The Mucker
Page 21
CHAPTER III. "FIVE HUNDRED DOLLARS REWARD"
"'WE KEPT a-rambling all the time. I rustled grub, he rustled rhyme,'"quoted Billy Byrne, sitting up and stretching himself.
His companion roused and came to one elbow. The sun was topping thescant wood behind them, glinting on the surface of the little creek. Arobin hopped about the sward quite close to them, and from the branchof a tree a hundred yards away came the sweet piping of a song bird.Farther off were the distance-subdued noises of an awakening farm. Thelowing of cows, the crowing of a rooster, the yelping of a happy dogjust released from a night of captivity.
Bridge yawned and stretched. Billy rose to his feet and shook himself.
"This is the life," said Bridge. "Where you going?"
"To rustle grub," replied Billy. "That's my part o' the sketch."
The other laughed. "Go to it," he said. "I hate it. That's the part thathas come nearest making me turn respectable than any other. I hate toask for a hand-out."
Billy shrugged. He'd done worse things than that in his life, and off hetrudged, whistling. He felt happier than he had for many a day. He neverhad guessed that the country in the morning could be so beautiful.
Behind him his companion collected the material for a fire, washedhimself in the creek, and set the tin can, filled with water, at theedge of the kindling, and waited. There was nothing to cook, so it wasuseless to light the fire. As he sat there, thinking, his mind revertedto the red mark upon Billy's wrist, and he made a wry face.
Billy approached the farmhouse from which the sounds of awakening stillemanated. The farmer saw him coming, and ceasing his activities aboutthe barnyard, leaned across a gate and eyed him, none too hospitably.
"I wanna get something to eat," explained Billy.
"Got any money to pay for it with?" asked the farmer quickly.
"No," said Billy; "but me partner an' me are hungry, an' we gotta eat."
The farmer extended a gnarled forefinger and pointed toward the rearof the house. Billy looked in the direction thus indicated and espied awoodpile. He grinned good naturedly.
Without a word he crossed to the corded wood, picked up an ax which wasstuck in a chopping block, and, shedding his coat, went to work. Thefarmer resumed his chores. Half an hour later he stopped on his way into breakfast and eyed the growing pile that lay beside Billy.
"You don't hev to chop all the wood in the county to get a meal from JedWatson," he said.
"I wanna get enough for me partner, too," explained Billy.
"Well, yew've chopped enough fer two meals, son," replied the farmer,and turning toward the kitchen door, he called: "Here, Maw, fix this boyup with suthin' t'eat--enough fer a couple of meals fer two on 'em."
As Billy walked away toward his camp, his arms laden with milk, butter,eggs, a loaf of bread and some cold meat, he grinned rather contentedly.
"A year or so ago," he mused, "I'd a stuck 'em up fer this, an' thoughtI was smart. Funny how a feller'll change--an' all fer a skirt. A skirtthat belongs to somebody else now, too. Hell! what's the difference,anyhow? She'd be glad if she knew, an' it makes me feel better to actlike she'd want. That old farmer guy, now. Who'd ever have taken him ferhavin' a heart at all? Wen I seen him first I thought he'd like to sicthe dog on me, an' there he comes along an' tells 'Maw' to pass me ahand-out like this! Gee! it's a funny world. She used to say that mosteverybody was decent if you went at 'em right, an' I guess she knew.She knew most everything, anyway. Lord, I wish she'd been born on GrandAve., or I on Riverside Drive!"
As Billy walked up to his waiting companion, who had touched a match tothe firewood as he sighted the numerous packages in the forager's arms,he was repeating, over and over, as though the words held him in thethrall of fascination: "There ain't no sweet Penelope somewhere that'slonging much for me."
Bridge eyed the packages as Billy deposited them carefully and one ata time upon the grass beside the fire. The milk was in a clean littlegraniteware pail, the eggs had been placed in a paper bag, while theother articles were wrapped in pieces of newspaper.
As the opening of each revealed its contents, fresh, clean, andinviting, Bridge closed one eye and cocked the other up at Billy.
"Did he die hard?" he inquired.
"Did who die hard?" demanded the other.
"Why the dog, of course."
"He ain't dead as I know of," replied Billy.
"You don't mean to say, my friend, that they let you get away with allthis without sicing the dog on you," said Bridge.
Billy laughed and explained, and the other was relieved--the red markaround Billy's wrist persisted in remaining uppermost in Bridge's mind.
When they had eaten they lay back upon the grass and smoked some more ofBridge's tobacco.
"Well," inquired Bridge, "what's doing now?"
"Let's be hikin'," said Billy.
Bridge rose and stretched. "'My feet are tired and need a change. Comeon! It's up to you!'" he quoted.
Billy gathered together the food they had not yet eaten, and made twoequal-sized packages of it. He handed one to Bridge.
"We'll divide the pack," he explained, "and here, drink the rest o' thismilk, I want the pail."
"What are you going to do with the pail?" asked Bridge.
"Return it," said Billy. "'Maw' just loaned it to me."
Bridge elevated his eyebrows a trifle. He had been mistaken, after all.At the farmhouse the farmer's wife greeted them kindly, thanked Billyfor returning her pail--which, if the truth were known, she had notexpected to see again--and gave them each a handful of thick, light,golden-brown cookies, the tops of which were encrusted with sugar.
As they walked away Bridge sighed. "Nothing on earth like a good woman,"he said.
"'Maw,' or 'Penelope'?" asked Billy.
"Either, or both," replied Bridge. "I have no Penelope, but I did have amighty fine 'maw'."
Billy made no reply. He was thinking of the slovenly, blear-eyed womanwho had brought him into the world. The memory was far from pleasant. Hetried to shake it off.
"'Bridge,'" he said, quite suddenly, and apropos of nothing, in aneffort to change the subject. "That's an odd name. I've heard of Bridgesand Bridger; but I never heard Bridge before."
"Just a name a fellow gave me once up on the Yukon," explained Bridge."I used to use a few words he'd never heard before, so he called me 'TheUnabridged,' which was too long. The fellows shortened it to 'Bridge'and it stuck. It has always stuck, and now I haven't any other. I eventhink of myself, now, as Bridge. Funny, ain't it?"
"Yes," agreed Billy, and that was the end of it. He never thoughtof asking his companion's true name, any more than Bridge would havequestioned him as to his, or of his past. The ethics of the roadsidefire and the empty tomato tin do not countenance such impertinences.
For several days the two continued their leisurely way toward KansasCity. Once they rode a few miles on a freight train, but for the mostpart they were content to plod joyously along the dusty highways. Billycontinued to "rustle grub," while Bridge relieved the monotony by anoccasional burst of poetry.
"You know so much of that stuff," said Billy as they were smoking bytheir camp fire one evening, "that I'd think you'd be able to make someup yourself."
"I've tried," admitted Bridge; "but there always seems to be somethinglacking in my stuff--it don't get under your belt--the divine afflatusis not there. I may start out all right, but I always end up where Ididn't expect to go, and where nobody wants to be."
"'Member any of it?" asked Billy.
"There was one I wrote about a lake where I camped once," said Bridge,reminiscently; "but I can only recall one stanza."
"Let's have it," urged Billy. "I bet it has Knibbs hangin' to theropes."
Bridge cleared his throat, and recited:
Silver are the ripples, Solemn are the dunes, Happy are the fishes, For they are full of prunes.
He looked up at Billy, a smile twitching at the corners of his mouth."How's that?" he asked.
"It's all right but the last line," said Billy, candidly. "There issomething wrong with that last line."
"Yes," agreed Bridge, "there is."
"I guess Knibbs is safe for another round at least," said Billy.
Bridge was eying his companion, noting the broad shoulders, the deepchest, the mighty forearm and biceps which the other's light cottonshirt could not conceal.
"It is none of my business," he said presently; "but from your generalappearance, from bits of idiom you occasionally drop, and from the wayyou handled those two boes the night we met I should rather surmise thatat some time or other you had been less than a thousand miles from thew.k. roped arena."
"I seen a prize fight once," admitted Billy.
It was the day before they were due to arrive in Kansas City that Billyearned a hand-out from a restaurant keeper in a small town by doing someodd jobs for the man. The food he gave Billy was wrapped in an old copyof the Kansas City Star. When Billy reached camp he tossed the packageto Bridge, who, in addition to his honorable post as poet laureate, wasalso cook. Then Billy walked down to the stream, near-by, that he mightwash away the grime and sweat of honest toil from his hands and face.
As Bridge unwrapped the package and the paper unfolded beneath his eyesan article caught his attention--just casually at first; but presentlyto the exclusion of all else. As he read his eyebrows alternatedbetween a position of considerable elevation to that of a deep frown.Occasionally he nodded knowingly. Finally he glanced up at Billy who wasjust rising from his ablutions. Hastily Bridge tore from the paper thearticle that had attracted his interest, folded it, and stuffed it intoone of his pockets--he had not had time to finish the reading and hewanted to save the article for a later opportunity for careful perusal.
That evening Bridge sat for a long time scrutinizing Billy throughhalf-closed lids, and often he found his eyes wandering to the red ringabout the other's wrist; but whatever may have been within his thoughtshe kept to himself.
It was noon when the two sauntered into Kansas City. Billy had adollar in his pocket--a whole dollar. He had earned it assisting anautomobilist out of a ditch.
"We'll have a swell feed," he had confided to Bridge, "an' sleep in abed just to learn how much nicer it is sleepin' out under the black skyand the shiny little stars."
"You're a profligate, Billy," said Bridge.
"I dunno what that means," said Billy; "but if it's something Ishouldn't be I probably am."
The two went to a rooming-house of which Bridge knew, where they couldget a clean room with a double bed for fifty cents. It was rather a highprice to pay, of course, but Bridge was more or less fastidious, andhe admitted to Billy that he'd rather sleep in the clean dirt of theroadside than in the breed of dirt one finds in an unclean bed.
At the end of the hall was a washroom, and toward this Bridge made hisway, after removing his coat and throwing it across the foot of thebed. After he had left the room Billy chanced to notice a folded bit ofnewspaper on the floor beneath Bridge's coat. He picked it up to layit on the little table which answered the purpose of a dresser when asingle word caught his attention. It was a name: Schneider.
Billy unfolded the clipping and as his eyes took in the heading astrange expression entered them--a hard, cold gleam such as had nottouched them since the day that he abandoned the deputy sheriff in thewoods midway between Chicago and Joliet.
This is what Billy read:
Billy Byrne, sentenced to life imprisonment in Joliet penitentiary forthe murder of Schneider, the old West Side saloon keeper, hurled himselffrom the train that was bearing him to Joliet yesterday, dragging withhim the deputy sheriff to whom he was handcuffed.
The deputy was found a few hours later bound and gagged, lying in thewoods along the Santa Fe, not far from Lemont. He was uninjured. Hesays that Byrne got a good start, and doubtless took advantage of it toreturn to Chicago, where a man of his stamp could find more numerous andsafer retreats than elsewhere.
There was much more--a detailed account of the crime for the commissionof which Billy had been sentenced, a full and complete description ofBilly, a record of his long years of transgression, and, at last, themention of a five-hundred-dollar reward that the authorities had offeredfor information that would lead to his arrest.
When Billy had concluded the reading he refolded the paper and placed itin a pocket of the coat hanging upon the foot of the bed. A momentlater Bridge entered the room. Billy caught himself looking often athis companion, and always there came to his mind the termination ofthe article he had found in Bridge's pocket--the mention of thefive-hundred-dollar reward.
"Five hundred dollars," thought Billy, "is a lot o' coin. I just wondernow," and he let his eyes wander to his companion as though he mightread upon his face the purpose which lay in the man's heart. "He don'tlook it; but five hundred dollars is a lot o' coin--fer a bo, andwotinell did he have that article hid in his clothes fer? That's wot I'dlike to know. I guess it's up to me to blow."
All the recently acquired content which had been Billy's since hehad come upon the poetic Bridge and the two had made their carefree,leisurely way along shaded country roadsides, or paused beside coolbrooklets that meandered lazily through sweet-smelling meadows, wasdissipated in the instant that he had realized the nature of the articlehis companion had been carrying and hiding from him.
For days no thought of pursuit or capture had arisen to perplex him. Hehad seemed such a tiny thing out there amidst the vastness of rollinghills, of woods, and plain that there had been induced within him anunconscious assurance that no one could find him even though they mightseek for him.
The idea of meeting a plain clothes man from detective headquartersaround the next bend of a peaceful Missouri road was so preposterousand incongruous that Billy had found it impossible to give the matterserious thought.
He never before had been in the country districts of his native land. Tohim the United States was all like Chicago or New York or Milwaukee, thethree cities with which he was most familiar. His experience of unurbanlocalities had been gained amidst the primeval jungles of far-away Yoka.There had been no detective sergeants there--unquestionably there couldbe none here. Detective sergeants were indigenous to the soil thatgrew corner saloons and poolrooms, and to none other--as well expectto discover one of Oda Yorimoto's samurai hiding behind a fire plugon Michigan Boulevard, as to look for one of those others along afarm-bordered road.
But here in Kansas City, amidst the noises and odors that meant a largecity, it was different. Here the next man he met might be looking forhim, or if not then the very first policeman they encountered couldarrest him upon a word from Bridge--and Bridge would get five hundreddollars. Just then Bridge burst forth into poetry:
In a flannel shirt from earth's clean dirt, Here, pal, is my calloused hand! Oh, I love each day as a rover may, Nor seek to understand. To enjoy is good enough for me; The gypsy of God am I. Then here's a hail to--
"Say," he interrupted himself; "what's the matter with going out now andwrapping ourselves around that swell feed you were speaking of?"
Billy rose. It didn't seem possible that Bridge could be going todouble-cross him.
In a flannel shirt from earth's clean dirt, Here, pal, is my calloused hand!
Billy repeated the lines half aloud. They renewed his confidence inBridge, somehow.
"Like them?" asked the latter.
"Yes," said Billy; "s'more of Knibbs?"
"No, Service. Come on, let's go and dine. How about the Midland?" and hegrinned at his little joke as he led the way toward the street.
It was late afternoon. The sun already had set; but it still was toolight for lamps. Bridge led the way toward a certain eating-place ofwhich he knew where a man might dine well and from a clean platter fortwo bits. Billy had been keeping his eyes open for detectives. Theyhad passed no uniformed police--that would be the crucial test, thoughthe--unless Bridge intended tipping off h
eadquarters on the quiet andhaving the pinch made at night after Billy had gone to bed.
As they reached the little restaurant, which was in a basement, Bridgemotioned Billy down ahead of him. Just for an instant he, himself,paused at the head of the stairs and looked about. As he did so a manstepped from the shadow of a doorway upon the opposite side of thestreet.
If Bridge saw him he apparently gave no sign, for he turned slowly andwith deliberate steps followed Billy down into the eating-place.