Delphi Collected Works of Max Brand US, page 447
At the same time Cartwright’s gun spat fire again. The bullet buzzed angrily above Sinclair’s head. His own brought a yell of pain, sharp as the yelp of a coyote.
“Keep quiet, Cartwright,” ordered the man at the window. “You’ll get yourself killed if you keep risking it. Sheriff!”
His voice rose and rang.
“Blow the lock off’n that door. We got him!”
There was an instant reply in the explosion of a gun, the crash of broken metal, the door swung slowly in, admitting a dim twilight into the room. The light showed Sinclair one thing — the dull outlines of Cartwright. He whipped up his gun and then hesitated. It would be murder. He had killed before, but never save in fair fight, standing in a clear light before his enemy. He knew that he could not kill this rat he detested. He thought of the wrecked life of the girl and set his teeth. Still he could not fire.
“Cartwright,” he said softly, “I got you covered. Your right hand’s on the floor with your gun. Don’t raise that hand!”
In the shadow against the wall Cartwright moved, but he obeyed. The revolver still glimmered on the floor.
A new and desperate thought came to Sinclair — to rush straight for the window, shoot down the man on the ledge, and risk the leap to the ground. “Scatter back!” called the man on the ledge.
That settled the last chance of Sinclair. There were guards on the ground, scattered about the house. He could never get out that way.
“Keep out of the light by the door,” commanded the man at the window. “And start shooting for the chest of drawers on the left-hand side of the room — and aim low down. It may take time, but we’ll get him!”
Obviously the truth of that statement was too clear for Sinclair to deny it. He reviewed his situation with the swift calm of an old gambler. He had tried his desperate coup and had failed. There was nothing to do but accept the failure, or else make a still more desperate effort to rectify his position, risking everything on a final play.
He must get out of the room. The window was hopelessly blocked. There remained the open door, but the hall beyond the door was crowded with men.
Perhaps their very numbers would work against them. Even now they could be heard cautiously maneuvering. They would shoot through the door in his general direction, unaimed shots, with the hope of a chance hit, and eventually they would strike him down. Suppose he were to steal close to the door, leap over the bed, and plunge out among them, his Colt spitting lead and fire.
That unexpected attack would cleave a passage for him. The more he thought of it, the more clearly he saw that the chances of escape to the street were at least one in three. And yet he hesitated. If he made that break two or three innocent men would go down before his bullets, as he sprang out, shooting to kill. He shrank from the thought. He was amazed at himself. Never before had he been so tender of expedients. He had always fought to win — cleanly, but to win. Why was he suddenly remembering that to these men he was an outlaw, fit meat for the first bullet they could send home? Had he been one of them, he would have taken up a position in that very hall just as they were doing.
Slowly, reluctantly, fighting himself as he did it, he shoved his revolver back into his holster and determined to take the chance of that surprise attack, with his empty hands against their guns. If they did not drop him the instant he leaped out, he would be among them, too close for gunplay unless they took the chance of killing their own men.
Keeping his gaze fixed on Cartwright across the room — for the moment he showed his intention, Cartwright would shoot — he maneuvered softly toward the bed. Cartwright turned his head, but made no move to lift his gun. There was a reason. The light from the door fell nearer to the rancher than it did to Sinclair. To Cartwright he must be no more than a shapeless blur.
A gun exploded from the doorway, with only a glint of steel, as the muzzle was shoved around the jamb. The bullet crashed harmlessly into the wall behind him. Another try. The sharp, stifling odor of burned powder began to fill the room, stinging the nostrils of Sinclair. Cartwright was coughing in a stifled fashion on the far side of the room, as if he feared a loud noise would draw a bullet his way.
All at once there was no sound in the hotel, and, as the wave of silence spread, Sinclair was aware that the whole little town was listening, waiting, watching. Not a whisper in the hall, not a stir from Cartwright across the room. The quiet made the drama seem unreal.
Then that voice outside the window, which seemed to be Sinclair’s Nemesis, cried: “Steady, boys. Something’s going to happen. He’s getting ready. Buck up, boys!”
In a moment of madness Sinclair decided to rush that window and dispose of the cool-minded speaker at all costs before he died. There, at least, was the one man he wished to kill. He followed that impulse long enough to throw himself sidling along the floor, so as not to betray his real strategic position to those at the door, and he splashed two bullets into the wall, trimming the side of the window.
Only clear, deep-throated laughter came in response.
“I told you, boys. I read his mind, and he’s mad at me, eh?”
But Riley Sinclair hardly heard the mocking answer. He had glided back behind the bed, the instant the shots were fired. As he moved, two guns appeared for a flickering instant around the edge of the doorway, one on each side. Their muzzles kicked up rapidly, one, two, three, four, five, six, and each, as he fired, spread the shots carefully from side to side. Sinclair heard the bullets bite and splinter the woodwork close to the floor. The chest of drawers staggered with the impact.
He raised his own gun, watched one of the jumping muzzles for an instant, and then tried a snap shot. The report of his revolver was bitten off short by the clang of metal; there was a shouted curse from the hallway. He had blown the gun cleanly out of the sharpshooter’s hand.
Before the amazed rumble from the hall died away, Sinclair had acted. He shoved his weapon back in its holster, and cleared the bed with a flying leap. From the corner of his eye, he saw Cartwright snatch up his gun and take a chance shot that whistled close to his head, and then Sinclair plunged into the hall.
One glimmering chance of success remained. On the side of the door toward which he drove there were only three men in the hall; behind him were more, far more, but their weapons were neutralized. They could not fire without risking a miss that would be certain to lodge a bullet in the body of one of the men before Sinclair.
Those men were kneeling, for they had been reaching out and firing low around the door to rake the floor of the room. At the appearance of Sinclair they started up. He saw a gun jerk high for a snap shot, and, swerving as he leaped, he drove out with all his weight behind his fist. The knuckles bit through flesh to the bone. There was a jarring impact, and now only two men were before him. One of them dropped his gun — it was he who had just emptied his weapon into the room — and flung himself at Sinclair, with outspread arms. The cowpuncher snapped up his knee, and the blow crumpled the other back and to the side. He sprang on toward the last man who barred his way. And all this in the split part of a second.
Chance took a hand against him. In the very act of striking, his foot lodged on the first senseless body, and he catapulted forward on his hands. He struck the legs of the third man as he fell.
Down they went together, and Sinclair lurched up from under the weight only to be overtaken by many reaching hands from behind. That instant of delay had lost the battle for him; and, as he strove to whirl and fight himself clear, an arm curled around his neck, shutting off his breath. A great weight jarred between his shoulders. And he pitched down to the floor.
He stopped fighting. He felt his gun slipped from the holster. Deft, strong hands jerked his arms behind him and tied the wrists firmly together. Then he was drawn to his feet.
All this without a word spoken, only the pant and struggle of hard-drawn breaths. Not until he stood on his feet again, with a bleeding-faced fellow rising with dazed eyes, and another clambering up unsteadily, with both hands pressed against his head, did the captors give voice. And their voice was a yell of triumph that was taken up in two directions outside the hotel.
They became suddenly excited, riotously happy. In the overflowing of their joy they were good-natured. Some one caught up Sinclair’s hat and jammed it on his head. Another slapped him on the shoulder.
“A fine, game fight!” said the latter. It was the man with the smeared face. He was grinning through his wounds. “Hardest punch I ever got. But I don’t blame you, partner!”
Presently he saw Sheriff Kern. The latter was perfectly cool, perfectly grave. It was his arm that had coiled around the neck of Sinclair and throttled him into submission.
“You didn’t come out to kill, Sinclair. Why?”
“I ain’t used to slaughterhouse work,” said Sinclair with equal calm, although he was panting. “Besides, it wasn’t worth it. Murder never is.”
“Kind of late to come to that idea, son. Now just trot along with me, will you?” He paused. “Where’s Arizona?”
Cartwright lurched out of the room with his naked gun in his hand. Red dripped from the shallow wound where Sinclair’s bullet had nicked him. He plunged at the captive, yelling.
“Stop that fool!” snapped the sheriff.
Half a dozen men put themselves between the outlaw and the avenger.
Cartwright straggled vainly.
“Between you and me,” said Sinclair coldly to the sheriff, “I think that skunk would plug me while I got my hands tied.”
The sheriff flashed a knowing glance up at his tall prisoner’s face.
“I dunno, Sinclair. Kind of looks that way.”
Although Cartwright had been persuaded to restore his gun to its cover, he passed through the crowd until he confronted Sinclair.
“Now, the tables is turned, eh? I’ll take the high hand from now on,
Sinclair!”
“It’s no good,” said Sinclair dryly. “The gent that shot out the light had a chance to see something before he done the shooting. And what he seen must have showed that you’re yaller, Cartwright — yaller as a yaller dog!”
Cartwright flung his fist with a curse into the face of the cowpuncher. The weight of the blow jarred him back against the wall, but he met the glare of Cartwright with a steady eye, a thin trickle of crimson running down his cut lips. The sheriff rushed in between and mastered Cartwright’s arms.
“One more little trick like that, stranger, and I’ll turn you over to the boys. They got ways of teaching gents manners. How was you raised, anyway?”
Suddenly sobered, Cartwright drew back from dark glances on every side.
“Fellows,” he said, in a shaken voice, “I forgot his hands was tied.
But I’m kind of wrought up. He tried to murder me!”
“It’s all right, partner,” drawled Red Chalmers, and he laid a strong hand on the shoulder of Cartwright. “It’s all right. We all allow for one break. But don’t do something like that twice — not in these parts!”
Sinclair walked beside the sheriff, while the crowd poured past him and down the hall. When they reached the head of the stairs they found the lighted room below filled with excited, upturned faces; at the sight of the sheriff and his prisoner they roared their applause. The faces were blotted and blurred by a veil of rapidly, widely waving sombreros.
The sheriff paused halfway down the stairs and held up his hand. Sinclair halted beside him looking disdainfully over the crowd. Instantly noise and movement ceased. It was a spectacular picture, the stubby little sheriff and the tall, lean, wolflike man he had captured. It seemed a vivid illustration of the power of the law over the lawbreaker. Sinclair glanced down in wonder at Kern. It was in character for the sheriff to make a speech. A moment later the sheriff’s own words had explained his reason for the impromptu address.
“Boys,” he said, “I figure some of you has got an almighty big wish to see Sinclair on the end of a rope, eh?”
A deep growl answered him.
“Speaking personal,” went on the sheriff smoothly, “I don’t see how he’s done a thing worth hanging. He took a prisoner away from me, and he’s resisted arrest. That’s all. Sinclair has got a name as a killer. Maybe he is. But I know he ain’t done no killing around these parts that’s come to light yet. I’ll tell you another thing. A minute ago he could have sent three men to death and maybe come off with a free skin. But he chose to take his chance without shooting to kill. He tried to fight his way out with his hands sooner’n blow the heads off of gents that never done him no harm except to get in his way. Well, boys, that’s something you don’t often see. And I tell you this right now: If they’s any lynch talk around this here town, you can lay to it that you’ll have to shoot your way to Sinclair through me. And I’ll be a dead one before you reach to him.”
He paused. Someone hissed from the back of the crowd, but the majority murmured in appreciation.
“One more thing,” went on the sheriff. “Some of you may think it was great guns to take Sinclair. It was a pretty good job, but they ain’t no credit coming to me. I’m up here saying that all the praise goes to a fat friend of mine by name Arizona. If you got any free drinks, let ’em drift the way of Arizona. Hey, Arizona, step out and make a bow, will you?”
But no Arizona appeared. The crowd cheered him, and then cheered the generous sheriff. Kern had won more by his frankness than he could possibly have won in half a dozen spectacular exploits with a gun.
25
THE CROWD SWIRLED out of the hotel before the sheriff and his prisoner, and then swirled back again. No use following the sheriff if they hoped for details. They knew his silence of old. Instead they picked off the members who had taken part in some phase of the fight, and drew them aside. As Sinclair went on down the street, the populace of Sour Creek was left pooled behind him. Various orators were giving accounts of how the whole thing had happened.
Sinclair had neither eye nor ear for them. But he looked back and up to the western sky, with a flat-topped mountain clearly outlined against it. There was his country, and in his country he had left Jig alone and helpless. A feeling of utter desolation and failure came over him. He had started with a double-goal — Sandersen or Cartwright, or both. He had failed lamentably of reaching either one. He looked back to the sheriff, squat, insignificant, gray-headed. What a man to have blocked him!
“But who’s this Arizona?” he asked.
“I dunno. Seems to have known you somewhere. Maybe a friend of yours,
Sinclair?”
“H’m,” said the cowpuncher. “Maybe! Tell me: Was it him that was outside the window and trimmed the light on me?”
“You got him right, Sinclair. That was the gent. Nice play he made, eh?”
“Very pretty, sheriff. I thought I knowed his voice.”
“He seems to have made himself pretty infrequent. Didn’t know Arizona was so darned modest.”
“Maybe he’s got other reasons,” said Sinclair. “What’s his full name?”
“Ain’t that curious! I ain’t heard of anybody else that knows it. He’s a cool head, this Arizona. Seemed to read your mind and know jest how you’d jump, Sinclair. I would have been off combing the trails, but he seemed to know that you’d come into town.”
“I’ll sure keep him in mind if I ever meet up with him,” murmured
Sinclair. “Is this where I bunk?”
The sheriff had paused before a squat, dumpy building and was working noisily at the lock with a big key. Now that his back was necessarily toward his prisoner, two of the posse stepped up close beside Sinclair. They had none of the sheriff’s nonchalance. One of them was the man whose head had made the acquaintance of Sinclair’s knee, and both were ready for instant action of any description.
“I’m Rhinehart,” said one softly. “Keep me in mind, Sinclair. I’m him that you smashed with your knee. Dirty work! I’ll see you when you get out of the lockup — if that ever happens!”
The voice of Sinclair was not so soft. “I’ll meet you in jail or out,” he answered, “on foot or on horseback, with fists or knife or gun. And you can lay to this, Rhinehart: I’ll remember you a pile better’n you’ll remember me!”
All the repressed savagery of his nature came quivering into his voice as he spoke, and the other shrank instinctively a pace. In the meantime the sheriff had succeeded in turning the rusted lock, which squeaked back. The door grumbled on its heavy hinges. Sinclair stepped into the musty, close atmosphere within.
“Don’t look like you had much use for this here outfit,” he said to the sheriff.
The latter lighted a lantern.
“Nope,” he said. “It sure beats all how the luck runs, Sinclair. We’d had a pretty bad time with crooks around these parts, and them that was nabbed in Sour Creek got away; about two out of three, before they was brought to me at Woodville. So the boys got together and ponied up for this little jail, and it’s as neat a pile of mud and steel as ever you see. Look at them bars. Kind of rusty, they look, but inside they’re toolproof. Oh, it’s an up-to-date outfit, this jail. It’s been a comfort to me, and it’s a credit to Sour Creek. But the trouble is that since it was built they ain’t been more’n one or two to put in it. Maybe you can make out here for the night. Have you over to Woodville in a couple of days, Sinclair.”
He brought his prisoner into a cagelike cell, heavily guarded with bars on all sides. The adobe walls had been trusted in no direction. The steel lining was the strength of the Sour Creek jail. The sheriff himself set about shaking out the blankets. When this was done, he bade his two companions draw their guns and stand guard at the steel door to the cell.
“Not that I don’t trust you a good deal, Sinclair,” he said, “but I know that a gent sometimes takes big chances.”
So saying, he cut the bonds of his prisoner, but instead of making a plunge at the door, Sinclair merely stretched his long arms luxuriously above his head. The sheriff slipped out of the door and closed it after him. A heavy and prolonged clangor followed, as steel jarred home against steel.
