Chapter 19

A TRAGEDY IN THE TIMBER GROVE

The black was undoubtedly broken. His subsequent actions proved that. He did not become docile by any means, but he was tractable, which is to say that he did as he was bidden with a minimum of urging; he was intelligent, divining, and learned quickly. Also, he respected his conqueror. If Dade or Malcolm came near him he gave unmistakable evidence of hostility; he even shied at sight of Betty, who was his most sincere admirer, for had not his coming to the Lazy Y been attended with a sentiment not the less satisfying because concealed?

But the black suffered Calumet's advances, his authority, his autocratic commands, with a patience that indicated that his subjugation was to be complete and lasting.

When, toward the middle of the week, Kelton's men--two bepistoled, capable punchers--drove the cattle comprising the Lazy Y purchase into the valley, Calumet immediately set to work to train the black to observe the various niceties of the etiquette of cow-punching. He soon learned, that when the rope whistled past his ears he was to watch its progress, and if its loop encircled a neck or a leg he was to brace himself for the inevitable shock. If the loop failed--which it rarely did--he discovered that he was to note at which particular steer it had been hurled, and was to follow that steer's progress, no matter where it went, until the rope went true. He discovered that it was imperative for him to stand without moving when his master trailed the reins over his head; he early learned that the bit was a terrible instrument of torture, and that it were better to answer to the pressure of Calumet's knee than to be subjected to the pain it caused him.

He was taught these things, and many more, while the work of rebranding the Diamond K cattle went forward.

This work was no sinecure. Dade and Malcolm, and even Bob, assisted in it--Malcolm and Bob attending to the heating of the branding irons while Calumet roped the steers and dragged them to the fire where Dade pressed the white-hot irons to their hips. But the work was done finally, and the cattle turned out into the valley.

On the night that saw the finish of the branding, Calumet, Dade, and Malcolm retired early. Betty and Bob remained in the kitchen for some time, but finally they, too, went to bed.

At one second before midnight Calumet was sleeping soundly--as soundly as it is possible for a man to sleep who has been working out of doors and is physically tired. At exactly midnight he was wide awake, lying on his back, looking with unblinking eyes at the ceiling, all his senses aroused and alert, his nerves and muscles at a tension.

He did not know what had awakened him, though he was convinced that it had been something strange and unusual. It had happened to him before; several times when cattle had stampeded; once when a Mexican freighter at a cow camp had rose in the night to slip his knife into a puncher with whom he had had trouble during the day. Incidentally, except for Calumet, the Mexican would have made his escape. It had happened to him again when a band of horse thieves had attempted to run off some stock; it had never happened unless something unusual was going on. And so he was certain that something unusual was going on now, and he lay still, looking around him, to make sure that what was happening was not happening in his room. He turned his head and looked at Dade. That young man was breathing heavily and regularly. He turned toward the door of the room. The door was closed. A flood of moonlight entered the window; objects in the room were clearly distinguishable, and nothing seemed wrong here. But something was wrong--he was certain of that. And so he got carefully out of bed and looked out of the window, listening, peering intently in all directions within the limits of his vision. No sound greeted his ears, no moving object caught his gaze. But he was not satisfied.

He put on his clothes, buckled his cartridge belt around his waist, took his six-shooter from beneath his pillow, and stuck it into the holster, and in his stockinged feet opened the door of the room and stepped out into the hall. He was of the opinion that something had gone wrong with the horses, and he intended to make the rounds of the stable and corrals to satisfy his curiosity. Strangely, he did not think of the possibility of Betty meeting Taggart again, until he had reached the bottom of the stairs. Even then he was half-way across the dining-room, stepping carefully and noiselessly for fear he might awaken someone, when he glanced back with a sudden suspicion, toward the door of the office. As in that other time there shone a streak of light through the crevice between the bottom of the door and the threshold.

He stood still, his muscles contracting, his lips curling, a black, jealous anger in his heart. Taggart was there again.

But he would not escape this time. He would take care to make no noise which would scare him away. He listened at the door, but he heard no voices. They were in there, though, he could distinguish slight movements. He left the door and stole softly up the stairs to his room, getting his boots and carrying them in his hand. As before, he intended putting them on at the kitchen door. But Bob's dog would not betray him this time, for since the other accident he had contrived to persuade Bob to keep the dog outside at night. Nor would there occur any other accident--he would take care of that. And so it took him a long time to descend the stairs and make his way to the kitchen door. Once outside, he drew on his boots and stole silently and swiftly to the front door of the house.

To his astonishment, when he arrived at the door, there was no light, no sound to indicate that anybody was in the room. He tried the door--it was barred. He stepped to the window. If there was a light within it would show through the cracks and holes in the shade, for the latter was old and well worn.

But no light appeared. If there was anyone inside they must have heard him in spite of his carefulness, and had put out the light. He cursed. He could not watch both the back and the front door, but he could watch the outside of the house, could go a little distance away from it and thus see anybody who would leave it.

He walked away toward the timber clump, looking around him. As his gaze swept the wood near the river he caught a glimpse of a horse and rider as they passed through a clearing and went slowly away from him.

They had tricked him again! Probably by this time Betty was in her room, laughing at him. Taggart was laughing, too, no doubt. The thought maddened him. He cursed bitterly as he ran to the stable. He was inside in a flash, saddling Blackleg, jamming a bit into his mouth. He would follow Taggart to the Arrow, to hell--anywhere, but he would catch him. Blackleg could do it; he would make him do it, if he killed him in the end.

In three minutes Blackleg shot out of the stable door--a flash in the night. The swift turn that was required of him he made on his hind legs, and then, with a plunge and a snort of delight, he was away over the level toward the wood.

Calumet guided Blackleg toward the spot where he had seen the rider, certain that he could not have gone far during the interval that had elapsed, but when he reached the spot there was no sign of a horse and rider in any direction.

For an instant only Calumet halted Blackleg, and then he spurred him down the river trail. One mile, two, three, he rode at a breakneck pace, and then suddenly he was out of the timber and facing a plain that stretched into an interminable distance. The trail lay straight and clear; there was no sign of a horse and rider on it. Taggart had not come in this direction, though in this direction lay the Arrow.

He wheeled Blackleg and, with glowering eyes and straightened lips, rode him back the way he had come, halting often and peering into shadows. By the time he arrived at the spot where he had first seen the horse and rider he had become convinced that Taggart had secreted himself until he had passed him and had then ridden over the back trail, later to return to the Arrow by a circuitous route.

Calumet determined to cut across the country and intercept him, and he drove the spurs into Blackleg and raced him through the wood. His trail took him into a section which led to the slope which the horses drawing the wagon had taken on the night of the ambush. He was tearing through this when he broke through the edge of a clearing about a quarter of a mile from the ranchhouse. At about the center of the clearing Blackleg came to a jarring, dizzying stop, rearing high on his hind legs. When he came down he whinnied and backed, and, peering over his shoulder to see what had frightened him, Calumet saw the body of a man lying at the edge of a mesquite clump.

With his six-shooter in hand, Calumet dismounted and walked to the man. The latter was prone in the dust, on his face, and as Calumet leaned over him the better to peer into his face--for he thought the man might be Taggart--he heard a groan escape his lips. Sheathing his weapon, Calumet turned the man over on his back. Another groan escaped him; his eyes opened, though they closed again immediately. It was not Taggart.

"Got me," he said. He groaned again.

"Who got you?" Calumet bent over to catch the reply. None came; the man had lost consciousness.

Calumet stood up and looked around. He could see nothing of the rider for whom he was searching. He could not leave this wounded man to pursue his search for Taggart; there might be something he could do for the man.

But he left the man's side for an instant while he looked around him. Some dense undergrowth rose on his right, black shadows surrounding it, and he walked along its edge, his forty-five in hand, trying to peer into it. He saw nothing, heard nothing. Then, catching another groan from the man, he returned to him. The man's eyes were open; they gleamed brightly and wildly.

"Got me," he said as he saw Calumet.

"Who got you?" repeated Calumet.

"Telza."

"Telza?" Calumet bent over him again; the name sounded foreign. "Talk sense," he said shortly; "who's Telza?"

"A Toltec Indian," said the man. "He's been hangin' around here--for a month. Around the Arrow, too. Mebbe two months. Nobody knows. He's like a shadow. Now you see him an' now you don't," he added with a grim attempt at a joke. "Taggart's had me trailin' him, lookin' for a diagram he's got."

"Diagram of what?" demanded Calumet. His interest was intense. A Toltec! Telza was of the race from whom his father and Taggart had stolen the idol. He leaned closer to the man.

"Are Telza an' Taggart friends?" he asked.

"Friends!" The man's weak laugh was full of scorn. "Taggart's stringin' him. Telza's lookin' for an idol--all gold an' diamonds, an' such. Worth thousands. Taggart set Telza on Betty Clayton." The man choked; his breath came thickly; red stained his lips. "Hell!" he said, "what you chinnin' me for? Get that damned toad-sticker out of me, can't you. It's in my side, near the back--I can't reach it."

Calumet felt where the man indicated, and his hand struck the handle of a knife. It had a large, queerly-shaped handle and a long, thin blade like a stiletto. It had been driven into the man's left side just under the fleshy part of the shoulder, and it was plain that its point had found a vital spot--probably through the lung and near the heart, for the man was limp and helpless, his breath coughed in his throat, and it was certain that he had not many minutes to live. Calumet carefully withdrew the weapon, and the man settled back with a sigh of relief.

"You're Marston, ain't you?" he said, slowly and painfully, gasping with every breath. "I've heard the Taggart's talk about you. Old Tom's developed a yellow streak in his old age an' he's leavin' all his dirty work to Neal. Neal's got a yellow streak, too, for that matter, but he's young an' ain't got no sense. I reckon I'm goin' somewhere now, an' so I can say what I like. Taggart ain't no friend of mine--neither of them. They've played me dirt--more than once. My name's Al Sharp. You know that Tom Taggart was as deep in that idol business as your dad was. He told me. But he's got Telza soft-soaped into thinkin' that Betty Clayton's folks snaked it from Telza's people. Taggart's got evidence that your dad planted the idol around here somewheres--seems to know that your dad drawed a diagram of the place an' left it with Betty. He set Telza to huntin' for it. Telza got it tonight--it was hid somewhere. I was with him--waitin' for him. If he got the diagram I was to knife him and take it away from him. Taggart an' his dad is somewhere around here--I was to meet them down the river a piece. Telza double-crossed me; tried to sneak over here an' hunt the idol himself. I found him--he had the diagram. I tried to get it from him--he stuck his toad-sticker in me, . . . the little copper-skinned devil. He--" He hesitated and choked, raising himself as though to get a long breath. But a dark flood again stained his lips, he strangled and stretched out limply.

Calumet turned him over on his back and covered his face with a handkerchief. Then he stood up, looking around at the edge of the clearing. Ten feet in front of him, curled around the edge of a bit of sagebrush, was a dirty white object. He walked over, kicked the sagebrush violently, that a concealed rattler might not spring on him, and took up the object. It was a piece of paper about six inches square, and in the dim moonlight Calumet could see that it contained writing of some sort and a crude sketch. He looked closer at it, saw a spot marked "Idol is here," and then folded it quickly and placed it, crumpled into a ball, into a pocket of his trousers.

He was now certain that Taggart had been merely deceiving Betty; there had been no other significance to his visits. The visits were merely part of a plan to get possession of the idol. While he had been talking to Betty in the office tonight Telza had stolen the diagram.

There was more than triumph in Calumet's eyes as he turned his pony--there was joy and savage exultation. The idol was his; he would get the money, too. After that he would drive Betty and all of them--

But would he? A curious indecision mingled with his other emotions at this thought. His face grew serious. Lately he was developing a vacillating will; whenever he meditated any action with regard to Betty he had an inclination to defer it. He postponed a decision now; he would think it over again. Before he made up his mind on that question he wanted to enjoy her discomfiture and confusion over the loss of the diagram.

He had lost all thought of pursuing Taggart. Sharp had said that Taggart was somewhere in the vicinity, but it was just possible that Sharp had been so deeply engaged with Telza about the time Taggart had made his escape that he had not seen him. There was time for him to settle with Taggart.

He took up the bridle rein, wheeled, placed one foot into the stirrup, intending to mount, when he became aware of a shadow looming near him. He pulled the foot out of the stirrup, dropped the reins with the same movement, and turned in a flash.

Neal Taggart, sitting on a horse at the edge of the clearing, not over twenty feet from him, was looking at him from behind the muzzle of a six-shooter. At a trifling distance from Taggart was another man, also bestride a horse. A rifle was at this man's shoulder; his cheek was nuzzling its stock, and Calumet saw that the weapon was aimed at his chest.

He rapidly noted the positions of the two, estimated the distance, decided that the risk of resistance was too great, and slowly raised his hands above his head.

"Surprise party, eh?" he said. "Well," he added in a self-accusing voice, "I reckon I was dreamin' some."

Neal Taggart dismounted, moving quickly aside so that the man with the rifle had an unobstructed view of Calumet. He went close to the latter.

"So it's you, eh?" he said. "We saw you tearin' up an' down the river trail, when we was back in the timber a piece. Racin' your fool head off. Nothin' in sight. Saw you come in here ten minutes ago. What you doin' here?"

"Exercisin'," said Calumet; "takin' my midnight constitutional." He looked at the man with the rifle.

The latter was hatless. Long gray hair, unkempt, touched his shoulders; a white beard, scraggly, dirty, hid all of his face except the beak-like, awry nose. Beady, viciously glowing eyes gleamed out of the grotesque mask.

"Who's your friend?" questioned Calumet, with a derisive grin. "If I was a sheep-man now, I'd try an' find time, next shearin'--"

"My father," growled Neal.

"Excuse me," said Calumet with a short laugh, though his eyes shone with a sudden hardness; "I thought it was a--"

"You're Calumet Marston, I reckon," interrupted the bearded man. "You're an impertinent pup, like your father was. Get his guns!" he commanded gruffly.

Neal hesitated and then took a step toward Calumet. The latter crouched, his eyes narrowing to glittering pin points. In his attitude was a threat, a menace, of volcanic, destroying action. Neal stopped a step off, uncertain.

Calumet's lips sneered. "Take my guns, eh?" he said. "Reach out an' grab them. But say your prayers before you do--you an' that sufferin' monolith with the underbrush scattered all over his mug. Come an' take them!" He jeered as he saw Neal Taggart's face whiten. "Hell!" he added as he saw the elder Taggart make a negative motion toward his son, "you ain't got no clear thoughts just at this minute, eh?"

"We ain't aimin' to force trouble," growled the older man. "We're just curious, that's what. Also, there's a chance that we can settle this thing peaceable. We want to palaver. If you'll give your word that there won't be no gun-play until after the peace meetin' is over, you can take your hands down."

"No shootin' goes right now," agreed Calumet. "But after this peace meetin'--"

"We ought to come to terms," said Taggart, placing his rifle in the saddle holster as Calumet's hands came down. "There hadn't ought to be any bad blood between us. Me an' your dad was a heap friendly until we had a fallin' out over that she-devil which he lived with--Ezela." There was an insincere grin on his face.

It was plain to Calumet that the elder Taggart had some ulterior motive in suggesting a peace conference. He noted that while Taggart talked his eyes kept roving around the clearing as though in search of something. That something, Calumet divined, was Sharp and Telza. He suspected that Calumet had seen Telza and Sharp, or one of them, enter the clearing, and had followed them. Neal had said that they had seen Calumet when he had been racing up and down the river trail; they had suspected he had been after Sharp or Telza, and had followed him. No doubt they were afflicted with a great curiosity. They were playing for time in order to discover his errand.

"I reckon we'll get along without mushin'," suggested Calumet. "What terms are you talkin' about?"

Taggart climbed down from his pony and stood beside it.

"Half-an'-half on the idol," he said. "That's square, ain't it?" He looked at Calumet with the beginning of a bland smile, which instantly faded and turned into a grimace of fear as he found himself looking into the gaping muzzles of Calumet's pistols, which had appeared with magic ease and quickness.

"I'm runnin' a little surprise party of my own," declared Calumet. "Was you thinkin' I was fool enough to go to gassin' with you, trustin' that you wouldn't take your chance to perforate me? You've got another guess comin'."

The disappointed gleam in Taggart's eyes showed that such had been his intention. "There wasn't to be no shootin' until after we'd held our peace meetin'," he complained.

"Correct," said Calumet. "But the peace meetin' is now over. Get your sky-hooks clawin' at the clouds!" he warned coldly as Neal hesitated. When both had raised their hands above their heads he deftly plucked their weapons from their holsters. Then, alert and watchful, he drew the elder Taggart's rifle from its sling on the saddle and threw it a dozen feet away.

"Now just step over to that bunch of mesquite," he ordered; "there's somethin' there that I want to show you."

In obedience to his command they went forward. Both came to a halt when around the edge of the mesquite clump they saw the dead body of Sharp, with the handkerchief over his face. Neither recognized the man until Calumet drew the handkerchief away, and then both started back.

"Know him, eh?" said Calumet, watching them narrowly. "Well, he done his duty--done what you wanted him to do. But your man, Telza, double-crossed him--knifed him." He took up the rapier-like blade that he had drawn from Sharp's side and held it before their eyes. Again they started, and Calumet laughed.

"Know the knife, too!" he jeered. "An' after what you've done you've got the nerve to ask me to divvy with you."

The elder Taggart was the first to recover his composure.

"Telza?" he said. "Why, I reckon you've got me; there ain't no one of that name--"

But Calumet was close to him, his eyes blazing. "Shut your dirty mouth, or I'll tear you apart!" he threatened. "You're a liar, an' you know it. Sharp told me about you settin' the Toltec on Betty. I know the rest. I know you tried to make a monkey out of my dad, you damned old ossified scarecrow! If you open your trap again, I'll just naturally pulverize you! I reckon that's all I've got to say to you."

He walked over to Neal, and the latter shrank from the bitter malignance of his gaze.

"Can you tell me why I ain't lettin' daylight through you?" he said as he shoved the muzzle of his six-shooter deep into Neal's stomach, holding it there with savage steadiness as he leaned forward and looked into the other's eyes. "It's because I ain't a sneak an' a murderer. I ain't ambushin' nobody. I've done some killin' in my time, but I ain't never plugged no man who didn't have the same chance I had. I'm givin' you a chance."

He drew out one of the weapons he had taken from the two men, holding it by the muzzle and thrusting it under Neal's nose. The terrible, suppressed rage in his eyes caused a shiver to run over Neal, his face turned a dull white, his eyes stared fearfully. He made no move to grasp the weapon.

"I ain't fightin'," he said with trembling lips.

Calumet reversed the gun and stepped back, laughing harshly, without mirth.

"Of course you ain't fightin'," he said. "That's the reason it's goin' to be hard for me to kill you. I'd feel like a cur if I was to perforate you now--you or your scarecrow dad. But I'm tellin' you this: You've sneaked around the Lazy Y for the last time. I'm layin' for you after this, an' if I ketch you maverickin' around here again I'll perforate you so plenty that it'll make you dizzy. That's all. Get out of here before I change my mind!"

Shrinking from his awe-inspiring wrath, they retreated from him, watching him fearfully as they backed toward their horses. They had almost reached them when Calumet's voice brought them to a halt.

His lips were wreathed in a cold grin, his eyes alight with a satanic humor. But the rage had gone from his voice; it was mocking, derisive.

"Goin' to ride?" he said. "Oh, don't! Them horses look dead tired. Leave them here; they need a rest. Besides, a man can't do any thinkin' to amount to anything when he's forkin' a horse, an' I reckon you two coyotes will be doin' a heap of thinkin' on your way back to the Arrow."

"Good Lord!" said the elder Taggart; "you don't mean that? Why, it's fifteen miles to the Arrow!"

"Shucks," said Calumet; "so it is! An' it's after midnight, too. But you wouldn't want them poor, respectable critters to be gallivantin' around at this time of the night, when they ought to be in bed dreamin' of the horse-heaven which they're goin' to one of these days when the Taggarts don't own them any more. You can send a man over after them when you get back, an' if they want to go home, why, I'll let them." His voice changed again; it rang with a menacing command.

"Walkin' is good!" he said; "get goin'! You've got three minutes to get to that bend in the trail over by the crick. It's about half a mile. I'm turnin' my back. If I see you when I turn around I'm workin' that rifle there."

There was a silence which might have lasted a second. Only this small space of time was required by the Taggarts to convince them that Calumet was in deadly earnest. Then, with Neal leading, they began to run toward the bend in the trail.

Shortly Calumet turned. The Taggarts had almost reached the bend, and while he watched they vanished behind it.

Calumet picked up the rifle which he had taken from the elder Taggart, mounted his horse, and drove the Taggart animals into the corral. He decided that he would keep them there for an hour or so, to give the Taggarts time to get well on their way toward the Arrow. Had he turned them loose immediately they no doubt would have overtaken their masters before the latter had gone very far.

Remounting, Calumet rode to the bend in the trail. He carried Taggart's rifle. About a mile out on the plain that stretched away toward the Arrow he saw the two men. They seemed to be walking rapidly.

Calumet returned to the ranchhouse, got a pick and shovel, and went back to the timber clump. An hour later he was again at the corral. He led the Taggart horses out, took them to the bend in the trail, and turned them loose, for he anticipated that the Taggarts would make a complaint to the sheriff about them, and if they were found in the Lazy Y corral trouble would be sure to result.

He watched them until they were well on their way toward the Arrow, and then he returned to the ranchhouse and went to bed. No one had heard him, he told himself with a grin as he stretched out on the bed beside Dade to sleep the hour that would elapse before daylight.