Partners of Chance Part 25

Again Bartley nodded.

"It ain't a bad country to settle down in, for folks that likes to settle," said Cheyenne.

Bartley glanced sharply at his companion. Cheyenne was gazing straight ahead. His face was unreadable.

"Now if I was the settlin' kind--" He paused and slowly turned toward Bartley. "A man could raise alfalfa and chickens and kids."

"Go ahead," laughed Bartley.

"I'm goin'--to-morrow mornin'. And you say you figure to stay here a spell?"

"Oh, just a few days. I imagine I shall grow tired of it. But to-night, I feel pretty well satisfied to stay right where I am."

Cheyenne rose and strode to the bar. After a short argument with the proprietor, he returned with a bottle and gla.s.ses. Bartley raised his eyebrows questioningly.

"Once in a while--" And Cheyenne gestured toward the bottle.

"It's powerful stuff," said Bartley.

"We ain't far from the hotel," declared Cheyenne. And he filled their gla.s.ses.

"This ought to be the last, for me," said Bartley, drinking. "But don't let that make any difference to you."

Cheyenne drank and shrugged his shoulders. He leaned back and gazed at the opposite wall. Bartley vaguely realized that the Mexicans were chattering, that two or three persons had come in, and that the atmosphere was heavy with tobacco smoke. He unb.u.t.toned his s.h.i.+rt-collar.

Presently Cheyenne twisted round in his chair. "Remember Little Jim, back at the Hastings ranch?"

"I should say so! It would be difficult to forget him."

"Miss Dorry thinks a heap of that kid."

"She seems to."

"Now, I ain't drunk," Cheyenne declared solemnly. "I sure wish I was.

You know Little Jim is my boy. Well, his ma is livin' over to Laramie.

She writ to me to come back to her, onct. I reckon Sears got tired of her. She lived with him a spell after she quit me. Folks say Sears treated her like a dog. I guess I wasn't man enough, when I heard that--"

"You mean Panhandle Sears--at Antelope?"

"Him."

"Oh, I see!" said Bartley slowly. "And that c.r.a.p game, at Antelope--I see!"

"If Panhandle had a-jumped me, instead of you, that night, I'd 'a'

killed him. Do you know why Wishful stepped in and put Sears down?

Wishful did that so that there wouldn't be a killin'. That's the second time Sears has had his chance to git me, but he won't take that chance.

That's the second time we met up since--since my wife left me. The third time it'll be lights out for somebody. I ain't drunk."

"Then Sears has got a yellow streak?"

"Any man that uses a woman rough has. When Jimmy's ma left us, I reckon I went loco. It wa'n't just her _leavin'_ us. But when I heard she had took up with Sears, and knowin' what he was--I just quit. I was workin'

down here at the ranch, then. I went up North, figurin' to kill him.

Folks thought I was yellow, for not killin' him. They think so right now. Mebby I am.

"I worked up North a spell, but I couldn't stay. So I lit out and come down South again. First time I met up with Sears was over on the Tonto.

He stepped up and slapped my face, in front of a crowd, in the Lone Star. And I took it. But I told him I'd sure see him again, and give him another chance to slap my face.

"You see, Panhandle Sears is that kind--he's got to work himself up to kill a man. And over there at Antelope, that night, he just about knowed that if he lifted a finger, I'd git him. He figured to start a ruckus, and then git me in the mix-up. Wishful was on, and he stopped that chance. Folks think that because I come ridin' and singin' and jos.h.i.+n'

that I ain't no account. Mebby I ain't."

Cheyenne poured another drink for himself. Bartley declined to drink again. He was thinking of this squalid tragedy and of its possible outcome. The erstwhile sprightly Cheyenne held a new significance for the Easterner. That a man could ride up and down the trails singing, and yet carry beneath it all the grim intent some day to kill a man--

Bartley felt that Cheyenne had suddenly become a stranger, an unknown quant.i.ty, a sinister jester, in fact, a dangerous man. He leaned forward and touched Cheyenne's arm.

"Why not give up the idea of--er--getting Sears; and settle down, and make a home for Little Jim?"

"When Aunt Jane took him, the understandin' was that Jimmy was to be raised respectable, which is the same as tellin' me that I don't have nothin' to do with raisin' him. Me, I got to keep movin'."

Bartley turned toward the doorway as a tall figure loomed through the haze of tobacco smoke: a gaunt, heavy-boned man, bearded and limping slightly. With him were several companions, booted and spurred; evidently just in from a hard ride.

Cheyenne turned to Bartley. "That's Bill Sneed--and his crowd. I ain't popular with 'em--right now."

CHAPTER XVII

THAT MESCAL

"The man who had your horses?" queried Bartley.

Cheyenne nodded. "The one at the end of the bar. The hombre next to him is Lawson, who claims he bought my hosses from a Mexican, down here.

Lawson is the one that is huntin' trouble. Sneed don't care nothin'

about a couple of cayuses. He won't start anything. He's here just to back up Lawson if things git interestin'."

"But what can they do? We're here, in town, minding our own business.

They know well enough that Panhandle stole your horses. And you said the people in San Andreas don't like Sneed a whole lot."

"Because they're scared of him and his crowd. And we're strangers here.

It's just me and Lawson, this deal. Sneed is sizin' you up, back of his whiskers, right now. He's tryin' to figure out who you are. Sneed ain't one to run into the law when they's anybody lookin' on. He works different.

"Now, while he is figurin', you just git up easy and step out and slip over to the barn and saddle up Joshua. I'm goin' to need him. Take the tie-rope off Filaree and leave him loose in his stall. Just say 'Adios'

to me when you git up, like you was goin' back to the hotel. And if you'll settle what we owe--"

"That's all right. But my feet aren't cold, yet."