The Song of the Wolf Part 12

"One thing more," he continued dispa.s.sionately; "I expect every man who works for this outfit to play the limit in his employer's interest. I have set aside two thousand dollars out of our last sales to be used to defend any man who finds it necessary to shoot up a few of the skunks that are looting this range. I believe that you are all dependable men, and your wages will be raised twenty-five per cent, after the first of the month. McVey will act as a.s.sistant foreman, and you will take orders from him. I think that's all," he said with a yawn, "except that Red and I are going to Gunnison in the morning. You fellows keep tabs till we get back; we'll be gone about five or six days."

He filled his pipe, a sure indication that he contemplated an extended stroll, and scooped up a hot coal from the fireplace; at the door he turned for a final word: "We will take those hides with us."

After he had gone the men sat for a long time in silence. Then Holy swore enthusiastically: "By Gawd! fellers, that's a man!" Woolly felt of his swollen jaw tenderly and turned in pretended amazement: "Why, was yuh thinkin' he was a woman?"

Punk ceased operations on his cigarette and stared meditatively into the fire. "Wonder haow he's goin' to ack-kwire that brand? Trade those hides fer it, mebbe."

But Red McVey for once was silent. Going to his warbag he took therefrom his spare gun; it had a soft leather scabbard of the kind designed for wearing inside the coat under the left armpit. Very carefully he cleaned and recleaned the already speckless weapon and oiled it anew; he then bestowed a similar attention on the Colts in his belt, and filled both bandolier and belt with fresh cartridges from an unbroken box. Of the hides he made a neat package that would "ride" well on a pack-saddle.

Then he took down his guitar and a moment later the night was vocal with the strains of "The Spanish Cavalier."

When his pipe was empty, Dougla.s.s went up to the office to write a letter. The rapidity with which he wrote showed that he had perfectly rehea.r.s.ed its text. It was addressed to Robert Carter at his New York residence:

"DEAR MR. CARTER:--

"I have just proved to my entire satisfaction that you have been systematically robbed by Matlock and certain of his confederates in your employ, for the past three years. The proof is indisputable and I am going to secure rest.i.tution if I can. By the time you receive this the matter will be definitely settled one way or the other.

"The O-O brand is not owned, as you suppose, by Mr. Wistar, but by a side partner of Matlock's named Coogan, a saloon keeper and tin-horned gambler in Gunniston. Their game has been to not only alter your C-- into O-O, but to have your own men, confederates of Matlock's and working under his directions, brand your calves in that brand, killing the mothers when necessary. I figure that your losses have been at least one thousand head. I have discharged every man implicated or under reasonable suspicion, retaining only four whom I deem dependable. I did not acquaint you of these facts before your departure for reasons that do not matter.

"Should I be fortunate in my endeavor I will report promptly.

Should you not hear from me within the next two weeks you may a.s.sume that my attempt has been unsuccessful. In the latter event you had better place the matter in the hands of competent counsel; sufficient proofs can be easily supplied by the men now in your employ, and an examination of young cattle in the O-O brands will give you sufficient evidence for an action for damages."

On another sheet he wrote:

"In case of my death from any cause, I hereby direct that all my effects be given to Red McVey if he be alive; if he be not, then it is my wish that they be divided among the other three boys employed at the time of this writing on the C Bar ranch."

"BREWSTER."

He signed and sealed them in separate envelopes, directing both to Robert Carter. Then he entrusted them to Abbie with the request that she have the former mailed at once to New York, but to retain the latter for two weeks before mailing. He was very explicit in his instructions and enjoined her to carry them out in every particular. She was inclined to ask questions but he calmly ignored them and went off to bed, after informing her that he wanted breakfast at daybreak in the morning.

As he entered the bunkhouse the measured breaths from each bed were those of placidly sleeping men and he undressed in the dark so as not to disturb them. A single ray of moonlight lay across the room, hitting squarely the peg in the post above Red's bunk. It lit up the two revolvers hanging in their scabbards and Dougla.s.s smiled almost affectionately in the direction of their owner. When Red "packed" that extra gun he was enlisted for the whole war.

He went over and looked down kindly upon the stalwart sleeper. In the relaxation of sleep the stern face was gentle and almost handsome. Was he justified in taking this comely young fellow into the grim uncertainty that lay ahead, into the jaws of the specter grinning waitingly behind the red lights of Bart Coogan's gambling h.e.l.l at Gunnison? As he hesitatingly debated the question in his mind, Red turned slightly and mumbled in his sleep: "All right, honey--for yuah sake--"

Dougla.s.s, stepping back involuntarily, laid his hand upon the breast of the s.h.i.+rt hanging under the guns; it encountered something round in the flannel pocket, and instantly his face hardened. He went over to his own bunk and laid down.

"You've got to sit in the game, Red, for her sake. We are in the same boat and we've got to take our medicine. I wonder if she told old Abbie about that ribbon, too. Well, maybe we'll give her something more to laugh at before we are through." Then youth and healthful fatigue a.s.serted itself and he rolled over and went to sleep.

CHAPTER XI

FRENZIED FINANCE

Outside of a fixed determination to compel the restoration of the stolen cattle, Dougla.s.s had no specific plans in mind as they rode away in the gray dawn. His actions would be determined by the conditions that would confront him at Gunnison, and he left much to what he deemed his luck, but which in reality was rather his great capability and apt.i.tude in moments of crisis.

Of course, he would incidentally kill Matlock if justifying circ.u.mstances permitted, but he was not a killer in cold blood and the provocation would have to be amply sufficient. He resolved to let Matlock make the first hostile demonstration, after which matters were a thing of evolution purely; of the ultimate result he had not the slightest apprehension.

Every fiber of him was tingling with resentment of what he deemed Grace's duplicity; she had begged for his friends.h.i.+p and then had maliciously exposed him to ridicule by showing that foolish poem to Abbie, and the Lord only knew who else besides. She had made of him a laughing stock of the whole community, a b.u.t.t for the coa.r.s.e witticisms of his fellows, and the deeply-driven barb in his vanity rankled sore.

Of course, he opined, she had only been making a fool of Red, too, but despite the old time-honored saw about misery loving company, he took small comfort in the thought, being rather disposed to harsher judgment of her for so unscrupulously playing upon that ignorant cowpuncher's fatuous credulity. Red knew nothing of fine ladies and their heartless machinations and it was a shame to encourage him in his hopeless folly.

No lady would take such cruel advantage of puerile innocence! It is possibly apparent to the reader by this time that Mr. Dougla.s.s was somewhat of an egotist, whose personal estimation of himself bulked large in his stock in trade. If it be true that a man's vanity is the real unit of the measure of his possibilities, then Ken Dougla.s.s, scaled by the miles of his self-containment, might logically have aspired beyond the stars. Not that he underestimated other men in the slightest; he was quick to recognize and commend courage, fort.i.tude, honesty and skill in his compeers; indeed, he heartily despised anyone in whom these primal qualities were not ingrained; but the ego was first in his cosmos and when a man humbly urges that he is the equal of all other men it may be set down as an axiom that he really thinks himself immeasurably their superior. Now the world always accepts a man at his own valuation in absence of evidence to the contrary, and he had vindicated his position so far as his range work went; he was concededly the best rider, roper, pistol shot and poker player in his circ.u.mscribed little world, and had, besides, the enviable reputation of never "falling down" in anything he essayed. In the flush of his present successes he entirely overlooked his previous grievous failures, as is man's wont the world over; the world was his own succulent oyster, and he, himself, the proper blade for its opening. Therefore he arrogantly pitied Red's unsophistication; at which the G.o.ds laughed.

As they rode along he made a clean breast of his dilemma. "It will have to be largely a case of bluff," he confided, "and we must make it stick.

We have no time for lawing, and if we did, the shysters would get it all. Bart isn't easily buffaloed and will put up a stiff fight. Of course we've got the age on him--those hides are a strong card--but we're not going to have a walk-over. I can't see my way clear just yet, but it will work out as we go along. It sure won't be a picnic, but one thing is certain; we'll either get those cattle or Matlock will have to rustle a new partner."

Red s.h.i.+fted his cud and spat unerringly on the crest of a loco weed in the trail. "D'yuh 'spose we'll meet up with Matlock there? Reckon 'tain't likely though." Through the labored indifference of his speech, Dougla.s.s detected a certain restrained hopefulness and his face grew serious.

"I want to talk to you about that, Red. We've got nothing that we can fasten on him securely as yet, and we've got to go slow. Of course, if we get him to rights, or if he makes any bad breaks"--the pause was ominous. "But we don't want to raise any h.e.l.l that we can't lay again.

I'm going to give him all the rope that the game will stand; I think, however, that he has quit."

"Them kind nevah quits," said McVey sententiously, "an' yuh don't want to take any fool chances, Ken. I seen a feller oncet thet was monkeying with a rattler an' ketched 'im by thu tail. He got bit! Thu best way with a pizen reptyle is to blow his d.a.m.n haid off, 'specially one thet yuh've pulled thu rattles offen."

They both grinned reminiscently at the reference to the Alcazar incident, but Dougla.s.s winced at the thought that although he had stopped Matlock's rattling for the time being, he had not neutralized the venom of his silent bite. And it is hard to side-step an unheralded stroke from behind.

"Well," he said unemotionally, "it's his first move."

"Hes last, yuh mean," muttered Red sotto voce, "fer I am to be first if he bats hes eye." But aloud he merely said, "That's what," and took a fresh chew of plug.

Dougla.s.s's perplexity as how his coup was to be executed increased with every pa.s.sing hour. He carefully formulated and as regretfully discarded at least a hundred schemes, each of which appealed less and less to his practical judgment as he critically reviewed them. Never in his experience had he faced anything so intangible as the problem which now confronted him. He was at a loss for a precedent, and what was still worse, was in total ignorance of the laws governing the unique conditions. Not that he cared a rap for the laws so far as they might affect him personally, and he had an inborn contempt for conditions; but he wanted that transfer of the brand to be legally absolute and without recourse, and he did not want to involve Mr. Carter in the slightest degree.

When they eventually reached Gunnison he went straight to the office of the best lawyer in the town, a life-long friend of old Bob Carter, and succinctly and forcibly laid all the facts before him. After listening attentively to his explicit elucidation of the law in the case, and his logical course of procedure in the premises, Dougla.s.s shook his head.

"That will take months of lawing and jawing and I want those stolen cattle returned at once. It's got to be settled before I leave town, and I won't consent to involving Carter in any long-drawn-out, expensive litigation. There must be some way of settling it man to man. Will the law protect a bill of sale made out to me or Red, here, if I win it in a card game or force it out of him with a gun? That's what I want to know."

The old pract.i.tioner chuckled at this ingenuous imputation of the law's plasticity; his eyes twinkled in antic.i.p.ation of the laugh he would raise in chambers when he got a chance to spring that joke on his dignified confreres. But his manner was gravity personified as he earnestly a.s.sured this exceedingly straightforward young fellow that much to his regret he would have to answer negatively.

"Even if you did get a sufficient and properly-drawn bill of sale out of Coogan by either of the means you suggest, he could come back at you with the 'baby act' and nullify the transfer by pleading no real consideration and invoking the statute which declares gambling debts noncollectible, in the first instance; and in the second, by setting up the plea of unlawful stress and intimidation. In either case you would lose out if he brought action."

"Supposin' he was daid an' couldn't get no action on hisself?"

interjected Red, softly.

The old lawyer, frontier-hardened as he was, started nervously. "You surely don't contemplate any such--?"

"Any such what?" Red's face was a study in mild curiosity. "I was only asking yuh a question."

The lawyer moistened his lips tentatively before replying. "That would complicate matters very much--to all parties concerned. I hope, gentlemen--"

"An' if thu bill o' sale was made out to me, an' I was to trade it off to Ken, an' he was to tuhn it inter coin an' cache thu dough, what then?" The drawling voice was a sinister purr and somehow the half-shut eyes took on a feline expression. The lawyer suddenly achieved a new interest in this inquisitive young man; he looked at him from under his grizzled brows with professional appreciation.

"Why, you're a pretty fair shyster, yourself, Red," said Dougla.s.s humorously; "that idea didn't occur to me. That could not possibly involve Carter, could it?"

"No. But I trust--." The old man's voice was hesitating and tremulous.

"O-h-h, put yuah trust in Jesus, An' yuh shall see thu Throne!"

chanted Red, nasally; adding as an after-thought: "Thu C Bar pays cash."