Valley Thieves

by Max Brand

  He chuckled, after he had said that, and turned to one of the others to ask where Old Man Cary was. They said he was coming. At that moment someone cried out in an agony, far away.

  "They're settin' Luke's busted leg," said a voice.

  "But when we get through with Clonmel, there ain't goin' to be nothin' left to set!" said another.

  It was that lad Chuck. He sneaked up to Clonmel with his hand on the hilt of a knife.

  "When we get through with you, you're goin' to be whittled right down to a boy's size. You hear?" he shouted at Clonmel.

  He might as well have talked to a face of stone. Harry Clonmel simply turned his head a little and shut that section of the scene out of his brain.

  I wondered what had happened. Silver and Taxi had not been taken or killed. That was certain, or else I should have heard their names long before this. But there had been a glorious battle when they put their hands on Harry Clonmel.

  I would have liked to have seen that. I wondered to myself if, when I saw such a thing, I would somehow find the courage to forget myself and jump into the war. And I felt a savage satisfaction that in the fight Clonmel had at least broken bones. He was ready to break more of them—neck bones, at that!

  Then we could hear Old Man Cary coming. It was strange how quietly the Cary outfit stood, eying the monster, Clonmel. More than one of them had felt his hands. I saw one burly man with a bulge on his jaw as big as a fist, and others were marked. They stood quietly and looked at the man with hunger in their faces. They were like good fighting dogs eying a bear that has been partly baited and tied up again.

  I heard Old Man Cary saying: "Watch how you walk. M'ria, you ain't as weak as all that. You can stiffen yourself a pile more. You ain't much more useful than a walkin' stick."

  Then I saw the tall form coming up the steps and across the threshold with one arm stretched across the shoulders of the girl.

  "Don't bring her in here," said Barry Christian sharply.

  "No? And why not, Barry, my son?" asked Old Man Cary.

  "Because a woman can't see things with the eyes of a man."

  The old man laughed, and the sound seemed to be tearing and choking in his throat. The laughter made him look more like a boy than ever, and, therefore, more horrible.

  "I raised her and I handled her," he said. "She ain't too much of a woman. Her eyes, they'll see things the way any Cary man would see 'em. Better'n most. Oh, a pile better'n most. Eh, M'ria?"

  She did not answer. To hold her grandfather's arm over her shoulders, she gripped his skeleton fingers with one upraised, young, brown hand. She kept that grip, her shoulder against the bony chest of the old man to steady him on his feet, and in the meantime she looked deliberately about her. When she came to me, she dismissed me. When she came to Clonmel, her glance quietly followed the course of his blood. She smiled a little.

  I think it was the most frightful thing I've ever seen, the smile of that girl as she looked at the running blood. It made me sick. It was monstrous.

  "Well, let her stay," said Christian, at that.

  "Oh, yes. We'll let her stay, all right," said the old man. "Now you got two chickens in your coop, what are you goin' to do with 'em, Barry, my son?"

  "Wring their necks," said Barry Christian.

  It didn't shock me to hear that. Somehow, after the smiling of the girl, murder was a very common idea. It was what was to be expected.

  The old man took Maria over to face Clonmel. Old Cary reached out a skinny forefinger, all covered with the grime of the gun cleaning, and poked the ribs of Clonmel. He was in such perfect condition that with his breathing the strong bone frame showed through the outer layering of muscles. And the old man poked again at the swelling strength that covered the chest of Clonmel, and then jabbed his finger into the big round column of his throat.

  "Ay, ay, ay!" said the old man. "Think of all the blood that's in him, Barry! I'm goin' to want to be on hand to see it sluice out of him. I'm goin' to feel younger, when I see the red come out of him, eh?"

  He started shaking his head.

  "I had to ask your opinion," said Barry Christian. "I suppose the best way is to take them down to the big creek and finish them there. The white water will chew them up so small that not even a button will be found later on."

  "I've heard tell that the water will do that," said the old man. "Only, I was thinkin' is it wise to wring their necks so quick? Are they ripe for killin', Barry?"

  "What do you mean by that?" asked Barry Christian.

  He turned to the old man, who said, still wagging his head:

  "Kill 'em today, and where do you think Jim Silver and Taxi will be tomorrow?"

  "I don't know. If they're anywhere near, we'll have a chance to run them down. Silver will never leave my trail till he's tried his chance to get Parade again— Parade and the gray wolf!"

  "True," said the old man, "but he ain't goin' to rush on account of horse blood. But on account of man blood—oh, he'll have to hurry on account of that!"

  "Go on," said Christian impatiently. "Hurry?"

  "Yeah. He'll hurry," said the old man. "You boys been tellin' me a lot about Jim Silver. You been tellin' me how brave and free and noble and good he is. Ain't you been tellin' me that?"

  Christian took in a breath, with his mouth sneering. He said nothing. The old man went on:

  "And a gent that's all those things which Silver is, how could he go and leave a coupla dear friends of his in our hands without makin' no effort?"

  "He doesn't know that Avon is here," said Christian.

  "But he knows that Clonmel is gone, or he will know, pretty soon. Unless our boys snag him up the creek, when he comes back to the place where you found Clonmel. He'll know then what's happened, and he's sure goin' to start for us."

  "He's not a fool," said Christian. "Even Jim Silver can't do any good for his friends here."

  "A good man," said the grandfather, "ain't the kind to stop and think too long. A good man, Barry, is the sort that'll throw himself away for a lost cause. It's kind of noble, that is. A good man, he loves to be noble, I tell you. Silver's goin' to be noble. He'll come up here, sure enough, whether you think so or not. And we gotta keep the bait in the trap till he shows up!"

  The detestable old devil began his husky laughter again, as he finished saying this.

  Then Clonmel burst out: "You dirty rats! Silver won't come. Silver has a brain in his head. He'll never come, no matter how long you keep us. And if you leave me in here, I'll find a way out. I'll find a way out if I have to bite through the wood with my teeth!"

  "Listen, listen!" murmured the old man, apparently in admiration. "Hear him talk, tryin' to persuade us to wring his neck now! Tryin' to persuade us to put the bait out of the trap so's Jim Silver can be kept out of it. And what might Jim Silver be to you, son?"

  Why, when I heard that question, I wondered a little, myself. But when I glanced aside to Clonmel, I thought that I could understand. There was in the giant the sort of nobility that could feel all the majesty of a man like Silver; the sort of nobility that makes a few human beings willing to die for the right.

  Yet, as I looked into the face of Clonmel and saw the tense expectancy and suffering in it, I felt that the old man was right. There was something very strange behind those last words of the giant.

  "I think you're right," said Christian suddenly. "We'll keep them."

  "Of course, I'm right," said the old man. "I'm always right. I'm too near dead to enjoy bein' wrong any more."

  CHAPTER XIV

  The Man of Action

  I REMEMBER that it was a long time after we were stifled by the blackness before I could speak, and then Clonmel asked me: "What happened?"

  I told him briefly, and asked him how it had gone with him. He said that the three of them had waited for a long time, and finally Taxi had declared that I must have gone home, or perhaps even that I had sold my information to the Cary outfit, because Taxi said that money sometimes is a prett
y strong voice in the ears of poor men.

  "But Silver," said Clonmel, "swore that you would never back out of the job. He was as sure of that as he was sure of anything in the world. He said, too, that it's the people who have money who will mostly sell themselves to get more of it. He's a wise fellow, that Jim Silver!"

  Wise? I thought he was something more than wise. His faith in me made me strong. Another man's faith always multiplies one's own, I think. It seemed suddenly ridiculously easy to do the right thing without regret afterward.

  I asked Clonmel what happened to him. He said:

  "We'd waited a good while for you. It was after dark. Taxi and Silver talked over different things to do, and Silver suggested, finally, that you might have been caught up by the Carys. In that case, Taxi said, you were probably already dead, because the only law in this valley is what Old Man Cary pleases to give to everybody in the place."

  "Silver said that you might have decided, after all, to go back and say good-by to your wife before you came over to the Cary Valley. He and Taxi went up to the head of the creek to see if they could spot you coming. They went off up the creek, and I stayed where I was, because it seemed to me a wild-goose chase. I walked up and down through a clearing at the side of the creek."

  "That was where I was a fool. Silver had told me to keep my ears open and my eyes working. I should have done that, but I didn't. I walked around, and the rush of the creek was loud enough to drown out any quiet sounds, such as people on the prowl would make. The first thing I knew, a man told me to stick up my hands. There he was, standing beside a tree, as I turned around. I put up my hands, all right, but I put up a foot, too, and kicked him under the chin. The bone must have broken. I heard something snap, anyway."

  "But as I turned to jump, three or four others piled onto me. We had a good brawl. They tapped me over the head enough times to make things hazy for me. Finally, they got me tied up, and they brought me on here."

  I considered that talk, for a moment. That's the way a man of action expresses himself. There was no story in it. There was no dwelling on all the details. I wanted to know how he'd happened to break the leg of a man. I said:

  "You smashed up one of them. How did that happen?"

  "Well," said Clonmel, "in the middle of the brawl, they were all heaped up on me, and I managed to heave myself out of the pile. I caught a fellow by one leg and used him for a club. I swung him a couple of times and knocked them scattering. But the second time I used him, the club broke off short at the handle. I mean, the leg turned into pulp. That was all."

  I closed my eyes and took in a breath. I was glad that grip had not fallen on my leg, for one thing, I can tell you!

  I heard Clonmel say: "I'm going to get out of this. So are you. I'm not going to die in here. I'm not ready to be slaughtered in a meat-house like this."

  I said nothing. There was nothing to say.

  He came over to me and asked me what sort of cords had been used on my hands. I told him that cords had not been used, but rope that was almost half an inch thick.

  "That's not thick enough, then," said he. "Twine might have held us, but not that pulpy stuff. Lie down flat on your face."

  I did as he said, and he got down beside me and found the rope that bound my wrists together. He began to tear at the rope with his teeth. It put a shudder in me—the strength of his jaws and the strange feeling, as though a beast were at work. Sometimes, as he wrenched at the cords, the strength of his pull lifted almost my entire weight. And I could hear the popping sounds as he got his grip under strand after strand of the rope and parted it. It might have been half an hour before the rope actually parted.

  I've told that to other people who would hardly believe it, but then not many of them had ever seen Clonmel. At any rate, there I was, with free hands, and though I didn't see what particular good free hands would do us, I found the knots that secured the ropes of Clonmel and undid them. That took only a few minutes more. He stood up, and I heard the swishing sound as he swung his arms.

  "The roof!" he said to me. "If there's half a chance, I may be able to pry a log out of the roof."

  I put myself against the wall, over in a corner, where I was sure that a beam ran overhead. Clonmel climbed on me. The bulk of him nearly smashed my bones, I can tell you, till he stood up on my shoulders and I heard him murmur that he had it.

  Then he pulled himself up. After a time, I could hear faint, squeaking sounds.

  Just over me his murmur said: "Come up here. Give me your hand and come up. The two of us may be able to wangle it!"

  I found his hand, and he lifted me up easily. Yes, with the strength of one hand, he shifted my weight easily. I thought his grip was breaking the bones of my fingers. It was like the pressure of a mechanical device with the power of a machine behind it.

  I climbed onto the rafter. He told me where to stand in the corner and what log to lift on, while he went down to the farther end of the beam and heaved at that section of the same log.

  When he gave the signal, by hissing softly, I fell to work, but my efforts were not what put the shudder in the log my shoulder was against or the beam that was under my feet.

  I might have guessed what followed, for, though that beam must have been at least three by four, it snapped suddenly at the farther end. I went down and rolled my length along the floor, and I heard big Clonmel bump not far away from me.

  The door snapped open. Lights came in. Those fellows paid little attention to me. One man simply backed me into a corner with his gun, but five or six of them piled on Clonmel. Even then they had a terrific job of it until someone managed to slip the noose of a rope over his arms. After that they were able to hold him and lash him, while the noise of his breathing sounded like that of a bull. Right through the trampling, panting, and cursing, I could hear the labor of his lungs, while they rolled him in enough ropes to have compressed a bale of hay.

  They tied me up again, too. Will Cary had charge of the entire job, and he did a good one, you can be sure.

  When we were tied up, and when wires had been used to make sure what ropes apparently were not able to accomplish, Will Cary stood over Clonmel where the giant was stretched on the floor, unable to stir.

  "I've got you—and I've got her!" said Will Cary.

  I wondered, for a moment, what he was talking about, and then I heard Clonmel laugh.

  "You haven't got her," he declared. "You haven't even got the ghost of her. She's seen the truth about you, Cary, and she smiles when she thinks about you!"

  Cary pulled back his foot and kicked Clonmel in the face. I saw blood come to answer the blow, but Clonmel kept on laughing. Cary stood trembling and cursing over his man, for a moment, and then went out and ordered the others out ahead of him. When it came to the killing of Clonmel, at the will of the old man, I had an idea that Will Cary would have the ordering of it. If superior hate counted, he would certainly be selected for the job.

  We could hear the voices muttering outside the smoke-house, now, and there was an occasional glinting of a lantern through one of the chinks as a guard walked up and down, carrying his light with him.

  "I'm sorry," said Clonmel, "but better to have tried that than to be twiddling our thumbs. Talk to me, Bill. Talk to me about Will Cary. Fine, upstanding fellow to look at, isn't he?"

  "As handsome as I ever saw, barring one," I answered. I did not tell him that the exception was himself. "I hated to see what he did to you, Harry."

  Clonmel actually laughed again. What a man he was!

  "I'm going to sing a little serenade for my girl. D'you think she cares a rap about me, Bill?"

  "Cares about you? She's dizzy about you. But she's not for you, maybe."

  "She's up here, I think," said Clonmel, "and if she is, she has to know that I'm out here."

  He rolled over and put his mouth close to one of the chinks through which the lantern light glowed, now and again. Then he opened his throat and sang such a rollicking, thundering, ringing song as
I'd never heard come out of a human being before.

  A hand beat on the door of the smoke-house almost at once.

  "Be still!" called Will Cary.

  Clonmel kept on with his song until it ended. But by that time Cary had torn the door open and rushed in with his lantern in one hand and a gun in the other. He was a raging devil.

  "I ought to empty the lantern on you and let you burn for a wick!" said Cary. "By thunder, I think I'll do it."

  "Tell her that I was singing for her when you murdered me, Will," said Clonmel. "No, you won't have to tell her. She's heard me and the song both, by this time."

  Cary swung up the lantern. I thought he would bring it down with a crash across the face of Clonmel, but instead he held his hand and stepped back. Whatever was in him for utterance, he could not get it past his lips, and he turned and walked slowly back through the open door. It slammed heavily behind him. The key ground in the lock, and I heard it rattle as it was withdrawn again.

  "What possessed you?" I asked Clonmel.

  "She had to know that I'm here," said Clonmel. "If she cares a rap about me, it'll keep her from mating with any Cary after I'm gone. Even if she doesn't care about me, she may ask a few questions that'll make them tell a few lies. And so, something of me lives after me."

  I thought that over. There was a good deal in what he said, though his mind was not like the minds of others. I was still lying there, pondering him even more than I thought about our danger, when I thought I heard a very light, scratching sound, as though a cat were sharpening its claws against the wall outside. But this noise progressed steadily up the logs toward the roof.

  CHAPTER XV

  Guns in the Dark

  AFTER a moment, I rolled myself over toward Clonmel and whispered to him what I thought I heard. He agreed. He had heard the same thing. He pointed out that the sound now seemed to be coming forward along the roof.

  "Is it Silver?" he murmured.

  "I don't know," I said. "Unless he has more than one man to help him, what can he possibly manage to do here?"