it.

“Well, I don’t know anything about it.” Meecham was inclined to be a trifle peevish over it. “I hired this horse and saddle to ride up here and see how Mr. Caswell was getting along, and if they gave me a saddle with a bullet-hole in it——”

“Well, that’s all right,” grinned Brick. “Nobody’s blamin’ you for it, Meecham.”

Brick turned and went back toward the saloon, as though dismissing the subject. Meecham talked with Leach and Grant for a few minutes before mounting his horse and going back toward Silverton.

Harp got their two horses and took them to the livery-stable. In a few minutes he came back, carrying the two rifles, and found Brick talking with Cale Wesson.

“You fellers come down to my house,” suggested Cale. “We’ve got plenty of room. You ain’t got no office, jail nor stable, Brick; so yuh might as well hive up at my place until yuh get somethin’ built.”

“By golly, that would be fine,” agreed Harp joyfully.

Brick and Cale exchanged amused glances and Cale drawled slowly:

“I’d rather have the music inside my house at a reasonable hour than to have it outside at four o’clock in the mornin’. Ma kinda likes music, too. Of course, Miss Miller won’t mind. Anyway, she’s too danged much of a lady to say what she thinks.”

“All right, Cale,” grinned Brick. “It would be mighty nice if yuh could take care of us for a few days.”

“Sure would,” nodded Harp, and without further argument he headed for the Wesson home, carrying the two useless rifles.

Leach, Slim Hunter and Ike Welden went to the hitch-rack, mounted their horses, and rode out of town toward Silverton. They nodded to Cale and Brick as they rode past. Santel came in from the other end of town and left his horse at the hitch-rack. He had not been there during the fire, and now he came over and considered the wreckage.

His examination was very brief and he came past Brick and Cale, on his way to the Dollar Down. He nodded curtly and Brick felt instinctively that Santel had been drinking. His eyes were bloodshot and he walked rather too deliberately, as though trying to show that he was perfectly sober. He met Bill Grant in the doorway, and, after a moment of conversation, they both went into the saloon.

“I couldn’t like that Santel,” observed Wesson. “I ain’t got a darned thing against him, yuh understand, but there’s somethin’ so dog-goned cold-blooded about him that it kinda gits me.”

“He’s salty,” grinned Brick. “He’s also drunk right now, Cale. Let’s go down and help Harp arrange them two rifles. That’s all we’ve got left to move.”

“Yo’re lucky. I lost danged near everythin’ I owned. But Ma says we’re kinda lucky, and I s’pose that’s a good way to look at things. We’ll go down and see if she’s got anythin’ to cook for a meal.”

Mrs. Wesson gave Brick and Harp an upstairs room, where they decided to grab a few hours’ sleep. Both of them were weary, and the peacefulness of the Wesson home sent them quickly into dreamland.

Mrs. Wesson woke them up at supper-time and they came down to the outdoor wash-bench to clean up a little.

“Bill Grant has been over twice to see yuh,” stated Mrs. Wesson.

“Tha’sso?” Brick lifted his wet face from the basin and blinked the soap out of his eyes. “What’d Bill want?”

“He didn’t say. I asked him if it was important, but he never said whether it was or not. Said he’d come again.”

They were just sitting down at the table, when Bill Grant knocked on the door and informed Mrs. Wesson that he wanted to see Brick. He wouldn’t come in; so Brick went out to him.

“I don’t like to take yuh away from a meal, Brick; but I’ve got somethin’ yuh ought to know. Santel’s drunk. He got me in a corner this afternoon and talked for an hour. He’s been detectin’ to beat ——, so he says. And here’s his solution of the thing:

“You and Silent Slade and Harp Harris must be the three men who done the dirty work; _sabe_? Yo’re the medium-sized one, Silent is the big one, and Harp is the tall, skinny one. Now, what do yuh think of that, Brick?”

Brick squinted hard over the information and Grant watched him closely. Then Brick’s face broke into a grin, as he looked up.

“Well, Bill, I’m s’prized that Santel ever found out that much. It sure does look like us three jiggers have been featherin’ our nests, don’t it?”

“Aw, ——, I didn’t believe him, Brick.”

“Thank yuh, Bill. Where is Santel now?”

“He’s gone to Silverton. I reckon he’s through around here. He told me that he was, anyway.”

“Yeah, I reckon he is,” Brick grew serious.

“He said he was goin’ to put his case up to Leach and Hendricks and let them do what they dang pleased about it.”

“That’s real thoughtful of him, I’m sure. Bill, I’m glad yuh told me this, and I thank yuh kindly.”

“Yo’re welcome, Brick. But dang it all, I wish you could put the deadwood on the guilty parties. I’m for yuh.”

“Well,” Brick grinned widely, “mebbe I will, as soon as I get time. I’ve been so dog-gone busy lately. Say, didja see Silent around the Dollar Down when yuh left?”

“He’s playin’ single-handed black-jack with Le Blanc.”

“Fine. Tell him to come down here right away, will yuh, Bill?”

“Sure.”

Grant turned and walked back toward the street, while Brick went back to his supper.

Miss Miller smiled at Brick as he sat down beside Harp.

“I have been trying to get Mr. Harris to tell me how he came to get that wound in his shoulder,” said Miss Miller, “but he refuses to tell me.”

Harp squinted at Brick, who grinned covertly and shook his head.

“I don’t blame him for not talkin’ about it,” declared Brick. “Mebbe next time he’ll look out for knife-throwin’ women.”

“Knife-throwing women?”

Miss Miller glanced sharply at Harp, whose ears immediately assumed a scarlet tint.

“Half-breed,” nodded Brick. “Married woman, too. Her husband was shootin’ mad, too.”

Harp shoved back his chair and got to his feet.

“That’s all a danged lie!” he wailed. “I—I——”

“I can’t understand this risin’ generation,” interrupted Mrs. Wesson seriously. “They do the darndest things. Why, when I was young, if a man monkeyed around a married woman——”

Harp whirled around, picked up his hat and stamped out of the house, while Brick put his head on his arms and cried tears. Mrs. Wesson hammered Cale on the back until the poor man slid sideways out of his chair; but Miss Miller failed to see the humor of the situation.

“It’s a —— shame,” declared Cale. “Don’tcha believe a danged thing that either of these critters try to make yuh believe, Miss Miller. That’s their idea of fun.”

“O-o-o-oh, that was good!” wailed Mrs. Wesson. “The look on his face! Ha, ha, ha, ha! Brick, he’ll hate us both for life.”

“I fail to see anything funny about it,” stated Miss Miller. “Why accuse a man of something that isn’t true, Mr. Davidson?”

“It was true,” choked Brick. “But not the way it sounded. He did get knifed by a woman. Anyway, I think it was a woman. And her husband was shootin’ mad, too. Me and Harp caught ’em stealing cattle—butcherin’ at night and burnin’ the hides.”

Brick wiped away his tears and was about to tell them what had happened the night before, when Silent knocked loudly at the front door.

“What happened to little Harp Harris?” he asked. “I met him up the street and asked him what you wanted. He said he didn’t care a —— what you wanted, but he knew what you was goin’ to get.”

“He’s got indigestion,” said Mrs. Wesson. “He told me the other day that he had it real bad. You know that upsets a man somethin’ awful. I’d sure hate to marry a man that has indigestion. I sure know what it’s like, ’cause Cale has touches of it.”

“I never had anythin’ like that in my life!” snorted Cale.

“I’ll betcha yuh got it right now,” grinned Brick. “Anybody that would speak to Ma Wesson that-a-way has got stummick trouble.”

Cale picked up his hat and started for the door.

“All right, all right! I s’pose I’ve got to stand for it. If I’d ’a’ had any sense I’d never invited the sheriff’s office to settle down in my house. Between Ma and Brick, I’ll prob’ly have to pitch a tent, if I want to have any peace.”

“Didja want me, Brick?” queried Silent, “or is that part of the joke?”

Brick laughed and shook his head.

“I was just wonderin’ if you’d like to ride to Silverton with me this evenin’.”

Silent squinted closely at Brick’s face. Their eyes met for a moment and a grin spread Silent’s lips. He knew that Brick was not riding to Silverton just for the ride.

“Yeah, I’d like to go along,” said Silent indifferently. “I’m ready any time you are. Is Harp goin’ along?”

“No, I don’t think so. He better take care of that shoulder for a day or two.” Brick turned to Miss Miller. “Are you goin’ to the dance tomorrow night with Harp, Miss Miller?”

“Not that I know of,” she replied.

“I must remind Harp of that,” said Brick seriously. “He told me to be sure and remind him to ask yuh—but it slipped my mind completely.”

“Oh, is that so?”

Miss Miller’s brows lifted slightly and she glanced at Mrs. Wesson, who was still chuckling.

“And if I forget it, Ma will remind him of it when he comes back.”

Brick picked up his hat and walked out behind Silent, while Ma Wesson wiped away her tears and patted Miss Miller on the arm.

“Don’t mind him, dearie,” she choked. “Brick don’t lie, but he sure does twist the truth around until it won’t neither lay down nor stand up. Harp would do the same to Brick, if he had the chance. They’re both salt of the earth.”

“And you—” began Miss Miller accusingly.

“Oh, me!” Ma Wesson laughed heartily. “I’ll back either of ’em, ’cause I love ’em both. Don’t mind me. If Harp don’t ask yuh to go with him, I’ll have Cale take both of us. By golly, I’d like to tromp around over a dance floor ag’in myself.”

“I think that would be fun, Mrs. Wesson.”

“Fun, ——! It’d be a riot.”

* * * * *

It was dark when Santel rode into Silverton. He took his horse to the livery-stable and turned it over to a skinny youngster. Santel had bought a bottle of liquor at Marlin City and had emptied it on the way down. He threw it away, as he came out of the stable and went toward the Short Horn saloon.

He was pretty drunk, but did not stagger as he went into the saloon and stopped at the bar. Leach was in the rear of the room, talking to Al Hendricks, and Santel went to them. They gave him a chair and he sat down with them at a card-table.

“Well, what’s the news?” asked Hendricks guardedly.

“I’m quittin’ the job,” announced Santel. “I told Grant what I decided upon, and he didn’t seem to believe me.”

“You mean to say that you couldn’t find out anythin’?” asked Hendricks.

Santel laughed angrily. Leach watched him closely. He knew that Santel was drunk.

“I reckon I could find out enough,” said Santel hoarsely, “but what the —— is the use? We all know that these robberies were done by three men, don’t we?”

“Well?”

“Three men,” continued Santel. “A big man, a medium-sized man and a tall, thin man. I’ve been lookin’ for three men of that description—three men who are close enough together to do this work. And—” Santel shook his head slowly—“there’s just three men in this county that answer that description, and that is the sheriff, his deputy and the big fellow, Slade.”

“Aw, ——!” snorted Hendricks.

“There yuh are,” Santel shrugged his shoulders wearily.

“And why not?” queried Leach. “Are they so ——ed pure that they wouldn’t do a thing like that, Al?”

Hendricks frowned heavily and looked at Santel.

“Is this the best you could do, Santel?”

“Suits me.”

“Where’s your proof?”

“Proof? What in —— do yuh want—a confession?”

Hendricks shook his head quickly.

“You couldn’t convict anybody on that evidence.”

“There’s a murder or two connected with this,” reminded Leach meaningly. “It might not be a jury case, Al.”

Hendricks laughed and shook his head.

“Don’t be a fool, Leach. Brick Davidson never done these things. Santel may be a good detective, but he sure got off on the wrong foot that time. I’d stake my life on Brick.”

“There yuh are,” said Santel disgustedly. “It’s about time for me to quit.”

“It sure is—if Brick finds it out.”

“All right,” Santel got to his feet. “I’ve quit. Now I’m goin’ to get drunk and as soon as I get paid for my work, I’m goin’ to pull my freight, _sabe_?”

He swaggered back to the bar, leaving Hendricks and Leach at the table.

“You sure picked a good man,” observed Hendricks.

“Did I?” Leach smiled crookedly. “I guess that Santel found out what he came here to find. It’s no fault of his if we don’t agree with him.”

“It’s a free country, Leach, and—here comes Brick now.”

Brick was coming into the place, with Silent behind him. Santel was at the bar, taking a drink, but he turned and looked at Brick, who stopped short and faced Santel.

Hendricks started to get up from the table, but Leach grasped him by the arm, drawing him back. Santel was just drunk enough to forget caution, and his lips drew up in a wolfish grin.

“Well,” he said, as his voice carried to all parts of the room, “here’s Sun Dog County’s little tin god.”

The bartender scuttled to the upper end of the bar, out of line with the two men, and those at a card-table behind Brick immediately lost all interest in their play and moved quickly. Brick was grinning and it irritated Santel.

“You, I’m talkin’ to!” snarled Santel.

“To me?” Brick laughed. “Well, that’s nice of yuh, Santel. I sure wondered who yuh meant, and I’m glad that Sun Dog likes me so well.”

“Tha’sso?” Santel sneered. “You ain’t got sense enough to know when yo’re insulted.”

“Have you insulted me?” questioned Brick wonderingly.

He turned his head and looked around the room, as if asking someone to confirm it. Hendricks caught his eye and tried to signal a warning. Silent moved in beside the bar and began rolling a cigaret, as if nothing was the matter. Santel shot a glance at Silent, and it seemed that the big man’s unconcerned attitude irritated him.

Brick turned back to Santel—

“You didn’t really mean to insult me, didja, Santel?”

“Well, I’ll be ——ed!” Santel’s voice was hoarse with indignation. “Did I really mean it?”

Santel leaned forward until his face was within a foot of Brick, his hands spread out from his sides. His anger had made him forget that Brick was egging him on.

“You red-headed pup!”

Santel had evidently figured that Brick was afraid of him, but he was jerking back as he spoke; jerking back, as his right hand flashed for his gun. As quick as a cat Brick shifted just a trifle, slashing out with his right hand; a cutting stroke with the side of his hand, which caught Santel just at the middle of his throat and made him lose immediate interest in his gun.

He straightened up, with both hands going to his throat, his face twisted with the agony of it, as he slithered along the edge of the bar.

“Ambulance on the job!” snorted Silent; and before any one could prevent him he stepped in, caught Santel with both hands, swung him over his shoulder and went striding out of the saloon.

The crowd rushed to the doorway and windows in time to see Silent step to the edge of the sidewalk and fairly hurl Santel into the street, where he rolled over and over.

“Hookum cow!” yelped Silent. “Yee-ow-w-w! Cowboy!”

Santel got slowly to his feet, but fell down once before he got himself steadied enough to stagger away across the street.

“Mebbe he don’t know what it was all about,” stated Silent, “but he’s got sense enough to not come back for information.”

“I never seen anythin’ like it,” declared a cowboy. “Brick hit him with the side of his hand. Right on the old apple. I’ll betcha that jigger will have an apple-juice taste in his mouth for a month.”

Hendricks congratulated Brick silently and Brick grinned.

“I seen yuh wig-waggin’ me, Al. Santel was on the prod, eh?”

“He sure was, Brick. You ain’t heard about what he found out, have yuh?”

“Grant was tellin’ me, Al.”

“What do yuh think of it?”

“Well,” Brick grinned widely, “I feel suspicious of myself.”

“I told Santel he was crazy.”

“Thank yuh, Al.”

“But look out for Santel, Brick. I don’t know a thing about him, but I’ll bet he won’t forgive yuh.”

“If he does, he’s plumb loco. Anyway, I ain’t lookin’ for forgiveness. See yuh later, Al.”

Brick and Silent went down to the livery-stable and found the gangling youth in charge, sitting in the office, playing a game of solitaire.

“Where’s McKeever?” asked Brick.

“I dunno. I come to work at four o’clock, but he wasn’t here.”

“He didn’t say where he was goin’, did he?”

“He didn’t say he was goin’ anywhere. I suppose he got into a poker game and forgot he owned a livery-stable.”

“He wasn’t at the Short Horn.” Thus Silent.

“Tha’sso? Didja look in at McGill’s place? He plays over there once in a while.”

“That’s probably where he is,” said Brick.

“Was it anythin’ I can do for yuh, Sheriff?”

“No-o-o, I guess not. I just wanted to ask Jimmy how one of his saddles happens to have a bullet-hole in the cantle.”

“One of his saddles?” The youth squinted at Brick, as he lighted a limp-looking cigaret. “I didn’t know about that.”

“The saddle that Meecham rode today,” explained Brick. “It’s a cheap saddle—one of them red leather hulls, with a rawhide-covered horn. Meecham was ridin’ a Triangle 8 bay filly.”

“Uh-huh?” The youth squinted thoughtfully. “I know the saddle and the bronc. Lemme see.”

He led them out into the stable and examined the saddles, but was unable to find the right one. The bay filly was in a stall, and Brick knew it was the same animal that Meecham had ridden to Marlin City.

“I dunno where that ——ed saddle is,” declared the boy. “I know it. McKeever bought it from a mail-order catalog. One of the worst forks I ever set into. Cost about fifteen dollars, I reckon. Are you sure that’s the horse he was ridin’?”

“That’s the horse.” Brick was positive.

“What about the bullet-hole? Been some shootin’ goin’ on?”

“Bullet-holes don’t occur by themselves,” grinned Brick. “We’ll see if we can find Jimmy.”

They left the stable and crossed the street, going past McGill’s saloon, but there was no sign of McKeever. McGill was behind the bar, reading a newspaper, alone in the place. They went on up to the Short Horn, but found no trace of McKeever.

They asked the bartender, who said that he had not seen McKeever since about noon. At the Boston hotel, where McKeever lived, they were informed that he had not been around there since morning.

They went back to the Short Horn and had barely entered the place when the youth from the livery-stable followed them in. He was hatless, pasty-faced, and in one hand he carried an old tin bucket.

“For ——’s sake, come on!” he panted to Brick. “Come on with me! My ——!”

He turned and ran out, with Brick and Silent close behind him. Several of those in the saloon, who had heard, followed them down the street.

Straight to the stable they went, and the boy stopped in the middle of the floor, under the light of a lantern.

“Tut-take the lantern,” he faltered. “You go ahead, will yuh? Look in the grain box. My ——!”

Brick grabbed the lantern and ran into the grain-room, a built-in room, adjoining the little office. A big grain-bin extended the full length of the room, with three different covers.

“That’n on the end,” panted the boy.

Brick lifted the cover and held up the lantern. Lying doubled up on some loose oats was Jimmy McKeever, his head a welter of blood. Silent and the men from the saloon crowded in and took a look.

“I—I ju-just found him that-a-way,” explained the boy. “I dunno how I did it. We didn’t use that bin any more. Sus-somethin’ made me look in there, I reckon.”

Brick fastened back the cover and climbed into the bin.

“One of yuh go after the doctor,” he ordered, and a man hurried away.

Brick lifted McKeever up to where they could all get hold of him, and they placed him on the floor of the stable.

Brick examined him, while Silent knelt down and held the lantern.

“I don’t reckon he needs a doctor,” observed Silent.

Brick shook his head slowly.

“Don’t look like it, that’s a cinch. Somebody beat his head all up.”

“Somebody—yeah.” It was an old cattleman from the southern end of the range. “I’d admire to know jist who that somebody was.”

The man who went after the doctor had shouted the news in at the Short Horn, and the stable soon filled with curious and interested people. Doctor Bridger came bustling in and the crowd gave him room. His examination was short and to the point.

“Been dead quite a while. Skull crushed. Who found him?”

Doctor Bridger was the coroner. The youth shouldered his way inside the circle.

“I found him, Doc. I—I thought he was out some’rs, playin’ poker, and I finds him in that danged old oat-bin. I told the sheriff jist as quick as I could.”

“I reckon he did,” agreed Brick. “He was still packin’ his oat-can with him.”

“But why would any one kill Jimmy McKeever?” Thus Banty Harrison indignantly. “Jimmy was a good guy.”

“Didn’t have an enemy that I ever heard about,” offered Slim Hunter. “By gosh, this country is gettin’ too salty to suit me. Mostly every day there’s a robbery, a killin’ or a dynamitin’. Makes a feller scared to do anythin’, I tell yuh.”

“Anything missing around here?” questioned the doctor. “It might have been done by a horse-thief.”

“There ain’t no horses gone,” declared the boy.

He was about to mention the missing saddle, but Brick’s eyes signaled him a warning and he turned away.

“Better take the body down to my place,” suggested the doctor.

They rolled the body onto a blanket and four men carried it away. Brick and Silent left the stable ahead of the crowd, and were half-way to the Short Horn when the doctor joined them.

“Murder, wasn’t it?” he asked.

“The dirtiest kind,” said Brick slowly. “They probably put him in there until they got a chance to dispose of him.”

The doctor shook his head wearily.

“I can’t understand men doing a thing like that, sheriff. Murder is so unnecessary.”

“From yore angle,” said Brick softly.

They left the doctor and went to the hitch-rack, where they mounted and rode out of town. Just at the outskirts, Brick swung off the road and led the way into the hills with Silent’s horse pounding along behind him.

“Can’t take a chance on the road,” declared Brick, as the lights of Silverton faded from view. “There’s too much —— to pay in Sun Dog. We’ll stay at the Nine-Bar-Nine tonight.”

* * * * *

It was about four o’clock the following afternoon. Brick and Silent crouched in the brush and watched the ranch-house of Mostano. They had been there since the middle of the forenoon but had seen nothing of interest.

Their few hours of sleep at the Nine-Bar-Nine had only been an aggravation to Silent, who complained wearily against accompanying a half-witted sheriff on a foolish quest. They had left the Nine-Bar-Nine before daylight, having cooked their own breakfast, and had ridden the entire distance away from the road.

Brick was taking no chances now, and he was forced to admit that his spying on the Mostano ranch was inspired by a “hunch.” Something seemed to tell him that the answer to the riddle was at that ranch. He knew that Mostano was not the only man at the ranch when he and Harp were chased out of the house.

The dynamiting of his office proved that the criminals feared him and felt that he knew too much. Just why they would dynamite the Red Hill mine safe, after stealing the payroll, was more than he could figure out. In some way it was connected with the attempted killing of Soapy Caswell, he decided.