by Brand, Max
They were Drummons, every one, and the central figure of the three bore a face which Silvertip would never forget. It was the true Drummon type, with fleshy, battered brow, and skull-like eyes, but the neck and the features of the man were flushed over and swollen with whisky bloat, like a raw sunburn.
He led the way, and, pointing to the side, toward the front door of the house, uttered a sudden wild yell of rage. For he had seen the newly drawn brand!
Silver was already inside the brush. It crashed and crackled around him. A rapid fire of bullets searched it, also. One of them nicked the mustang as Silver mounted. It reared, struck out at the air, then fled unmanageably among the trees. There was more danger from its running than from the gunfire to the rear. The branches of the trees seemed to reach out and then stoop suddenly at the head of the rider. The tree trunks threatened to strike him on either side and fling him with a broken body to the ground.
At last, sawing savagely at the reins, he managed to get the head of the frightened horse under control. They were already nearing the edge of the woods; now they swept out into the open, and Silvertip saw a cavalcade coming up on the farther side of the river, the same rout of horsemen and dogs that had streamed past him not long before. But there was one difference now. For in the midst of them, his hands tied behind his back, rode Tonio.
The distance was still great, but by the horse Silver knew his companion. The little mustang went proudly along, as though feeling that it was a guard of honor that accompanied its master. But the sight was a stroke to the very heart of Silvertip. For Tonio had protested; he had not come blindly into the region of danger, but had been persuaded and drawn on against his will.
Retreat in the direction of the river was impossible.
Silver turned the horse back into the trees. The three riders, yelling loudly, poured into the open, had a glimpse of him, and hurtled in pursuit again.
He ran the horse hard, so that the brush cracked noisily about him. Then, making a sudden halt, he turned to the side and walked the mustang a few quiet steps into high brush.
It might be that he could lose them in that way. He heard them come with a sweep; he saw, through the screen of branches, shadowy forms leaping past him, two of them in succession. But a third drove straight at his place of concealment. Only chance was aiming that course; but it came near to being the death of Silvertip. He had to get his mustang under way with a rush, swerving it well to the side.
It was the man of the bloated face, looking redder than ever because of the white flash of his bared teeth as he fired on Silver. The first bullet sang at the ear of Silver; the second knocked the hat from his head.
“Alligator — hey, Hank — you got him?” yelled a voice from in front.
“I’ve nicked him. Turn to the right and we’ll bag him. We got him! He’s the one that killed Terry!”
But Silvertip’s mustang already had taken him clear of the woods. He took an angling course to the right, down the slope of the hill. The guns began again behind him. Then the trees of an open grove received him, flicking back in a shadowy throng, like the pickets of a fence.
That patch of trees shielded him from gunfire for a little distance. He reached the small stream in the center of the hollow at a narrows, and the mustang leaped the gap. On the farther slope he gained another cluster of trees.
The Drummons were not gaining. They had been too eager with their guns, and a man cannot shoot and ride his best at the same time. They gave up gun work now. Their hat brims blown and flapping like open jaws, they came now with a rush; and off to the side, from the big barn behind the house, the youngster was quirting a mustang into full speed, trying to cut across the line of the flight.
Silvertip angled again to the right. There were more trees in clusters that received him as clouds in the sky receive a fugitive bird when the hawks are flying near.
Then the mouth of a narrow canyon opened to his left. He shot into it. A yell of frenzied delight rang behind him, to give warning that he was in a trap, and, scudding around the next corner, he saw the very face of the danger. For the ravine ended against a sheer wall of rock fifty feet high, with a dribble of water dropping into mist from the lip of the rock.
He snatched the rifle from its saddle holster and leaped to the ground while the mustang was still running.
To the left the wall of the ravine went up like the flat of a hand; to the right a rubble and scattering of great boulders climbed in broken stairs toward the sky line. Silver was instantly in the heart of that rocky confusion.
The Drummons were already at the spot. They were out of the saddle; they were pouring in among the big boulders, calling directions.
Silver lay out on the flat forehead of a rock and waited. A head bobbed at the side of a great stone twenty yards beneath him.
He knocked the hat off that head. Another man lurched into view and dodged back to shelter again with a yelp; a bullet from Silver’s gun had slipped through his arm.
Then Silver continued his retreat, for he knew that they would not press him too closely. Twice he came into the open; twice they salted the rocks around him with splashes of lead. But he was not touched in body. He had lost a hat; his coat was torn with a great gash close to the pit of his right arm; and that was the only mark he bore.
He reached the top of the divide. Beneath him was another valley; or he could go up or down the divide itself. But he chose, as an alternative, to double back down the hillside which he had just climbed. He could hear the gritting of heels among the stone. So he pulled off his riding boots and feathered his way among the boulders in his stockinged feet.
Just before him he heard the grunt and stifled gasp of a man doing hard labor. Silver dropped to a knee with his gun ready. The sun beat on him with sudden strength. He was aware of the gleaming of the rocks around him. For an instant all of that great face of nature was still, and all its eyes seemed to be focused upon him.
He waited with his teeth set behind that faint smile of his. If the fellow who puffed and panted among the rocks so close to him came in view, there would have to be a death. His own position among the rocks would be revealed, and the others could take him from above and hunt him down with ease.
But the hurrying climber went by on the left, out of view. And Silvertip continued to work down among the rocks.
Above him he heard voices ring out; then the sounds grew dim, as though the Drummons had clambered into the valley just beyond them.
He reached the floor of the ravine. Looking up, he saw one form looking gigantic against the sky, rifle at the ready, as the lookout turned gradually, scanning all about him. Yet he never looked down into the floor of the canyon, where Silvertip was now stealing toward his mustang.
He gained the saddle before a yell from the middle of the sky, as it seemed, floated down to him; then bullets. Those bullets merely helped him. Nothing is harder than to shoot accurately from a height at a running target. The gunfire aided Silver to rouse the four other horses to a frenzy of panic, and they scattered at full speed before him down the canyon, out into the pleasant, open green of the valley.
There was no more pursuit. There could be no more. He caught up those four Drummon horses, fastened their lead ropes together, and trotted straight back toward the house of Monterey.
Nothing happened on the way. He saw not a soul. Nothing lived in the valleys except the slowly browsing cattle, or the bright wind riffles that ran over the grass.
So he came up the narrower valley into view of the fortress house of Monterey. It seemed to him like a picture of a gallant last stand, a great castle without a garrison. There were armed men within, to be sure, but at their head was a tired, grim, despairing old man.
He came up to the patio gate; and there a house mozo greeted him, stared at the horses, then saw the brands on their sides, and gave token of news to the entire household with a yell.
CHAPTER XVII
In the Night
IT WAS like the alarming of a garri
son, indeed. Distant shouts, distant footfalls beat inside the house; doors slammed like muffled reports of cannon; then the torrent of humanity came sweeping out into the patio. Male and female, they gathered about the four captured horses; they examined the bleeding cut where a bullet had nicked Silver’s mustang across the quarters. They laid their fingers on the shot-torn cantle of his saddle. They noted the absence of his hat, and they looked with a deep interest on the torn side of his coat. But even more than these signs of battle, they regarded the horses of the Drummons with a sort of startled awe, at first, but afterward with a joyous laughter.
Julia Monterey came out, last of all, and Silvertip told her, shortly:
“Tonio’s gone. We got to the river, and I wanted to go across to see the Drummon house. Tonio hid and waited for me. I went on to the house, and burned the brand on the door of it. The Drummons chased me. The head of the gang was with the rest. They hunted me up to the rocks. I managed to get around ’em and bring back the horses. And I saw a whole herd of the Drummons leading Tonio up to the Drummon house. It’s a bad business, Julia. And there’s the whole of it.”
Tonio? It seemed as though his life or death were of no interest at all to the other Mexicans, compared with the immense fact that the first step of Monterey’s vow had been performed. That vow was known to the whole world, it appeared. It was the battle song which the Monterey faction followed. They were like happy children. Three of the vaqueros rode in from the upper valley, heard the news, and turned the demonstration into a frenzy.
Silvertip escaped into the house. He went out onto the garden terrace at the back of the house with Julia, and a house mozo brought out a decanter of strong wine and another of rye whisky. Silver took the whisky. He drank it in small sips, letting the sick burn of it fume in his nose and up like a mounting smoke into his brain. It was bright and hot on the open terrace, but he would not move into the skeleton shade which the pergola offered to them. Instead, he chose to soak in the sunshine, relaxed, inert.
The girl sat opposite him with the same broad hat on her head. At a distance, it buried her features in shadow. At close hand, the color burned through from her cheeks, and her eyes. Her eyes were not Mexican black. They were paler, clearer. There seemed to be more of spirit and less of race in them.
Arturo Monterey walked back and forth across the terrace. He had not spoken a word to Silver about the branding of the door of the Drummons. What he felt about the accomplishment of the first portion of his vow was too great for speech. But as he walked back and forth, once he paused and dropped his hand on the shoulder of the American. Then he continued pacing, and halting at the farther end of the terrace, he stood staring over the lowlands beyond, lost in a dream of hope.
“He even forgets Pedro,” said the girl softly. “Don’t doubt that he loved his son, but a thousand children would be nothing to him compared with the filling of his vow. Twenty-five years of hating and hoping!”
“And Tonio?” said Silvertip.
The sun that blazed on his head made the gray tufts above his temples glisten like metal indeed.
“Tonio? What does he matter?” asked the girl. She laughed bitterly. “Tonio was simply an old adherent, the wisest and the best man in the whole valley, the kindest to me, the truest to his master, the most faithful to his friends. But it doesn’t matter. What does the life of one man mean, compared with putting the mark on the door of the Drummon house? Oh, nothing at all!”
She fell silent. He watched the pinching of her lips and the slight flaring of her nostrils. The battle spirit was in her, also, he could see. And out of the distance, he could hear the Mexicans singing. The noise sometimes drove close to them with the opening of a door, then receded, and grew as far away as a thought.
Her chin was dropped on one brown fist that was whitened at the knuckles by the force with which she gripped it. His head was far back; she watched the faintness of his smile.
She looked at him with a queer mixture of horror and admiration.
“You want trouble,” she said. “You live by it.”
“I’ll die by it, too,” said Silvertip gloomily.
“What gave you the gray markings in your hair?” she asked. “That wasn’t just chance, was it?”
“No. It’s a long story,” he told her. “Stop talking about me. I want to know about Tonio. What’ll they do to him?”
“He’ll disappear, that’s all. He’ll never be seen by his friends again.”
“They’ll kill him out of hand, eh?”
“Not at all,” she answered. “He’ll simply be riding through the woods, and he’ll brain his head against a bough of a tree. Or else he’ll fall off his horse and drown in the rapids. Or he might even have an accident with his own revolver. There are lots of ways. The Drummons won’t know anything about it.”
He nodded. “Tonio,” said Silvertip, “you think quite a lot of him, don’t you?”
“He taught me to ride,” she said. “He taught me to shoot. He taught me the old Mexican and Indian legends of everything. Whatever I know that’s worth knowing, he taught me.”
Silvertip nodded again.
“That means I have to get him back,” he said.
At this, she looked him over quizzically, dropping her glance from his eyes to his smile. Then she seemed to rally to a sudden realization that he meant what he had said.
“How could you do it? How could you even try to do it?” she asked.
He looked at the horizon line, where it slid up and down the ragged sides of the mountains, across the valley.
“You can’t go with numbers; they’d be seen,” said she. “And if you go alone, how do you dream you could take Tonio away from them? They know that he’s important to Arturo Monterey. They’ll keep him caged and watched all the time.”
“I’ll go off and think,” said Silvertip.
He went to his room to be alone. But the four walls looked in upon his mind like four faces.
He went up to the roof of the old house, where a low wall was built around an open promenade. There he remained for hours, smoking cigarettes, staring at the mountains, growing constantly more nervous and tense.
Something was gathering in him, as water gathers behind a dam; something was kindling in him. His smile was seen no more. As the evening came nearer, he began to pace the roof restlessly with a step longer and more silent. He watched the evening begin, the color burn up in the west like a red thunderhead.
Then he went down to the dining room and sat silently at one end of the long table, Monterey at the other, the girl between. She tried to talk; Silver answered in murmurs. The windows grew black with night, the yellow image of the table lamp sitting deep in the glass.
At last he left her, suddenly, and felt the drift of her eyes, as her glance followed him across the room. He knew that she understood where he was going, but she said nothing. An American girl would have had to speak, but the Mexican blood was enough to keep her silent. He felt, at that moment, that to look into her mind would be to look into a greater darkness than the night.
Outside, he went to the stable. Two vaqueros appeared from nowhere and attached themselves to him. Their attitude was a queer mixture of suspicion and respect. He wanted a horse, a fresh horse. They took him with a lantern into the corral behind the stable, and flashed the light for him over the string of mustangs that were kept on hand.
He picked a bay gelding, built long and low, with a pair of fine shoulders. He had not made a mistake; he knew that by the way the two looked at one another. They roped that mustang, together with another, at his request, They wielded long, rawhide lariats, heavy and supple as quicksilver, and made their casts with a queer underhand flick, effortless and sure. The rawhide noose stuck with a report, like the slap of a hand.
The pair were saddled. Silvertip’s rifle was brought, examined by one of the vaqueros, and slid into the saddle holster. The Mexicans escorted him to the gate of the patio. They held up their lantern to light him on his way; he saw th
e flash of their teeth and their eyes, and the gleam of perspiration on their dark faces. Then he was gone down the road.
A voice called after him. As he halted, Juan Perez galloped up and drew rein with a jerk.
“You are riding alone, amigo,” said Juan Perez. “How is that? It is too dark to see anything. It is too dark to find anything except trouble. Let me go with you!”
“No,” said Silver. “This is a case, Juan, where two men are too many, and where one is almost too much. But when the right time comes, I shall call on no one but you, amigo.”
He left Juan Perez sitting the saddle disconsolately, and went on along the road.
He passed a small group of bushes. A figure rose out of it.
“Who goes?” called a voice. And it added instantly: “Señor Silver?”
“Yes!” said Silvertip.
“Good fortune!” called the voice.
Silver rode on. At the mouth of the ravine, two more shadows arose, hailed him, let him pass. It was clear that the men of Monterey would keep good watch.
He kept steadily on across the valley of the Haverhill. The stirrups had been tied up so that they would not flop and make a noise. But as he drew near the ford of the river, the hoofbeats of his mustang seemed to grow louder and louder, for they were entering the domain of the Drummons, and armed men might grow up out of the ground at any moment.
He rode into the ford. The water dashed about the two horses; it seemed to burn with a white fire, to the excited eye of Silvertip. His long-geared mustang grunted as it climbed the farther bank, and it seemed to Silvertip that the sound must reverberate to the very edge of the hills.
But still there was no sign of an enemy.
So he reached the trees that covered the hill before the house of Drummon. There he dismounted, and led the horses slowly through the double blackness beneath the branches until, from the brow of the slope, he saw the long line of lights across the face of the Drummon house. It was not so much like a private dwelling as a hotel.
