The 8th Western Novel

by Dean Owen

  “Saw his stencil on the tent,” he said. “J. P. in a diamond. Same brand he uses fo’ his hawsses. Or mebbe you found it.”

  His drawling voice held a taunt that brought angry flushes of color to the faces of the men opposing him, yet they made no definite movement toward attack. It seemed patent that Sandy Bourke was testing them. Trouble was in the air, two kinds of it: on the one side hesitant belligerency; on the other—cool nonchalance. Sandy, with his smiling lips and unsmiling eyes, stood lightly poised as a dancing master. Mormon and Sam were tenser, crouched a little from the hips, elbows away from their sides, hands with fingers apart, ready to close on gun butts, standing as boxers stand or distance-runners set on their marks.

  The man who stood in the tent door kicked at his sleeping companion and roused him to sit on the side of his cot and stare sleepily out, gradually taking in the situation. There were seven against three but, when the odds are so big and the minority faces them with a readiness and an assurance that shows in their eyes, on their lips, vibrates from their compacted alliance, the measure is one of will, rather than physical and merely numerical superiority, and the balance beam quivers undecidedly. The bearded miner, with the rest, looked shiftily toward the man who had done the speaking, the bald-headed one, whose khaki and nail-studded boots were belied by the softness and puffiness of his flesh, the sags and wrinkles beneath his eyes and under his double chins. He had little gray-green orbs that glittered uneasily.

  “I’m giving you men two minutes to clear out of here,” he said. “No two-gunned cow-puncher can throw any bluff round here, if that’s what you’re trying to do.”

  Sandy laughed joyously. The smile was in his eyes now.

  “If I figger a man’s throwin’ a bluff,” he said, “I usually figger to call him, not to chew about it. Me, I pack two guns fo’ a reason. Once in a while I shoot off all the ca’tridges from one an’ then I don’t have to reload. Now, I’m talkin’. These claims are duly registered in the name of Patrick Casey, his heirs an’ assigns. Here’s the papers. The assessment work is all done. Pat’s daughter owns ’em now. We’re representin’ her. An’ I’m servin’ you notice to quit. We’ll take the same two minutes you was talkin’ of. They must be nigh up now, though I didn’t see you lookin’ at yo’ watch. I’m lookin’ at my Ingersoll an’ I give it sixty seconds mo’. Then staht yore li’l’ demonstration, gents, providin’ I don’t beat you to it.” He started to roll a cigarette with hands skilful and steady. Back of him Sam and Mormon stood like dogs on point, watchful, unmoving, but instinct with suppressed motion.

  “The girl may be his heir,” said the bald-headed man, “but Plimsoll is assignee. Plimsoll staked him an’ these claims are half his. The girl can put in her share to the title later, if they amount to anything. She ain’t of age.”

  “So J. P. was hirin’ you to do his dirty work,” said Sandy, his voice cold with contempt. “You go back to him, the whole lousy pack of you, an’ tell him from me he’s a yellow-spined liar. Git! Take yore stuff with you or send back fo’ it. Now, git off this property.”

  If a man can make movements with his hands so swiftly that they are covered in less than a tenth of a second, ordinary human sight can not register them. He has achieved the magician’s slogan—the quickness of the hand deceives the eye. It takes natural aptitude and long practise, whether one is juggling gilded balls or blued-steel revolvers. Sandy could, with a circling movement of his wrists, draw his guns from their holsters and bring them to bear directly upon the target to which his eyes shifted. Glance, twist of wrist, arrest of motion, pressure of finger, all coordinated. One moment his hands were empty, his glance carelessly contemptuous, the veriest movement of a split-second stop-watch and the gun in his right hand spat fire, the gun in his left swung in an arc that menaced the five card players.

  The other two were struggling beneath the crumpled folds of a collapsed tent, wriggling frantically like the stage hands who simulate waves by crawling beneath painted canvas. Sandy had shattered the pegs that held up the upper corners of the tent on the slope, had cut the cords of the remaining guys on that side and the structure had swayed and collapsed.

  Sam and Mormon had lined up now with Sandy. There was no mistaking their intention to use their guns. But the exhibition had been quite sufficient. With one accord the five raised their hands shoulder high and began to shuffle down the hill, regardless of their equipment, which, having been paid for by Plimsoll, they regarded as of much less value than the necessity for departure.

  “Come out of that,” commanded Sandy to the two wrigglers. “Git a move on.”

  The faces that appeared were ludicrous in their expressions of dismay and appeal. Their owners came out like dogs from a kennel who expect to be kicked as they emerge. One of them had taken off his boots for better sleeping and he hobbled uneasily in his socks.

  “Take along yore booze,” said Sandy.

  The bootless one looked furtively at the demijohn, still like a wary cur who snatches at and bolts with a stray bone. Then the pair set off at a jog trot after the rest.

  “I wonder,” said Sam, “if that was good whisky?”

  Sandy looked at him reproachfully. “Sody-Water,” he said, “I’m plumb disappointed in you an’ yore cravin’. Smell it an’ see.”

  His gun exploded. The man with the demijohn gave a curious hop, skip and jump. The demijohn jerked in his hand but seemed intact. The bullet, smashing through the wickerwork, had shattered the container but the tough willow twigs preserved the shape. Two more shots and there was a tinkle of broken glass. The last bullet had clipped the neck. It was too close shooting for the sockless one and the whisky was dripping fast through the weave, bringing a reek of crude liquor to Sam’s twitching nostrils. The claim-jumper dropped what was left of his burden and went hopping on, acquiring stone bruises with every leap.

  “Scattered like a bunch of coyotes,” said Sam.

  “Sure did,” agreed Sandy. “Minute they stahted talkin’, ’stead of shootin’, I knew they was ready to stampede. They’ll beat it to Plimsoll an’ we’ll see jest how much sand he’s got in his craw.”

  “Not enough to keep him from skiddin’ on a downgrade,” said Mormon. “Sandy, that’s cruelty to animals, sendin’ that hombre off ’thout his boots after you took away his licker. I’ve got tender feet myse’f as well as a soft heart. Help me with this tent a minute, Sam.”

  Together they raised the fallen canvas enough to discover the boots, which Mormon hurled down-hill after the limping one, who was far in the rear of his companions. He turned at Mormon’s shout and he stopped, fearful at the act of kindness, crawled up the slope and retrieved his footwear, pulled them on and scurried off.

  A distant shout reached them from the other side of the gulch. By position, rather than actual recognition, Sandy guessed the figure that of Westlake. The firing must have sounded only a little louder than cork poppings, but evidently the engineer had sized up the retreating men and the collapsed tent. Sandy waved to him in assurance that all was well and the other waved back in understanding.

  “Think Plim’ll show?” asked Sam.

  “Got to—or quit,” said Sandy. “That bunch of jumpers he got together’ll spill the beans unless he makes some play. It’s plumb evident he wants these partickler claims. I don’t believe he’s hirin’ men just to make us peevish. ’Sides, he didn’t know fo’ sure we were comin’. Might have figgered we’d trail the news of the rush, but I’ll bet a sack of Durham against a pinch o’ dirt that he’s fairly sure that old man Patrick Casey picked him some first-class locations. We got one card that’ll upset him considerable, my bein’ the legal guardeen of Molly.”

  “A heap he cares fo’ legal or not legal,” said Sam.

  “That’s jest what he will do, now he ain’t standin’ in with the crowd that hands out the law, Sam. He might try to make it a show-down right here an’ drive us out of the camp
or leave us tucked away stiff in some prospect hole. But there’s a lot of decent material drifted in an’ it w’udn’t be hard to beat him to that play an’ organize a camp committee fo’ the regulation of law an’ order till such time as the camp proves itself an’ is established. Once big capital gits stahted in here the law’ll be workin’ right along hand in hand with the development. Let’s take a pasear an’ look at Casey’s workings.”

  Patrick Casey had run in a tunnel from the face of his discovery. Weathered porphyry float showed on the dump whose size suggested greater depth to the tunnel than they had expected. Its mouth had been closed by timbers fitting closely into the frame of the horizontal shaft, forming, not so much a door, as a barricade, that had been firmly spiked to heavy timbers. This had been recently dismantled and then replaced, as recent marks on the weathered lumber showed. Sandy looked at these places closely, frowning as he gave his verdict.

  “Some one monkeyin’ with this inside of the last month,” he announced. “The nails ain’t rusted like the old ones an’ the chips are fresh. Like as not it was that bunch of easterners. They’d figger the camp was abandoned an’ consider themselves justified as philanthropists into bu’stin’ open anything that looked good—like this tunnel. A man w’udn’t go to the trouble of timberin’ up if he didn’t think he had somethin’ inside that was goin’ to turn up high cahd some day. ’Course the capitalist, if he found somethin’ that looked good, ’ud hunt up the owner in the registry an’ make him an offer. But it w’udn’t be a half interest in the mine. He’d say he was thinkin’ of developin’ half a mile away an’, if he bought cheap enough, he might make an offer. Yes, sir,” Sandy went on, warming to his own theory, “it w’udn’t surprise me if this warn’t the mine they sampled which Plimsoll finds out is the real stuff an’ clamps on.”

  “Well,” said Mormon, “we’ll have a chance to ask him in a minute. He’s comin’ up with that crowd of his rangin’ erlong an’ their ha’r liftin’. Thar’s that ungrateful skunk I chucked the boots at. Plim don’t look over an’ above pleased the way things are breakin’. Looks as amiable as a timber wolf with his tail in a b’ar trap.”

  The three partners met the jumpers, now headed by Plimsoll, on the border of the claims. The gambler’s face was livid. He had boasted and lashed himself into a bullying confidence that he knew was inadequate to meet the situation he could not avoid. Hatred of the men who had balked him more than once served him better.

  “You four-flushers get off this ground,” he blustered. “You’re claiming to represent Molly Casey’s rights after you’ve kidnaped the girl and sent her out of the state. It won’t get you anywhere or anything. I’ve got a half interest in these claims and I’ve plenty of witnesses to prove it.”

  “I don’t believe yore witnesses are half as vallyble as they might have been before politics shifted in Herefo’d County,” said Sandy. “You ain’t got a written contract an’ it w’udn’t do you a mite of good if you had, fur as I’m concerned. Because I’ve been duly an’ legally app’inted guardeen to Casey’s daughter Molly an’ I’m here to represent her interests, likewise mine. I’ve got my guardianship papers right with me.”

  “A hell of a lot of good they’ll do you in this camp,” sneered Plimsoll. “Representin’ her interests. I’ll say you are, an’ your own along with ’em.” A laugh from his followers heartened him. “If the camp ever hears the yarn of your running off with the girl and now, with her tucked away, coming back to clean up, I’ve a notion they’d show you four-flushers where you’ve sat in to the wrong game. Why.…”

  Something in Sandy’s face stopped him. It became suddenly devoid of all expression, became a thing of stone out of which blazed two gray eyes and a voice issued from lips that barely moved.

  “I’ve got a notion, too, Plimsoll. A notion that it ’ud be a good day’s work to shoot you fo’ a foul-mouthed, lyin’, stealin’ crook! You sure ain’t worth bein’ arrested fo’, an’ there ain’t no open season fo’ two-laigged coyotes of yore sort, so I’ll give you yore chance. You’ve called me a fo’-flusher twice, an’ the on’y way to prove a fo’-flush is to call fo’ a show-down. I’m doin’ it.”

  The words came cold and even, backed by a grim earnestness that imprinted itself on the lesser manhood of the jumpers as a finger leaves its print in clay. They shifted back a little from Plimsoll, circling out as they might have moved away from a man marked by pestilence. He stood trying to outface Sandy, to keep his eyes steady. His lips were tight closed, still he could not help but open his mouth to a quickened breathing, to touch the lips with a furtive tongue that found the skin peeling in tiny feverish strips.

  “You pack yore gun under yore coat flap,” said Sandy. “I don’t know how quick you can draw but I aim to find out.”

  He handed one of his own guns to Mormon, announcing his action lest Plimsoll might mistake it.

  “Now then,” he went on, “I once told you I looked to you to stop any gossip about Molly Casey. Same time Butch Parsons an’ Sim Hahn got huht. You don’t seem able to sabe plain talk an’ I’m tired of talkin’ to you, Jim Plimsoll. Me, I’m goin’ to roll me a cigareet. Any time you want to you can draw. I’m givin’ you the aidge on me. If you don’t take that aidge, Jim Plimsoll, I’m givin’ you till sun-up ter-morrer mornin’ to git plumb out of camp. An’ to keep driftin’.”

  Deliberately Sandy took tobacco sack and papers from the pocket of his shirt, his fingers functioning automatically, precisely, his eyes never shifting from Plimsoll’s face, measuring by feel the amount of tobacco shaken into the little trough of brown paper. While he rolled the cigarette the sack swung from his teeth by its string.

  The group gazed at him fascinated. Plimsoll’s face beaded with tiny drops of sweat, his hands moved slowly upward toward his coat lapels, touched them as Sandy twisted the end of the cigarette, stayed there, shaking slightly with what might have been eagerness—or paralysis. For the look in the steel gray eyes of Sandy Bourke, half mocking, all confident, spurred the doubts that surged through the gambler’s chance-calculating mind, while he knew that every atom of hesitation lessened his chances.

  His own hands were close to his chest. His right had but a few inches to dart, to drag the automatic from its smooth holster. Sandy’s hands were high above his belt, rolling the cigarette. They had four times as far to go. But Plimsoll knew that if anything went wrong with his performance, if he failed to kill outright, that nothing would go wrong with Sandy’s shooting. The mention of Butch and Sim Hahn did not compose him. He had had the stage all set that time and Butch had been shot down, Sim Hahn’s capacities as a crooked dealer had been spoiled for ever. But—if he did not take his chance and, failing it, did not leave camp.…

  He felt cold. The temperature of his own conceit, the mercury of the regard of his bullies, was falling steadily. The nervous sweat was no longer confined to his face. The palms of his hands were moist, slippery.…

  “Gimme a match, Sam.” Sandy’s voice came to Plimsoll across a gulf that could never be bridged. He watched the flame, pale in the sunshine, watched it lift to the cigarette and then a puff of smoke came into his face as Sandy flung away the burnt stick and turned on his heel. Murder stirred dully in Plimsoll’s brain at the sneers he surmised rather than read on the faces of his followers. His defeat was also theirs. But the moment had gone. He knew he lacked the nerve. Sandy knew it and had turned his back on him.

  His prestige was gone. His boon companions would talk about it. Mormon gave Sandy back his second gun and Sandy slid it into the holster. He exhaled the last puff of his cigarette before he spoke again to Plimsoll.

  “Sun-up, ter-morrer. You can send fo’ yore stuff here any time you’ve a mind to. Fo’ a gamblin’ man, Plimsoll, you’re a damned pore judge of a hand.”

  Plimsoll strode off down the hill alone. The men who had come with him hesitated and then crossed the gulch. They had severed connections with the J. P.
brand for the time, at least. The three partners walked back toward the tunnel.

  “I saw the carkiss of a steer one time,” said Sam, “that had been lyin’ on a sidehill fo’ quite a spell. The coyotes an’ the buzzards had been at it, an’ the wind an’ weather had finished the job till there warn’t much mo’n hide an’ some scattered bones. Mebbe a li’l’ hair. But that carkiss sure held mo’ guts than Jim Plimsoll packs.”

  “He ain’t through,” said Mormon. “You didn’t ought to give him till sun-up, Sandy. Sun-down ’ud have been better. He’s a mangy coyote, but he’s got brains an’ he’ll addle ’em figgerin’ out some way to git even.”

  “I w’udn’t wonder,” answered Sandy. “Me, I’m goin’ to do a li’l’ figgerin’ too.”

  “We got to stay on the claims,” said Sam. “If they happened to think of it they might heave a stick of dynamite in our midst afteh it’s good an’ dahk. A flyin’ chunk of dynamite is a nasty thing to dodge, at that.”

  He spoke as dispassionately as if he had been discussing a display of harmless fireworks. Sandy answered in the same tone.

  “I don’t think it likely, Sam. Camp knows, or will know, what’s been happenin’. If dynamite was thrown they’d sabe who did it an’ I don’t believe the crowd ’ud stand for it. Jest the same it ’ud sure surprise me if we didn’t git some sort of a shivaree pahty afteh nightfall. I w’udn’t wonder if Jim Plimsoll forgets to send fo’ that tent an’ stuff of his. Hope he does.”

  “What do we want with it?” demanded Mormon.

  “Nothin’, with the stuff. We’ll set it out beyond the lines come dusk. But the tent’ll come in handy. We didn’t bring one erlong.”