The Heart of the Range

by William Patterson White

  CHAPTER V

  McFLUKE'S

  "They been after him to sell a long time," said Chuck Morgan, rolling acigarette as he and Racey Dawson jogged along toward McFluke's at theford of the Lazy.

  "Who?" asked Racey.

  "I dunno. Can't find out. Luke Tweezy is the agent and he won't givethe party's name."

  "Has Old Salt tried to buy him out?"

  "Not as I know of. Why should he? He knows he won't sell to anybody."

  "Have they been after you, too?"

  "Not yet. Dad Dale's the lad they want special. My ranch would be agood thing, but it ain't noways necessary like Dale's is to anybodystartin' a big brand. Lookit the way Dale's lays right across thevalley between them two ridges like a cork in a bottle. A mile widehere, twenty mile away between Funeral Slue and Cabin Hill she's agood thirty mile wide--one cracking big triangle of the best grassin the territory. All free range, but without Dale's section and hiswater rights to begin with what good is it?"

  "Not much," conceded Racey.

  "And nobody would dast to start a brand between Funeral Slue and CabinHill," pursued Chuck. "Free range or not, it as good as belongs to theBar S."

  "Old Salt used to run quite a bunch round Cabin Hill and another northnear the Slue."

  "He does yet--one or two thousand head in all, maybe. Oh, thesefellers ain't foolish enough to crowd Old Salt that close. They knowDale's is their best chance."

  Racey's eyes travelled, from one ridge to the other. "How come theyallowed Dale to take up a six-forty?" he inquired.

  "They didn't," was the answer. "The section is made up of four claims,his'n, Jane's, Molly's, an' Mis' Dale's. But they're proved up now,and made over to him all regular. That's how come."

  "Haven't Silvertip Ransom and Long Oscar got a claim some'ers overyonder on Dale's land?" inquired Racey, looking toward the northerlyridge.

  "They had, but they got discouraged and sold out to Dale the same timeSlippery Wilson and his wife traded in their claims on the other sideof the ridge to Old Salt and Tom Loudon. None of 'em's worth anything,though."

  Racey nodded. "Dale ever drink much?" was his next question.

  "He used to before he come here. But he took the cure and quit.To-day's the first bust-up he's had since he hit this country."

  "That's it, then. Luke gave him the redeye so's he'd be easy meat forthe butcher. Does he ever gamble any?"

  "Shore--before he came West. Jane done told me how back East inMcPherson, Kansas, he used to go the limit forty ways--liquor, cards,the whole layout o' hellraising. But his habits rode him to a frazzlefinal and he knuckled under to tooberclosis, and they only saved hislife by fetchin' him West. All of us thought he was cured for good."

  "Now Luke Tweezy has started him off so's Nebraska--Peaches Austin, Imean, can get in his fine work. It's plain enough."

  "Shore," assented Chuck Morgan. "Yonder's McFluke's," he added,nodding toward two gray-brown log and shake shacks and a stockadedcorral roosting on the high ground beyond the belt of cottonwoodsand willows marking the course of the Lazy. "Them's his stables andcorral," went on Chuck. "The house she's down near the river. Can'tsee her on account of the cottonwoods."

  "And they can't see us count of the cottonwoods. So--"

  "Unless he's at the corral."

  "I'll take the chance, Chuck. You stay here--down that draw is a goodplace. I'll go on alone. McFluke don't know me. Maybe I can find outsomething, see. Bimeby you come along--half-hour, maybe. You don'tknow me, either. I'll get into conversation with you. You follow mylead. We'll pull McFluke in if we can. Between the two of us--Well,anyhow, we'll see what he says."

  Chuck Morgan nodded, and turned his horse aside toward the draw.

  Ten minutes later the water of the Lazy River was sluicing the dustfrom the legs and belly of Racey Dawson's horse. Racey spurred up thebank and rode toward the long, low building that was McFluke's storeand saloon.

  There were no ponies standing at the hitching-rail in front of theplace. For this Racey was devoutly thankful. If he could only catchMcFluke by himself.

  As Racey dismounted at the rail a man came to the open doorway of thehouse and looked at him. He was a heavy-set man, dewlapped like abloodhound, and his hard blue eyes were close-coupled. The reptilianforehead did not signify a superior mentality, even as the slack,retreating chin denoted a minimum of courage. It was a mostcontradictory face. The features did not balance. Racey Dawson was nota student of physiognomy, but he recognized a weak chin when he sawit. If this man were indeed McFluke, then he, Racey Dawson, was inluck.

  Without a word the man turned from the doorway. Racey heard himwalking across the floor. And for so heavy a man his step wasamazingly light. Racey went into the house. The room he entered wasa large one. In front of a side wall tiered to the low ceiling withshelves bearing a sorry assortment of ranch supplies was the storecounter. Across the back of the room ran the long bar. Behind the bar,flanking the door giving into another room, were two shelves heavilystocked with rows of bottles.

  The man that had come to the door was behind the bar. His hands wereresting on top of it, and he was staring fixedly and fishily atRacey Dawson. There was no welcome in his face. Nor was there anyunfriendliness. It was simply exceedingly expressionless.

  Racey draped himself against the bar. "Liquor," said he.

  Having absorbed a short one, he poured himself a second. "Have onewith me," he nodded to the man.

  "All right." The man's tone was as expressionless as his face. "Here'shell." He filled and drank.

  Racey looked about the room.

  "Where's Old Man Dale?" he asked, casually.

  "He got away on me," replied the man. "He--Say!"--with suddensuspicion--"who are you?"

  "Are you McFluke?" shot back Racey.

  The man nodded slowly, suspicion continuing to brighten his hard blueeyes.

  "Then what didja let him get away for?" persisted Racey. "Luke Tweezysaid he left him here, and he said he'd stay here. That was yorejob--to see he _stayed_ here."

  "Who are--" began the suspicious McFluke.

  "Nemmine who I am," rapped out Racey, who believed he had formed acorrect estimate of McFluke. "I'm somebody who knows more about thisdeal than you do, and that's enough for you to know. Why didn't youhold Old Man Dale?"

  "I--He got away on me," knuckled down McFluke. "I was in the kitchengettin' me some coffee, and when I come back he had dragged it."

  "Luke Tweezy will be tickled to death with you," said Racey Dawson."What do you s'pose he went to all that trouble for?"

  "I couldn't help it, could I? I ain't got eyes in the back of my headso's I can see round corners an' through doors. How'd I know Old ManDale was gonna slide off? When I left him he was all so happy withhis bottle you'd 'a' thought he'd took root for life. Anyway, PeachesAustin oughta come before the old man left. He was supposed to come,and he didn't. If anything slips up account o' this it's gotta beblamed on Peaches."

  "Yeah, I guess so. And Peaches ain't been here yet?"

  "Not yet, and I wish to Gawd he was never comin'."

  The man's tone was so earnest that Racey looked at him, startled.

  "Why not?" he asked, coldly.

  "Because I don't wanna get my head blowed off, that's why."

  "Aw, maybe it won't come to that. Maybe Luke will win out."

  "It ain't only Luke Tweezy who's gotta win out, and you know it. Andthey's an 'if' the size of Pike's Peak between us and winning out. Itell you, I don't like it. It's too damn dangerous."

  "Shore, it's dangerous," assented Racey, slowly revolving his glassbetween his thumb and fingers, and wondering how far he dared go withthis McFluke person. "But a gent has to live."

  "He don't have to get himself killed doin' it," snarled McFluke,swabbing down the bar. "Who's that a-comin'?"

  He went to the doorway to see for himself who it was that rode sobriskly on the Marysville trail. "Peaches Austin!" he sneered. "He'sonly about three hours late."

  It wa
s now or never. Racey risked all on a single cast.

  "What did the boss say when him and Lanpher got here and found oldDale gone?" he asked, carelessly.

  "He raised hell," replied McFluke. "But Lanpher wasn't with him. Yuhknow old Dale hates Lanpher like poison. Well, I told Jack, like Itell you, that if anything slips up account o' this, Peaches Austincan take the blame."

  Racey nodded indifferently and slouched sidewise so that he couldwatch the doorway without dislocating his neck. McFluke, his backturned, still stood in the doorway. Racey lowered a cautious hand andloosened his sixshooter in its holster. He wished that he had takenthe precaution to tie it down. It was impossible to foresee what thenext few minutes might bring forth. Certainly the coming of PeachesAustin was most inopportune.

  Peaches Austin galloped up. He dismounted. He tied his horse. Hegreeted cheerily the glowering McFluke. The latter did not reply inkind.

  "This is a fine time for you to get here," he growled. "A fi-inetime."

  "Shut up, you fool!" cautioned Peaches in a low voice. "Ain't you gotno better sense, with the old man--"

  "Don't let the old man worry you," yapped McFluke. "The old man hasdone flitted. And Jack's been here and _he's_ done flitted."

  "Whose hoss is that?" demanded Peaches, evidently referring to Racey'smount.

  "One of the boys," replied McFluke. "One o' Jack's friends. C'mon in."

  Entered then Peaches Austin, a lithe, muscular person with paleeyes and a face the colour of a dead fish's belly. He starednon-committally at Racey Dawson. It was evident that Peaches Austinwas taking no one on trust. He nodded briefly to Racey, and strode tothe bar. McFluke went behind the bar.

  "Ain't I seen you in Farewell, stranger?" Peaches Austin asked,shortly.

  "You might have," returned Racey. "I'm mighty careless where Itravel."

  "Known Jack long?" Peaches was becoming nothing if not personal.

  "Long enough," smiled Racey.

  "Lookit here, who are you?"

  "That's what's worryin' McFluke," dodged Racey, wishing that he couldsee just what it was McFluke was doing with his hands.

  But McFluke was employing his hands in nothing more dangerous than thefetching of a bottle from some recess under and behind the bar. Now helaughed.

  "He ain't tellin' all he knows," he said to Peaches Austin. "Don't beso damn suspiciony, Peaches. He's a friend of Jack's, I tell you. Heknows all about the deal."

  "That don't make him no friend of Jack's," declared Peaches,stubbornly. "I--"

  At which juncture Peaches' flow of language was interrupted by thesudden entrance of Chuck Morgan. Chuck, after a sweeping glance roundthe room, headed straight for the bar.

  "McFluke," said Chuck, halting a yard from the bar, "did you sell anyredeye to Old Man Dale to-day?"

  "What's that to you?" demanded McFluke, truculently.

  "Why, this," replied Chuck, producing a sixshooter so swiftly thatMcFluke blinked. "You listen to me," he resumed, harshly. "It don'tmatter whether you sold it to him or not. He _got_ it here, and that'sthe main thing. I'm telling you if he gets any more I'm gonna make youhard to find."

  "Is that a threat or a promise?" inquired McFluke.

  "Don't do that," Racey said, suddenly, as his hand shot out and pinnedfast the right wrist of Peaches Austin. "C'mon outside now, where wecan talk. Right through the door. To yore left. Aw right, now theycan't hear us. Lookit, they ain't any call for a gunplay, nonewhatever. This gent is only laying down the law to Mac. And here youhave to get serious right away. See how easy Mac takes it. He ain'tdoing a thing, not a thing. Good as gold, Mac is. Can't you see howa killing thisaway, and a fellah like Morgan, too, would maybe puta crimp in this place for good? Have some sense, man. We needMcFluke's."

  "He hadn't oughta drawed on Mac," said Peaches, his pale eyes, shiftyas a cat's, darting incessantly between Racey and the doorway.

  "He didn't shoot him. And he ain't. You lemme attend to this, willyou? I'll get him away quiet and peaceable--if I can. But you keep outof it. Y'understand?"

  Peaches Austin gnawed his lower lip. "I never did like Chuck Morgan,"he grumbled. "It was a good chance."

  "A good chance to get yoreself lynched. Shore. It was all that."

  "Say, I'd like to know where you come in, stranger. Jack never saidanything to me about any feller yore size."

  "Jack is like me. He ain't tellin' all he knows. And while we'retalking about Jack, I'll tell you something. And that's to keep awayfrom Farewell for three-four days."

  "Why for?"

  "So's to give Jack a chance to cool off. He's hotter than a wet wolf'cause you didn't turn up here on time."

  "I ain't afraid of Jack."

  "'Course you ain't. But you know how Jack is. Even if it don't come toa showdown, there'll be words passed. And I don't wanna run any riskof you quitting the outfit. Every man is needed. You be sensible andstick here with McFluke three-four days like I say, and after thatc'mon in to Farewell. In the meantime, I'll see Jack and tell himhow it happened you didn't get here on time. And how did it happen,anyway?"

  Peaches Austin looked this way and that before replying.

  "I shore don't like to tell how it happened," he said. "Sounds sobabyish like. But my hat blowed off over this side of Injun Ridge aways and when I leaned down to pick her up, my hoss started, my handslipped, and I went off on my head kerblam. And do you know, I'll betI was three hours a-running from hell to breakfast before I caughtthat hoss where he was feedin' in a narrow draw. I'm all tired outyet. They ain't no strength in my legs."

  "I'll fix it up with Jack," Racey lied with a wonderfully straightface. "Don't you worry."

  "I ain't worryin'," Peaches denied, irritably. "I ain't afraid ofJack, I tell you."

  "Shore," soothed Racey, who, having formed an estimate of Peaches,ranked him scarcely higher than McFluke and treated him accordingly."Shore, I know you ain't. But alla same you need considerable of acoolin' off yoreself. Just you stay out here now and watch me getMorgan away."

  Racey nodded blithely to Peaches Austin, and turned to go into thehouse. He saw that Chuck Morgan had come outside, that he had broughtMcFluke with him, and was observing events with a cold and calculatingeye.

  "I tell you I couldn't help his getting the whiskey," McFluke waswhining. "It ain't my fault if somebody gives it to him, is it?"

  "Of course not," chimed in Racey, briskly. "Mac means all right.He didn't know there was any law against providing old Dale withwhiskey."

  "They is a law," insisted Chuck Morgan, belligerently, his gun trainedunswervingly on McFluke's broad stomach. "They is a law. I made it.And it goes. Peaches," he added, raising his voice, "don't you slideround the house now. If you move so much as a yard from where yo'restanding I ventilate McFluke immediate."

  "I wouldn't do that," said Racey, mildly.

  "I got my eye on you, too," declared Chuck. "What I said to Peachesgoes for you, and don't you forget it."

  "I ain't likely to, not me. All I want you to do is go some'ers elsepeaceful. You ain't figuring on living here, are you?"

  Chuck uttered a short, hard laugh. McFluke's back was toward Racey.Peaches Austin was behind him, thirty feet away. Racey's left eyeliddrooped. His head moved almost imperceptibly toward his horse.

  "I'm going now," said Chuck.

  "I'll go with you just to see you on yore way sort of," said Racey.

  "You was going with me anyway sort of," Chuck told him. "Yo're theonly _man_ round here so far's I can see, and I ain't taking anychances on you, not a chance. Yo're going down the trail a spell withme. Later you can come back. Keep yore hands where they are."

  Quickly Chuck shoved McFluke to one side, rushed forward, andpossessed himself of Racey's gun. "Crawl yore hoss," he commanded.

  Racey obeyed without a word. Chuck climbed into his own saddle withoutlosing the magic of the drop and without losing sight for an instantof McFluke and Peaches Austin.

  "Take the trail south," said Chuck Morgan, and backed his hors
e in awide half-circle.

  Racey did as he was ordered. Three minutes later he was joined by hisfriend. Until the trail took them down into a draw grown up in spruceChuck's gun remained very much in evidence. Any unbiased spectatorwithout a knowledge of the facts would have said that he was keeping aclose watch on Racey Dawson.

  Once out of sight of the house of McFluke, Chuck sheathed hissixshooter with a jerk and returned Racey's gun.

  "You did fine at the last," Racey said, admiringly, as he bolsteredhis weapon. "But what did you jump McFluke for thataway at first? Thatcome almighty near kicking the kettle over, that play did."

  "I know," said Chuck, shamefacedly, "and when I rode up to the shackI hadn't intended anything like that. But when I saw that slickeryjuniper McFluke standing there behind the bar so fat and sassy, itcome over me all of a sudden what he'd done to the Dale family byletting old Dale have whiskey, that I couldn't help myself. Gawd, Iwanted to knock him down and tromp his face flat as a floor. It ain'tas if McFluke ain't been told about old Dale's failing. I warned himwhen he first came here last year not to let old Dale have redeye onany account."

  "I know," nodded Racey, soberly, "but you want to remember his givingold Dale whiskey ain't the particular cow we're after. There's more toit than that, a whole lot more. We've got to be a li'l careful,Chuck, and go a li'l slow. If we go having a fraycas now they'll getsuspicious and go fussbudgettin' round like a hound-dog after quail."

  "Just as if they won't suspicion something's up soon as Peaches Austingets back to Farewell."

  "Peaches Austin ain't going back to Farewell right away. I've fixedPeaches for a few days. And a few days is all I need to find out whatI want to. And even after Peaches does float in will he know me afterI've changed my shirt, dirtied my hat, and got me a clean shave twiceover? He ain't got no idea what I look like under the whiskers. Hewasn't living in Farewell before I went north, so all he knows aboutme is my voice and my hoss. It will shore be the worst kind of luck ifI can't keep Peaches from hearing the one and seeing the other untilafter I'm ready. You leave it to yore uncle, Chuck. He knows."

  "He's a great man, my uncle," assented Chuck, and struck a derisivetongue in his cheek. "What did you find out from McFluke--anything?"

  "Anything? Gimme a match and I'll tell you."