Mystery Ranch Part 6

"You don't have to tell us anything that might be used against you,"

said the sheriff.

Fire Bear smiled bitterly.

"I've studied white man's law," he said.

Redmond rubbed his head in bewilderment. Such words, coming from a blanketed Indian, in such primitive surroundings, pa.s.sed his comprehension. Yet Lowell thought, as he smiled at the sheriff's amazement, that it merely emphasized the queer jumble of old and new on every reservation.

"I'll ask you to wait for me out there in the trees," said Fire Bear.

Redmond hesitated, but the agent turned at once and walked away, and the sheriff finally followed. Fire Bear exhorted his followers a few moments, and then disappeared in his tent. Soon he came out, dressed in the "store clothes" of the ordinary Indian. He joined Redmond and the agent at the edge of the glade, and they made their way toward the creek, no one venturing to follow from the camp. At the bottom of the slope they found the Indian helpers with the horses.

"Fire Bear," said Lowell, as they paused before starting out, "there's one thing more I want of you. Help us to find Jim McFann. He's as deep or deeper in this thing than you are."

"I know he is," replied Fire Bear, "but it wasn't for me to say so. I'll help find him for you."

They had to fight to get Jim McFann. They found the half-breed cooking some bacon over a tiny fire, at the head of a gulch that was just made for human concealment. If it had not been for the good offices of Fire Bear on the trail, they might have hunted a week for their man. McFann had moved camp several times since Plenty Buffalo had located him. Each time he had covered his tracks with surpa.s.sing care.

Lowell, according to prearranged plan, had walked in upon McFann, with Redmond covering the half-breed, ready to shoot in case a weapon was drawn. But McFann merely made a headlong dive for Lowell's legs, and there was a rough-and-tumble fight about the camp-fire which was settled only when the agent managed to get a lock on his wiry opponent which pinned McFann's back to the ground.

"You wouldn't fight that hard if you thought you was being yanked up for a little bootlegging, Jim," mused Tom Redmond, pulling his long mustache. "You know what we've come after you for, don't you?"

McFann threshed about in another futile attempt to escape, and cursed his captors with gifts of expletive which came from two races.

"It's on account of that tenderfoot that was found on the Dollar Sign,"

growled Jim, "but Fire Bear and his gang can't tell any more on me than I can on them."

"That's the way to get at the truth," chuckled the sheriff triumphantly.

"I guess by the time you fellers are through with each other we'll know who shot that man and staked him down."

CHAPTER V

On the day following the incarceration of Fire Bear and Jim McFann, Lowell rode over to the scene of the murder on the Dollar Sign road.

It seemed to the agent as if a fresh start from the very beginning would do more than anything else to put him on the trail of a solution of the mystery.

Lowell was not inclined to accept Redmond's comfortable theory that either Fire Bear or Jim McFann was guilty--or that both were equally deep in the crime. Nor did he a.s.sume that these men were not guilty. It was merely that there were some aspects of the case which did not seem to him entirely convincing. Circ.u.mstantial evidence pointed strongly to Fire Bear and the half-breed, and this evidence might prove all that was necessary to fasten the crime upon the prisoners. In fact Redmond was so confident that he prophesied a confession from one or both of the men before the time arrived for their hearing in court.

As Lowell approached Talpers's store, the trader came out and hailed him.

"I hear Redmond's arrested Fire Bear and Jim McFann," said Talpers.

"Yes."

"Well, as far as public opinion goes, I s'pose Tom has. .h.i.t the nail on the head," observed Bill. "There's some talk right now about lynchin'

the prisoners. Folks wouldn't talk that way unless the arrest was pretty popular."

"That's Tom Redmond's lookout. He will have to guard against a lynching."

Talpers stroked his beard and smiled reflectively. Evidently he had something on his mind. His att.i.tude was that of a man concealing something of the greatest importance.

"There's one thing sure," went on Bill. "Jim McFann ain't any more guilty of a hand in that murder than if he wasn't within a thousand miles of the Dollar Sign when the thing happened."

"That will have to be proved in court."

"Well, as far as McFann's concerned I know Redmond's barkin' up the wrong tree."

"How do you know it?"

Talpers made a deprecating motion.

"Of course I don't know it absolutely. It's jest what I feel, from bein'

as well acquainted with Jim as I am."

"Yes, you and Jim are tolerably close to each other--everybody knows that."

Talpers shot a suspicious glance at the agent, and then he rea.s.sumed his mysterious grin.

"Where you goin' now?" he asked.

"Just up on the hill."

"I've been back there a couple of times," sneered Bill, "but I couldn't find no notes dropped by the murderer."

"Well, there's just one thing that's plain enough now, Talpers," said Lowell grimly, as he released his brakes. "While Jim McFann is in jail a lot of Indians are going to be thirsty, and your receipts for whiskey are not going to be so big."

Talpers scowled angrily and stepped toward the agent. Lowell sat calmly in the car, watching him unconcernedly. Then Talpers suddenly turned and walked toward the store, and the agent started his motor and glided away.

Bill's ugly scowl did not fade as he stalked into his store. Lowell's last shot about the bootlegging had gone home. Talpers had had more opposition from Lowell than from any other Indian agent since the trader had established his store on the reservation line. In fact the young agent had made whiskey-dealing so dangerous that Talpers was getting worried. Lowell had brought the Indian police to a state of efficiency never before obtained. Bootlegging had become correspondingly difficult.

Jim McFann had complained several times about being too close to capture. Now he was arrested on another charge, and, as Lowell had said, Talpers's most profitable line of business was certain to suffer. As Bill walked back to his store he wondered how much Lowell actually knew, and how much had been shrewd guesswork. The young agent had a certain inscrutable air about him, for all his youth, which was most disturbing.

Talpers had not dared come out too openly for McFann's release. He offered bail bonds, which were refused. He had managed to get a few minutes' talk with McFann, but Redmond insisted on being present, and all the trader could do was to a.s.sure the half-breed that everything possible would be done to secure his release.

Bill's disturbed condition of mind vanished only when he reached into his pocket and drew out the letter which indicated that the girl at Mystery Ranch knew something about the tragedy which was setting not only the county but the whole State aflame. Here was a trump card which might be played in several different ways. The thing to do was to hold it, and to keep his counsel until the right time came. He thanked the good fortune that had put him in possession of the postmasters.h.i.+p--an office which few men were shrewd enough to use to their own good advantage! Any common postmaster, who couldn't use his brains, would have let that letter go right through, but that wasn't Bill Talpers's way! He read the letter over again, slowly, as he had done a dozen times before. Written in a pretty hand it was--handwriting befitting a dum fine-lookin' girl like that! Bill's features softened into something resembling a smile. He put the letter back in his pocket, and his expression was almost beatific as he turned to wait on an Indian woman who had come in search of a new shawl.

Talpers's att.i.tude, which had been at once cynical and mysterious, was the cause of some speculation on Lowell's part as the agent drove away from the trader's store. Something had happened to put so much of triumph in Talpers's face and speech, but Lowell was not able to figure out just what that something could be. He resolved to keep a closer eye than customary on the doings of the trader, but soon all thoughts of everything save those concerned directly with the murder were banished from his mind when he reached the scene of the tragedy.

Getting out of his automobile, Lowell went over the ground carefully.

The gra.s.s and even some of the sage had been trampled down by the curious crowds that had flocked to the scene. An hour's careful search revealed nothing, and Lowell walked back to his car, shaking his head.

Apparently the surroundings were more inscrutable than ever. The rolling hills were beginning to lose their green tint, under a hot sun, unrelieved by rain. The last rain of the season had fallen a day or so before the murder. Lowell remembered the little pools he had splashed through on the road, and the scattered "wallows" of mud that had remained on the prairie. Such places were now all dry and caked. A few meadow-larks were still singing, but even their notes would be silenced in the long, hot days that were to come. But the distant mountains, and the little stream in the bottom of the valley, looked cool and inviting.

Ordinarily Lowell would have turned his machine toward the line of willows and tried an hour or so of fly-fis.h.i.+ng, as there were plenty of trout in the stream, but to-day he kept on along the road over which he had taken Helen Ervin to her stepfather's ranch.

As Lowell drove up in front of Willis Morgan's ranch-house, he noticed a change for the better in the appearance of the place. Wong had been doing some work on the fence, but had discreetly vanished when Lowell came in sight. The yard had been cleared of rubbish and a thick growth of weeds had been cut down.

Lowell marveled that a Chinese should be doing such work as repairing a fence, and wondered if the girl had wrought all the changes about the place or if it had been done under Morgan's direction.