CHAPTER XIV
THE SURPRISE
The sun, lifting over the rim of the world, sprayed its rays throughthe window and splashed with gold the face of Racey Dawson. He awoke,and much to the profane disgust of Swing Tunstall, shook that worthyawake immediately.
"Aw, lemme sleep, will you?" begged Swing, with suspicious meekness,reaching surreptitiously for a boot. "You lemme alone, that's a goodfeller."
"Get up," commanded Racey. "Get up, it's the early worm catches themost fish. Rise and shine, Swing. Never let the sun catch you snorin'.Besides, I can't sleep any more myself. I--"
Wham! Swing's flung boot shaved Racey's surprised ear and smashedagainst the partition.
"You'll wake up that Starlight proprietor," Racey said, calmly, as hepicked up the boot and dropped it out of the window. "Good dog," hecontinued, presumably addressing a canine friend without, "leaveSwing's nice new boot alone, will you? Don't go gnawin' at itthataway. It ain't a bone."
Swing, pulling on his pants, left the room, hopping physically andmentally. Racey rested both elbows on the sill and waited happily forhis comrade to appear beneath him.
"Shucks," he said in a tone of great surprise when Swing shot roundthe corner of the hotel, "I shore thought there was a dog therea-teasin' that boot. I could have took my Bible oath there was agreat, big, black, curly-haired feller with lots of teeth down there.I saw him, Swing. Shore thought I did. Must 'a' been mistaken. And youwent and believed me, and got splinters in yore feet because you werein such a hurry. Never mind, Swing, here's the other one."
He jerked the boot in question at his friend's head, and sat down onhis cot to complete his own dressing.
Came then the sound of a prodigious yawn from the room next dooroccupied by Jack Harpe. A cot creaked. A boot was scraped along thefloor.
"Shore must be a sound sleeper," said Racey Dawson to himself, "if hereally did just wake up."
He buckled on his gunbelt, set his hat a-tilt on one ear, and wentdown to wash his face and hands in the common basin on the wash-benchoutside the kitchen door.
But Swing Tunstall was before him, and was disposed to make an issueof the dropped boots. Only by his superior agility was Racey enabledto dodge all save a few drops of a full bucket of water.
"Djever get left! Djever get left!" singsonged Racey from the cornerof the building, and set the thumb of one hand to his nose andtwiddled opprobrious fingers at his comrade. "You wanna be a li'l bitquicker when you go to souse me, Swing. Yo're too slow, a lot tooslow. Yep. Now I wouldn't go for to fling that pail at me, Swing.You might bust it, and yore carelessness with crockery thataway hasalready cost you ten dollars and six bits."
This was too much for the ruffled Swing. Waving the pail he pursuedhis tormentor round the hotel and into the front doorway. Raceyfled up the stairs. At the stair foot Swing gave over the chase andreturned to the washbench to resume his face-washing. Racey went oninto their room. There was in it several articles belonging to Swingthat he intended to throw out of the window at once.
But when he had entered the room and the door was closed behind him hedid not touch any of Swing's belongings. Instead he remained standingin the middle of the room looking thoughtfully at the floor. What hadgiven him pause was the fact that he had found the door ajar. Andhe knew with absolute certainty that he had closed the door tightlybefore he went downstairs.
It is the vagrant straw that shows the wind's direction, and since theattempt to bushwhack him Racey was not overlooking any straws. Thedoor had been ajar. Why?
There was no closet, and from where he stood he could see under bothcots. No one lay concealed in the room. The bedclothes on Swing's cothad not been touched. At least they were in precisely the position inwhich they had been landed when thrown back by Swing's careless hand.Racey did not believe that his own had been touched, either. But thesaddlebags and _cantenas_ lying on the floor at the head of his cothad certainly been moved. He recalled distinctly having, the previousevening, piled the _cantenas_ on top of the saddlebags. And now thesaddlebags were on top of the _cantenas_.
He glanced at Swing's warbags. They had not been moved. He wonderedif Jack Harpe and the Starlight's owner were still in their rooms. Helistened intently. Hearing no sound he went out into the hall, andknocked gently on Jack Harpe's door and called him softly by name.Getting no reply, he lifted the latch and walked in. There were JackHarpe's saddlebags, _cantenas_, and rifle in a corner. A coat lay onthe tumbled blankets of the cot. Otherwise the room was empty.
Racey went out, being careful to close the door tightly, and went tothe room of the Starlight's owner. This room, too, was empty. Raceyreturned to his own room, tossed his _cantenas_ and saddlebags on thecot, and began feverishly to paw through their contents.
Nothing had been subtracted from or added to the heterogeneouscollection of articles in the _cantenas_. The contents of the off-sidesaddlebag were in their familiar disorder. There was nothing in orabout the off-side saddlebag to arouse suspicion. Not a thing.
He unbuckled the flap of the near-side saddlebag, and flipped it back.Somebody had been at this saddlebag. He was sure of it. His extrashirt, instead of being wadded into the fore-end of the saddlebag ontop of a pair of socks, had been stuffed into the hinder end on top ofa pair of underdrawers. Which underdrawers should by rights have beenat the bottom of the leather hold-all.
But there was something else at the bottom of the saddlebag. It wassomething long and hard and wrapped in the buttonless undershirtdespised and rejected by Swing.
Racey unrolled the undershirt. His eyes stared in genuine horror atwhat the unrolling revealed. It was the commonest of butcher knivesthat someone's busy hand had wrapped in the undershirt. But what wasnot nearly so common was that the broad, thin blade was stained withblood. From point to haft the steel was as red as if it had beendipped in a pail of paint. Indeed, being dry, it looked not unlikepaint. But Racey knew that it was not paint.
"It was dry before it was wrapped in that undershirt," he said tohimself, testing the blood on the blade with a speculative fingernail."There ain't a mark on the undershirt. Gawd! Here it is again--theearmark of a crime, and no crime--yet. This is getting monotonous."
He laid down the knife, settled his hat, and methodically searchedSwing Tunstall's warbags. It turned out a needless precaution. He hadfelt that it would be. But he could not afford to take any risks.Having found nothing in Swing's warbags save his friend's personalbelongings, Racey slid the knife up his sleeve and went downstairs tobreakfast. On the way he stopped a moment at a fortuitous knothole inthe board wall. When he passed on his way the knife was no longer withhim.
Jack Harpe was still eating when Racey eased himself into the chair atSwing's right hand. Jack Harpe nodded to Racey and went serenely onwith his meal. Racey seized knife and fork, squared his elbows, andbegan to saw at his steak. And as he chewed and swallowed and sloshedthe coffee round in his cup in order to get the full benefit of thesugar he wondered whether it was Jack Harpe or Bull to whom he wasindebted for the butcher knife. It was one of the two, he thought. Whoelse could it be?
He believed it would be wise to spend most of his spare time in hisroom. At least until he knew the inwardness of the butcher-knifeincident. It was possible that the man who had secreted the knifewould return. Racey might well be in line for other even more delicateattentions.
Before going up to his room Racey went to the corral. He had left hissaddle-blanket out all night, he mentioned to Swing in the hearingof Jack Harpe. He was gone five minutes. When he returned, strangelyenough minus the saddle-blanket, he was in time to see Piney Jacksondart round the corner of the blacksmith shop, cup his hand at hismouth, and raise a stentorian bellow for Jake Rule.
Piney did not wait to see whether the sheriff replied to his call.Instead he beckoned violently to the handful of men grouped on thesidewalk in front of the hotel.
"C'mon over!" he bawled. "Look what I found here this morning."
Jack Harpe and the owner of the Starligh
t being among those presentand responding to the invitation, Racey Dawson took a chance and wentwith the rest.
"Look at that," said Piney Jackson, indicating a humped-up individualsitting behind the woodpile.
Racey and the other spectators went round the woodpile and viewed thehumped-up individual. The latter was Bull, the Starlight bartender.And he was dead, very dead. His throat had been cut from ear to ear.He was a ghastly object.
"Who done it?" inquired one of the fools that infest every group ofmen.
"He didn't leave any card," the blacksmith replied with sarcasm.
The fool asked no more questions. Came then Jake Rule and KansasCasey. Jake, a rather heavy, well-meaning officer, old at thebusiness, began to sniff about for clues. Kansas Casey laid the bodydown on its back and thoroughly searched the pockets of the clothing.
"One thing," said Kansas Casey, looking up from what he had found--ahandful of silver dollars, a pocket knife, and a silver watch,"robbery wasn't the motive."
Racey looked sidewise from under his eyebrows at Jack Harpe. Thelatter was staring down unmoved at the dead body.
"Somebody must 'a' had a grudge against Bull," offered the fool.
"You think so?" said Piney. "Yo're a real bright feller."
The fool subsided a second time.
"Lookit here, Jake," Piney continued to the sheriff's address, "youdon't have to kick my wood all over the county, do you?"
"I'm lookin' for the knife," explained the sheriff, ceasing not tostub his toes against the solid chunks. "Feller after doing a thinglike this gets flustrated sometimes and drops the knife. And findingthe knife might be a help in locating the feller."
All of which seemed sufficiently logical to the bystanders.
Racey decided he had seen enough. Besides, he wanted to camp closer tohis warbags. He should have been in his room before this, and he wouldhave been had he cared to make himself conspicuous by not going alongwith the crowd to see what Piney Jackson had found.
Declining Swing's earnest invitation to drink he returned to thehotel. Swing went grouchily to the Happy Heart, wondering what was thematter with his friend. It was not like the Racey he knew to play thehermit.
Once in his room Racey again explored his own and Swing's saddlebagsand _cantenas_, looked under the cots and through the bedclothes. Buthe found nothing that did not belong to either himself or Swing.
"They didn't make a second trip," he said to himself. "I'm bettingit's Jack Harpe. Shore it is, the polecat."
Then in order to have a water-tight reason for remaining in the roomhe pulled off his boots and trousers, fished a housewife from a_cantena_, and set about repairing a rip in his trousers. It was aperfectly good rip. He had had it a long time. What more natural thaton this particular day he should wish to sew it up?
It was an hour later that he heard the tramp of several pairs of bootson the stairs. He could hear the wheezing, laboured breathing of BillLainey, the hotel proprietor. Climbing the stairs always botheredBill. The latter and his followers came along the hall and stopped infront of Racey's door.
"This is his room," panted Bill Lainey.
Unceremoniously the latch was lifted. A man entered. The man was JakeRule, the sheriff of Fort Creek County. He was followed by KansasCasey, his deputy.
Jake looked serious. But Kansas was smiling as he closed the doorbehind him. Then he opened it quickly and thrust his head into thehall.
"No need of you, Bill," he said.
"Aw right," said Bill, aggrievedly, and forthwith shuffled away.
Kansas withdrew his head and nodded to Jake Rule. "He's gone," hesaid.
Racey Dawson, sitting crosslegged on his cot and plying his needle inmost workmanlike fashion, grinned comfortably at the two officers.Lord, how glad he was he had found that knife! If he hadn't--
"Sidown, gents," invited Racey. "There's two chairs, or you can haveSwing's cot if you like."
Jake Rule shook his head. "We don't wanna sit down, Racey," he said."We got a li'l business with you, maybe."
"Maybe? Then you ain't shore about it?"
"Not unless yo're willing. You see, Dolan's drunk to-day, and ofcourse we can't get a warrant till he's sober."
"A warrant? For me?"
"Not yet," said Jake Rule. "Only a search warrant--first. But ofcourse if you ain't willing we can't even touch anything."
"Still, Racey," put in Kansas Casey, smoothly, "if you could see yoreway to letting us go through yore warbags, yores and Swing's, it wouldbe a great help, and we'd remember it--after."
"Yeah, we shore would," declared the sheriff. "You save us troublenow, Racey, and I'll guarantee to make you almighty comfortable in thecalaboose. You won't have nothing to complain of. Not a thing."
Racey laughed cheerily. "Got me in jail already, have you?" hechuckled. "You'll have me hung next."
"Oh, they's quite some formalities to go through before _that_happens," declared the sheriff, seriously.
"I'm glad," drawled Racey. "I thought maybe you were fixing to take meright out and string me up before dinner. Want to search our stuff,huh? Hop to it. Swing ain't here, but I'll give you permission forhim. He won't mind."
Jake and Kansas went at the warbags like terriers digging out abadger. Racey leaned on his elbow and watched them. What luck that thedoor had been ajar and that he had noticed it! If it had not been alife-and-death matter he would have laughed aloud.
At the end of twenty minutes the officers stood up. They had gonethrough everything in the room, including the cots. Kansas Casey worea pleased smile. Jake Rule looked disappointed.
"Don't look so glum, Jake," urged Racey. "Is it a fair question to askwhat yo're hunting for?"
"The knife," he said, shortly. "The knife that cut Bull's throat."
"The knife, huh?" remarked Racey as if to himself. "So yo'resuspectin' me of wiping out Bull, are you?"
"I never did," said Kansas, promptly. "I know you. You ain't thatkind."
Jake looked reproachfully at his deputy. "You never can tall, Racey,"he said, turning to the puncher. "I've got so myself I don't trustnobody no more."
"Was this here yore own idea," pursued Racey, "or did somebody sic youonto me?"
Jake made no immediate answer. It was obvious that he was of two mindswhether to speak or not.
"Why not tell him?" suggested Kansas. "What's the odds?"
At this Jake took a piece of paper from his vest pocket and handed itto Racey.
"I found this lying on the floor of my office when I come back afterattending to Bull," was his explanation.
There were words printed on the slip of paper. They read:
Look in Racey Dawson's room for what killed Bull.
The communication was unsigned.
Racey handed it back to Jake Rule. "Got any idea who put it in yoreoffice?" he asked.
Jake shook his head. "I dunno," he said. "The window was open. Anybodypassing could 'a' throwed it in."
"You satisfied now, Jake, or--" Racey did not complete the sentence.
"Oh, I'm satisfied you didn't do it," replied the sheriff, "if that'swhat you mean. But--the man who wrote this here _joke_!"
As he spoke he tore the note in two, dropped the pieces on the floor,and stamped out of the room. Kansas Casey looked over his shoulder ashe followed in the wake of his superior.
He saw Racey Dawson picking up the two pieces of the note. Racey'smouth was a grim, uncompromising line.
"If Racey ever finds out who wrote that," thought Kansas to himself,pulling the door shut, "hell will shore pop. And I hope it does."
For he liked Racey Dawson, did Kansas Casey, the deputy sheriff.
The Heart of the Range Page 14
