The Max Brand Megapack

by Max Brand

  He did not rouse himself into full consciousness of his direction until he felt Lou throw up her head with a little start, such as she always gave when there was before her a problem which she felt might better have the attention of the master. At the same time she quickened her stride, settling down toward the ground a little, in the manner which unmistakably betokens a leap to come.

  Ronicky looked up barely in time to see before him a wide, still stretch of water, shining faintly in the darkness of the night. Where a star, looking through the swirl of dizzy clouds above, peered down at the water, there was a point of light. He saw that and measured with a sudden concern the width of the leap; then Lou rose like a swallow against a sudden gust of wind and sailed high in the air.

  He could tell by the convulsive effort with which she flung herself up and forward that she knew the leap to be close to the limit of her ability. And, as she passed the apex of her spring and began to shoot down, it seemed to Ronicky a certain thing that she would dip in the water. But she shot on, and her forehoofs landed on the dry ground, and her hind toes scooped up a spray of the water, but the next moment she was cantering on, only laboring a little in the heavy going which the water of the creek had impregnated. But she had hardly taken a stride—indeed, it was almost simultaneous with her landing across the water—when there was a faint cry and then a shrill one from some shrubs to Ronicky’s right. At once he whirled the mare toward the voice.

  CHAPTER IX

  IN THE DARK

  It was a woman’s voice; the first sound coming as though she was half choked by surprise, and the second shrill with terror. Ronicky ranged his horse behind the shrubs, just as she darted out, an indistinct figure in the night. He halted her with a shout, at the same time peering on all sides to make out the light of her home, but there was no such light in view. She seemed to have been standing there in the thicket by choice. Ronicky had heard, however, of female tramps, though even in his wide wanderings he had never seen one. But such she must unquestionably be.

  “Look here,” he said, “there ain’t any call for running. I ain’t going to harm you. Who might you be?”

  She paused at the side of a tree, more distinctly visible to him, now that he was able to fix her with his eyes. Moreover she was wearing a dress of some light color which helped to define her in the night.

  “Who are you?” she asked in turn. “And what are you doing here, off the road?”

  The first sound of her voice convinced Ronicky that he had been wrong in his surmise about the female tramp. Never in the world could there be a wanderer of the road with such a voice. He could guess at other things, too, having once heard her speak. She had courage, or her voice would not have been so even. She had surprising courage considering the youth which her voice suggested, and the lateness of the hour and the midnight dark.

  “Me?” answered Ronicky, with as much daylight good humor as he could manage to throw into his voice, “Why, I’m just a stranger out riding for the sake of the ride.”

  She remained silent, as one who did not believe what she had heard, but who considered that it would be bad policy to dispute with the unknown.

  “I might be asking you,” said Ronicky, “what you’re doing out here at this time of night—away from the road?”

  “Oh, I’ll tell you how to reach it,” she said, not answering this question. “You start over to your right and keep going till you reach a fence. Then ride down the fence, turning north until you come to a gate. That gate opens onto the road to Twin Springs. I suppose that’s the place you’re trying to find?”

  “That’s the place I’ve just left,” said Ronicky, “and I don’t worry about the road. My hoss and me—we sort of get along where there ain’t no road to speak of.”

  Again she was silent, but what little she had spoken left such a pleasant impression on Ronicky that he paused and hunted through his mind for the means of prolonging the talk.

  “I’d an idea,” he murmured at length, “that maybe you was lost yourself, being out here alone in the night. You see?”

  Still she did not speak, and he could see by the increasing dimness of her figure that she was slowly drawing back from him. All at once Ronicky Doone began to laugh.

  “Lady,” he said, “it’s sure a queer thing what the sun does to us. If this was by daylight, you wouldn’t think nothing of meeting me here, but because it’s night, you figure that there’s danger. Is that it?”

  “There’s no danger of course,” said the girl, her voice as steady as ever, in spite of her retreat. Then suddenly she was laughing, also. “Who are you?” she asked.

  “My name,” he answered, “don’t matter particular. I’m just drifting through. Most like I’ll never be in this valley again. What might the valley be, lady?”

  “If you’ll never see it again,” she answered, “I don’t suppose the name matters much.”

  “Oh, if you’re going to put it that way,” said Ronicky, “I’ll tell you. My name is Ronicky Doone.”

  “Ronicky Doone!” she gasped, and then again she repeated: “Ronicky Doone! You’re the man that Charlie Loring—”

  She stopped short, but Ronicky continued for her in perfect good nature. “Is that big Blondy’s name? Yes, I’m the man that Charlie Loring knocked down and beat up, and then he got away clean, and I didn’t do a thing to him!”

  “But, oh,” she broke in, “you’re the man whose horse he saved from the river, so you bear him no grudge, of course!”

  “No grudge?” asked Ronicky. “Well, he saved the hoss right enough, but he also knocked me flat when I’d done nothing to him. For saving Lou I’d sure like to save a dozen hosses for him, but for knocking me down—but women can’t understand things like that.”

  “Can’t we? But we do! And you’ve come up here trying to find him in the dark because you don’t care to face him in the daylight. Oh, how cowardly!”

  If she had struck him suddenly in the face Ronicky Doone could not have been more surprised. He fumbled for an answer, found no polite rejoinder, and was still, a silence which she instantly interpreted as a confession. Certainly if she had been afraid before, all fear now vanished, as she came swiftly toward him and only halted when she was under the very nose of the mare. And she stood there, regardless of the fearless and inquisitive muzzle which Lou poked toward her. For the bay mare had the trust of those animals which have never endured pain from the hand of man. In her fury, however, the girl paid no heed to that reaching head.

  “Before you can do what you hope to do,” she said fiercely, “you’ll have to be ten times the man that you are. Oh, I know what stories they brought out—about Ronicky Doone the gun fighter and the man-killer, but no man who hunts in the dark and sneaks around to strike from behind can ever beat Charlie Loring. No man!”

  She stopped. He heard her panting with her rush of anger, as she waited for his retort, but he only said, light breaking in on him: “I guess this is Hanshaw Valley? And you’re Elsie Bennett?”

  “What of that?” she asked.

  “Only that I won’t be bothering you no more,” said Ronicky Doone dryly, and he turned Lou away into the darkness.

  “Wait! Wait!” she cried after him, but Ronicky had had enough of facing such guns in battle. He sent Lou away at a brisk canter and shot away out of view over the next swell of ground, and the calling of the girl died out behind him.

  No sooner was the rim of the hill between them, however, than he turned about and slipped back in the direction from which he had come until his head was just above the edge of the hill. There he paused: scanning the shrubbery beside the water carefully, he was able to make out the dim outlines of the upper part of the body of the girl, as she stood among the bushes with the flat surface of the pool behind her.

  There was only one reason why she should be standing there, it seemed to Ronicky, and that was to meet Blondy. It had occurred to him as soon as he guessed her identity. This was a secret meeting place which she and the big fell
ow had agreed upon, and now that he was in trouble she was waiting out for him here, confident that he would come, if that were possible, and then she could tell him the good news, without which he might wander on for days and days, unknowing. She could tell him that death did not hang over his head after all, for big Oliver Hopkins had recovered. And then they would go happily back to the house together. And on the way she would tell him how she had met his enemy, Ronicky Doone, and how Ronicky had slipped away into the night.

  If all of these surmises proved correct, then that blind ride into the darkness from Twin Springs had taken him directly to his enemy. The thought warmed his heart. There was only a matter of a few minutes to wait now, before he received verification of his suspicions. For in the distance he heard the sound of a jogging horse. And then, as that sound approached, he made out the shadowy form of a horseman who approached the stream and the wide pool from the farther side. This traveler presently halted his horse and sent a low-pitched, wavering whistle up the hill, which was immediately answered by another from the shrubs by the water.

  The heart of Ronicky leaned, as he saw that his guess had been perfectly accurate. Now the rider urged his mount, so it seemed, straight into the water, though Ronicky shrewdly guessed that he was riding out on a firm sand bar, from which the easiest leap would carry him safe to the farther shore. Presently the rider was in the shrubs, off the horse, and beside the girl.

  So hushed was the night air that Ronicky could hear the murmur of their voices distinctly. Then after a moment or two they began to walk toward the hill, with the vague form of the gray horse drifting along behind them. No matter how queenly Elsie Bennett might be—and from the description of old Al Jenkins she must be a heart-stopping beauty—she had apparently made her choice. The handsome form of big, blond-headed Charlie Loring was her selection as a husband, it seemed. For surely only love could keep a girl waiting in such a place at such a time, alone. Indeed it must be an affair of long standing, comparatively speaking, or they would not have agreed so perfectly on their meeting point and on their system of signals.

  In the meantime Ronicky must remove himself from their course. For they were making straight for the hill, and he must take care that Lou moved softly, since the wind was blowing down to them and would carry every sound a considerable distance. So Ronicky leaned and whispered in the ear of the bay mare, at the same time bringing the most careful pressure to bear on the reins. The result was astonishing, for Lou was converted in a trice into a stealthy-stepping cat. Crouching a little and gliding with such a delicate foot-fall that the grass was hardly disturbed underfoot, she slipped away to the shelter of a low line of trees. Behind these Ronicky Doone turned her and there cautioned her once more in a whisper to which she listened with her ears pricked anxiously forward. Having been warned in this fashion, nothing could make her betray their position with a neigh.

  In fact the girl and the man, with the staunch little gray horse dragging wearily in the rear, passed within fifteen yards without giving a sign that anything was suspected. Just as they were by, however, and Ronicky was congratulating himself that the maneuver was so successfully accomplished, the gray tossed his head and neighed. Ronicky ground his teeth, as the girl and her escort stopped and turned with exclamations. But the gray was too tired to continue his whinnying. They apparently took it for granted that the little outburst was simply due to the fact that the hungry horse sensed his nearness to home and a well-earned portion of grain; for they went on almost at once and faded into the darkness. No sooner were they a glimmering, almost invisible shadow ahead of him, than Ronicky Doone sent the light-footed Lou out from the trees once more, and so he stole along on the trail of the two.

  CHAPTER X

  IN THE BARN

  He felt somewhat as he would have felt had he been eavesdropping, but now stealth was necessary, for he had to make these people his guide to the house which, beyond doubt, was their destination—that of Steve Bennett. There the girl would probably go inside the house, while Charlie Loring went out to put up his horse, and Ronicky could stop him on the way. Or perhaps they could finish their argument by lantern light in the barn. Why not?

  All turned out as he hoped. Before long, as they worked their way up that rolling, pleasant valley, he saw from the crest of a rise the yellow window lights of a house which, as he drew nearer, assumed large dimensions. For the wind had shifted in the past half hour or more and had scoured the sky clean of clouds, and the big house was distinctly drawn across the stars. Beyond it stretched the usual array of barns and the gloomy network of fences around corrals which goes with the Western ranch. In the starlight, too, it was easily possible to trace the movements of the two by the gray horse. Ronicky stayed just within sight of that spot of color, trusting that the drab color of Lou would not be visible.

  For a moment they paused at the house, and then the gray horse and the man went on toward the barn, alone. Ronicky at once dropped out of the saddle, threw his reins to make Lou keep to that spot until he needed her, and hurried on after Blondy. It was not exactly a joyous occasion for him. He had no feeling of personal animosity against Blondy Loring. But it was necessary in the strictest sense of the term that he should clear his honor. For he could not leave that district until he had finished with Loring. And now was as good a time as any, or better.

  Vaguely he wondered what would happen. He would not shoot to kill, if it had to come to a gun play, as it probably would. But if he did not shoot to kill, there was a vast probability that Charlie Loring would. This, however, was a problem which he had faced before, and he was not unnerved by it now. He saw the door of the house open and let out a shaft of light which framed the black form of the girl and glimmered in her hair. Then the door closed, and Ronicky hurried on until he picked the barn into which big Blondy Loring and the gray horse disappeared.

  Here, before resuming his pursuit, he paused a moment to take his bearings as accurately as he could. And, as one long familiar with danger, he now worked most coolly, jotting down in his mind an elaborate sketch in which the position of the house, the fences, what seemed to be the bunk house, and the outlying sheds were all marked. When he left that barn he might be in considerable haste, so that it would pay him to know exactly in what direction he had best race to get to the mare. He would start her toward him with his alarm whistle, as soon as he left the barn, and they would meet midway.

  With his retreat thus cared for, or at least carefully considered, he turned his back resolutely on the past and fronted the work just before him. And, so doing, he settled himself into a strange attitude of mind which an ordinary man could never have achieved.

  Carefully he cut out and threw from his attention all his past. And of his future nothing was left to concern him except the events of the next few instants. He was about to confront an antagonist who had given the most conclusive proof that he was a foeman worthy of the steel of even a Ronicky Doone. For that reason the heart of Ronicky began to rise. On times before this he had been forced by public opinion into battle with men who were beaten before the fight began. But this case was distinctly different, and he rallied himself to meet it.

  He found something to rejoice in. There was war ahead of him. He could turn himself for the nonce into a wild man. The law would not strike him down even if he killed. And, though he would fight to conquer, not to destroy, this was a consolation; they would consider this battle as a duel.

  When he reached the entrance to the long barn, at the side where the gray horse had entered, Ronicky was high of head, almost smiling, and with a fierce joy keeping him tensed and keen. In the darkness of the barn he saw a match struck, a sharp line of blue leaping out, as the match was drawn over the trousers of Blondy. Then the head spurted into flame. Next, as that flame gathered strength, it showed the hand, the intent, tired face of Charlie Loring, and the glass of the lantern he was lighting. The head of the gray horse was shown, also, and the light rudely outlined the forms of two or three other horses. Bu
t this was the season when most of the stock would be running on pasture.

  As soon as the lantern chimney was drawn down into place, shutting off the wind, the flame steadied, and the light was multiplied tenfold. Blondy hung the light at the side of the barn and, after tethering his horse, climbed into the mow and threw a quantity of hay into the manger. In the meantime Ronicky turned and looked back toward the ranch house. There was only one lighted window when the place was looked at from this direction, and that light was bleared to a greasy effect, perhaps by cobwebs and other dirt Yet it gave Ronicky the effect of an eye overlooking him from behind.

  And might they not come out of the house toward him? No, the great chances were that the girl had stolen from the house without telling anyone of her intention of meeting Blondy. Her father would not have permitted it. Besides it would have revealed the secret meeting place, and that no girl could have consented to. So it stood to reason that she had gone out secretly after supper, and now she was secretly returning. So that there was no danger of an alarm being spread among the men to send them out to congratulate big Blondy on his escape of that day and his epic achievement in riding into Twin Springs. Such an errand would have brought them squarely upon Ronicky Doone.

  This decision heartened Ronicky still more. He had waited just outside the door, and now he stepped in, as Blondy swung down from the manger and came whistling toward the lantern. Certainly he was a magnificent man! The lantern threw a giant shadow behind him, blotching the far side of the almost empty haymow, and yet there was no need of shadows to exaggerate the size of those wide shoulders. He was as huge as two ordinary men rolled into one.