Black Jack (1922)

by Brand, Max

  Sometimes he joined them in the West; sometimes he "worked" an Eastern territory. He came and went as he pleased, and was more or less a law to himself. Moreover, he had certain qualities of silence and brooding that usually disturbed the leader. They troubled him now as he approached the squat, shapeless figure in the corner chair.

  "What you think of him?" said Denver.

  "A good kid and a clean-cut kid," decided Joe Pollard judicially. "Maybe he ain't another Black Jack, but he's tolerable cool for a youngster.

  Stood up and looked me in the eye like a man when I had him cornered a while back. Good thing for him you come out when you did!"

  "A good thing for you, Joe," replied Denver Pete. "He'd of turned you into fertilizer, bo!"

  "Maybe; maybe not. Maybe they's some things I could teach him about gun- slinging, Pete."

  "Maybe; maybe not," parodied Denver. "You've learned a good deal about guns, Joe--quite a bit. But there's some things about gun fighting that nobody can learn. It's got to be born into 'em. Remember how Black Jack used to slide out his gat?"

  "Yep. There was a man!"

  "And Minter, too. There's a born gunman."

  "Sure. We all know Uncle Joe--damn his soul!"

  "But the kid beat Uncle Joe fair and square from an even break--and beat him bad. Made his draw, held it so's Joe could partway catch up with him, and then drilled him clean!"

  Pollard scratched his chin.

  "I'd believe that if I seen it," he declared.

  "Pal, it wasn't Terry that done the talking; it was Gainor. He's seen a good deal of gunplay, and said that Terry's was the coolest he ever watched."

  "All right for that part of it," said Joe Pollard. "Suppose he's fast-- but can I use him? I like him well enough; I'll give him a good deal; but is he going to mean charity all the time he hangs out with me?"

  "Maybe; maybe not," chuckled Denver again. "Use him the way he can be used, and he'll be the best bargain you ever turned. Black Jack started you in business; Black Jack the Second will make you rich if you handle him right--and ruin you if you make a slip."

  "How come? He talks this 'honesty' talk pretty strong."

  "Gimme a chance to talk," said Denver contemptuously. "Takes a gent that's used to reading the secrets of a safe to read the secrets of a gent's head. And I've read the secret of young Black Jack Hollis. He's a pile of dry powder, Joe. Throw in the spark and he'll explode so damned loud they'll hear him go off all over the country."

  "How?"

  "First, you got to keep him here."

  "How?"

  Joe Pollard sat back with the air of one who will be convinced through no mental effort of his own. But Denver was equal to the demand.

  "I'm going to show you. He thinks he owes you three hundred."

  "That's foolish. I cheated the kid out of it. I'll give it back to him and all the rest I won."

  Denver paused and studied the other as one amazed by such stupidity.

  "Pal, did you ever try, in the old days, to _give_ anything to the old Black Jack?"

  "H'm. Well, he sure hated charity. But this ain't charity."

  "It ain't in your eyes. It is in Terry's. If you insist, he'll get sore.

  No, Joe. Let him think he owes you that money. Let him start in working it off for you--honest work. You ain't got any ranch work. Well, set him to cutting down trees, or anything. That'll help to hold him. If he makes some gambling play--and he's got the born gambler in him--you got one last thing that'll be apt to keep him here."

  "What's that?"

  "Kate."

  Pollard stirred in his chair.

  "How d'you mean that?" he asked gruffly.

  "I mean what I said," retorted Denver. "I watched young Black Jack looking at her. He had his heart in his eyes, the kid did. He likes her, in spite of the frosty mitt she handed him. Oh, he's falling for her, pal--and he'll keep on falling. Just slip the word to Kate to kid him along. Will you? And after we got him glued to the place here, we'll figure out the way to turn Terry into a copy of his dad. We'll figure out how to shoot the spark into the powder, and then stand clear for the explosion."

  Denver came silently and swiftly out of the chair, his pudgy hand spread on the table and his eyes gleaming close to the face of Pollard.

  "Joe," he said softly, "if that kid goes wrong, he'll be as much as his father ever was--and maybe more. He'll rake in the money like it was dirt. How do I know? Because I've talked to him. I've watched him and trailed him. He's trying hard to go straight. He's failed twice; the third time he'll bust and throw in with us. And if he does, he'll clean up the coin--and we'll get our share. Why ain't you made more money yourself, Joe? You got as many men as Black Jack ever had. It's because you ain't got the fire in you. Neither have I. We're nothing but tools ready for another man to use the way Black Jack used us. Nurse this kid along a little while, and he'll show us how to pry open the places where the real coin is cached away. And he'll lead us in and out with no danger to us and all the real risk on his own head. That's his way--that was his dad's way before him."

  Pollard nodded slowly. "Maybe you're right."

  "I know I am. He's a gold mine, this kid is. But we got to buy him with something more than gold. And I know what that something is. I'm going to show him that the good, lawabiding citizens have made up their minds that he's no good; that they're all ag'in' him; and when he finds that out, he'll go wild. They ain't no doubt of it. He'll show his teeth! And when he shows his teeth, he'll taste blood--they ain't no doubt of it."

  "Going to make him--kill?" asked Pollard very softly.

  "Why not? He'll do it sooner or later anyway. It's in his blood."

  "I suppose it is."

  "I got an idea. There's a young gent in town named Larrimer, ain't there?"

  "Sure. A rough kid, too. It was him that killed Kennedy last spring."

  "And he's proud of his reputation?"

  "Sure. He'd go a hundred miles to have a fight with a gent with a good name for gunplay."

  "Then hark to me sing, Joe! Send Terry into town to get something for you. I'll drop in ahead of him and find Larrimer, and tell Larrimer that Black Jack's son is around--the man that dropped Sheriff Minter. Then I'll bring 'em together and give 'em a running start."

  "And risk Terry getting his head blown off?"

  "If he can't beat Larrimer, he's no use to us; if he kills Larrimer, it's good riddance. The kid is going to get bumped off sometime, anyway. He's bad--all the way through."

  Pollard looked with a sort of wonder on his companion.

  "You're a nice, kind sort of a gent, ain't you, Denver?"

  "I'm a moneymaker," asserted Denver coldly. "And, just now, Terry Hollis is my gold mine. Watch me work him!"

  Chapter 27

  It was some time before Terry could sleep, though it was now very late.

  When he put out the light and slipped into the bed, the darkness brought a bright flood of memories of the day before him. It seemed to him that half a lifetime had been crowded into the brief hours since he was fired on the ranch that morning. Behind everything stirred the ugly face of Denver as a sort of controlling nemesis. It seemed to him that the chunky little man had been pulling the wires all the time while he, Terry Hollis, danced in response. Not a flattering thought.

  Nervously, Terry got out of bed and went to the window. The night was cool, cut crisp rather than chilling. His eye went over the velvet blackness of the mountain slope above him to the ragged line of the crest--then a dizzy plunge to the brightness of the stars beyond. The very sense of distance was soothing; it washed the gloom and the troubles away from him. He breathed deep of the fragrance of the pines and then went back to his bed.

  He had hardly taken his place in it when the sleep began to well up over his brain--waves of shadows running out of corners of his mind. And then suddenly he was wide awake, alert.

  Someone had opened the door. There had been no sound; merely a change in the air currents of the room, but ther
e was also the sense of another presence so clearly that Terry almost imagined he could hear the breathing.

  He was beginning to shrug the thought away and smile at his own nervousness, when he heard that unmistakable sound of a foot pressing the floor. And then he remembered that he had left his gun belt far from the bed. In a burning moment that lesson was printed in his mind, and would never be forgotten. Slowly as possible and without sound, he drew up his feet little by little, spread his arms gently on either side of him, and made himself tense for the effort. Whoever it was that entered, they might be taken by surprise. He dared not lift his head to look; and he was on the verge of leaping up and at the approaching noise, when a whisper came to him softly: "Black Jack!"

  The soft voice, the name itself, thrilled him. He sat erect in the bed and made out, dimly, the form of Kate Pollard in the blackness. She would have been quite invisible, save that the square of the window was almost exactly behind her. He made out the faint whiteness of the hand which held her dressing robe at the breast.

  She did not start back, though she showed that she was startled by the suddenness of his movement by growing the faintest shade taller and lifting her head a little. Terry watched her, bewildered.

  "I been waiting to see you," said Kate. "I want to--I mean--to--talk to you."

  He could think of nothing except to blurt with sublime stupidity: "It's good of you. Won't you sit down?"

  The girl brought him to his senses with a sharp "Easy! Don't talk out. Do you know what'd happen if Dad found me here?"

  "I--" began Terry.

  But she helped him smoothly to the logical conclusion. "He'd blow your head off, Black Jack; and he'd do it--pronto. If you are going to talk, talk soft--like me."

  She sat down on the side of the bed so gently that there was no creaking.

  They peered at each other through the darkness for a time.

  She was not whispering, but her voice was pitched almost as low, and he wondered at the variety of expression she was able to pack in the small range of that murmur. "I suppose I'm a fool for coming. But I was born to love chances. Born for it!" She lifted her head and laughed.

  It amazed Terry to hear the shaken flow of her breath and catch the glinting outline of her face. He found himself leaning forward a little; and he began to wish for a light, though perhaps it was an unconscious wish.

  "First," she said, "what d'you know about Dad--and Denver Pete?"

  "Practically nothing."

  She was silent for a moment, and he saw her hand go up and prop her chin while she considered what she could say next.

  "They's so much to tell," she confessed, "that I can't put it short. I'll tell you this much, Black Jack--"

  "That isn't my name, if you please."

  "It'll be your name if you stay around these parts with Dad very long," she replied, with an odd emphasis. "But where you been raised, Terry? And what you been doing with yourself?"

  He felt that this giving of the first name was a tribute, in some subtle manner. It enabled him, for instance, to call her Kate, and he decided with a thrill that he would do so at the first opportunity. He reverted to her question.

  "I suppose," he admitted gloomily, "that I've been raised to do pretty much as I please--and the money I've spent has been given to me."

  The girl shook her head with conviction.

  "It ain't possible," she declared.

  "Why not?"

  "No son of Black Jack would live off somebody's charity."

  He felt the blood tingle in his cheeks, and a real anger against her rose. Yet he found himself explaining humbly.

  "You see, I was taken when I wasn't old enough to decide for myself. I was only a baby. And I was raised to depend upon Elizabeth Cornish. I--I didn't even know the name of my father until a few days ago."

  The girl gasped. "You didn't know your father--not your own father?" She laughed again scornfully. "Terry, I ain't green enough to believe that!"

  He fell into a dignified silence, and presently the girl leaned closer, as though she were peering to make out his face. Indeed, it was now possible to dimly make out objects in the room. The window was filled with an increasing brightness, and presently a shaft of pale light began to slide across the floor, little by little. The moon had pushed up above the crest of the mountain.

  "Did that make you mad?" queried the girl. "Why?"

  "You seemed to doubt what I said," he remarked stiffly.

  "Why not? You ain't under oath, or anything, are you?"

  Then she laughed again. "You're a queer one all the way through. This Elizabeth Cornish--got anything to do with the Cornish ranch?"

  "I presume she owns it, very largely."

  The girl nodded. "You talk like a book. You must of studied a terrible pile."

  "Not so much, really."

  "H'm," said the girl, and seemed to reserve judgment.

  Then she asked with a return of her former sharpness: "How come you gambled today at Pedro's?"

  "I don't know. It seemed the thing to do--to kill time, you know."

  "Kill time! At Pedro's? Well--you _are_ green, Terry!"

  "I suppose I am, Kate."

  He made a little pause before her name, and when he spoke it, in spite of himself, his voice changed, became softer. The girl straightened somewhat, and the light was now increased to such a point that he could make out that she was frowning at him through the dimness.

  "First, you been adopted, then you been raised on a great big place with everything you want, mostly, and now you're out--playing at Pedro's. How come, Terry?"

  "I was sent away," said Terry faintly, as all the pain of that farewell came flooding back over him.

  "Why?"

  "I shot a man."

  "Ah!" said Kate. "You shot a man?" It seemed to silence her. "Why, Terry?"

  "He had killed my father," he explained, more softly than ever.

  "I know. It was Minter. And they turned you out for that?"

  There was a trembling intake of her breath. He could catch the sparkle of her eyes, and knew that she had flown into one of her sudden, fiery passions. And it warmed his heart to hear her.

  "I'd like to know what kind of people they are, anyway! I'd like to meet up with that Elizabeth Cornish, the--"

  "She's the finest woman that ever breathed," said Terry simply.

  "You say that," she pondered slowly, "after she sent you away?"

  "She did only what she thought was right. She's a little hard, but very just, Kate."

  She was shaking her head; the hair had become a dull and wonderful gold in the faint moonshine.

  "I dunno what kind of a man you are, Terry. I didn't ever know a man could stick by--folks--after they'd been hurt by 'em. I couldn't do it. I ain't got much Bible stuff in me, Terry. Why, when somebody does me a wrong, I hate 'em--I hate 'em! And I never forgive 'em till I get back at 'em." She sighed. "But you're different, I guess. I begin to figure that you're pretty white, Terry Hollis."

  There was something so direct about her talk that he could not answer. It seemed to him that there was in her a cross between a boy and a man--the simplicity of a child and the straightforward strength of a grown man, and all this tempered and made strangely delightful by her own unique personality.

  "But I guessed it the first time I looked at you," she was murmuring. "I guessed that you was different from the rest."

  She had her elbow on her knee now, and, with her chin cupped in the graceful hand, she leaned toward him and studied him.

  "When they're clean-cut on the outside, they're spoiled on the inside.

  They're crooks, hard ones, out for themselves, never giving a rap about the next gent in line. But mostly they ain't even clean on the outside, and you can see what they are the first time you look at 'em.

  "Oh, I've liked some of the boys now and then; but I had to make myself like 'em. But you're different. I seen that when you started talking. You didn't sulk; and you didn't look proud like you wanted to sho
w us what you could do; and you didn't boast none. I kept wondering at you while I was at the piano. And--you made an awful hit with me, Terry."

  Again he was too staggered to reply. And before he could gather his wits, the girl went on:

  "Now, is they any real reason why you shouldn't get out of here tomorrow morning?"

  It was a blow of quite another sort.

  "But why should I go?"

  She grew very solemn, with a trace of sadness in her voice.

  "I'll tell you why, Terry. Because if you stay around here too long, they'll make you what you don't want to be--another Black Jack. Don't you see that that's why they like you? Because you're his son, and because they want you to be another like him. Not that I have anything against him. I guess he was a fine fellow in his way." She paused and stared directly at him in a way he found hard to bear. "He must of been! But that isn't the sort of a man you want to make out of yourself. I know.

  You're trying to go straight. Well, Terry, nobody that ever stepped could stay straight long when they had around 'em Denver Pete and--my father."

  She said the last with a sob of grief. He tried to protest, but she waved him away.

  "I know. And it's true. He'd do anything for me, except change himself.

  Believe me, Terry, you got to get out of here--pronto. Is they anything to hold you here?"

  "A great deal. Three hundred dollars I owe your father."

  She considered him again with that mute shake of the head. Then: "Do you mean it? I see you do. I don't suppose it does any good for me to tell you that he cheated you out of that money?"

  "If I was fool enough to lose it that way, I won't take it back."

  "I knew that, too--I guessed it. Oh, Terry, I know a pile more about the inside of your head than you'd ever guess! Well, I knew that--and I come with the money so's you can pay back Dad in the morning. Here it is--and they's just a mite more to help you on your way."

  She laid the little handful of gold on the table beside the bed and rose.