Casually Yeager sauntered over to the roulette table. A fat man in duck trousers—he was the agent for a firm of rifle manufacturers, Steve learned later—was bucking the wheel hard. In front of him lay a pile of gold-pieces and several stacks of chips. He was very red in the face from excitement and cocktails. The range-rider put a half-dollar on the red and won. He let it ride, won again, and shifted the chips to the black. Once more the goddess of luck favored him. He divided his pile. Half went on the red, the rest on the first number his eye caught. It happened to be seventeen. The croupier spun the wheel again. The ball whirled round, dipped down once or twice, and plumped into the compartment numbered seventeen.
"Enough's a-plenty. Here's where I cash in," announced Steve cheerfully.
He stuffed the bills carelessly into his pocket and strolled over to the faro table. Yeager had come on business, not for pleasure. He intended to play just enough to give a colorable reason for his presence.
His roving eye settled upon the poker table at the rear of the room. Five men were playing. Two were Mexicans, three white. Two of the Americans were dismissed from Steve's mind with a casual glance. They were negligible factors. The third had his back to the observer, but the figure had a slender, boyish trimness that spoke of youth. The Mexican sitting to his right was a square-built fellow of forty with a scar on the cheek running from mouth to ear. There was on his face a certain ugliness of expression, a furtive cruelty. That there was an understanding between him and the man opposite soon became apparent to Yeager. They cross-raised the boy, working together to mulct him of the pile of chips in front of him.
It was the Mexican who sat with his back to the wall that drew and held the cowpuncher's eye. He too was slender, not much past thirty, but with the youth long since stamped out of his face. Sleek and black, a dominant personality, he sat there warily as a rattlesnake, dark eyes gleaming from a masked, smiling countenance.
The boy was the pigeon, and it was the Mexicans that were plucking him. So much Steve learned within two minutes. He had cut his eye teeth at poker, and he saw at a glance that this was no game for a youngster. Quietly he moved a step or two closer along the wall. He observed the play without appearing to do so.
The tension of the game was relieved with casual conversation. The two negligibles, playing about even, contributed mostly to it. The bulky Mexican added his quota. The boy, a heavy loser, concealed his feelings under the bravado expected of a good sport.
They were playing jack pots with a stripped deck, the joker going as a fifth ace or to fill a straight or a flush. Several hands were dealt without any stayers. The slender Mexican was dealing when the sensation of the game was handed out.
One of the negligibles opened the pot. The bulky Mexican stayed.
In the slow, easy drawl of the Southwest the boy spoke. "Me, I reckon I'll have to tilt it. Got to protect your hand from these wolves, Dave." He pushed in a stack of blue chips.
The third American did not stay. It was now up to the dealer—his name, it appeared, was Ramon Culvera. After a moment's hesitation he measured a stack of blues by those the boy had put in the pot and added to it another pile of yellows. With a grunt of protest the older Mexican stayed. The man who had opened the pot dropped out.
"Enough's a-plenty. Me, I got no business trailing along with you hyenas," he explained.
"Different here," commented the boy. "My cards look good enough for another hike."
Culvera examined his hand carefully, met the raise, and picked up the deck.
The Mexican with the scar interposed. "But one moment, señor. Let us make it a good pot." He pushed in all the chips in front of him.
Yeager, standing against the wall, caught the swift flash of surprise in the eyes of the boy. He counted the chips of the Mexican and then his own. These he added to the small fortune in the center of the table.
"Call it. I'm fifty-three shy," he said in an even voice.
The range-rider knew without being told that this hand had been dealt from a cold deck for the express purpose of cleaning out the boy. From the tenseness of the lithe body, which had become, as it were, a coiled spring, he knew that the lad's suspicions were stirring to life.
The greedy little eyes of Culvera fastened on the boy. He made his first mistake. "How much you play back, Pheelip?"
The youngster answered. "I said a hundred bucks. I've got fifty-three in the pot now. That leaves forty-seven."
Culvera's raise was forty-seven dollars. The big Mexican shrugged. "Too steep for Jesus Mendoza." He threw his cards into the discard.
The boy who had been called Philip laid his cards face down on the table in front of him.
"Call it," he announced hoarsely. His eyes were fastened steadily on the nimble brown fingers of the dealer.
"Cards?" asked Culvera with an indolent lift of his eyebrows.
Philip hesitated. He had the nine, ten, and jack of clubs, the queen of hearts, and the joker. This counted as a king-high straight. Steve, standing back and to one side of him, guessed the boy's dilemma. Should he stand pat on his straight or discard the heart and draw to his straight flush? Culvera's play had shown great strength and would probably beat the pat hand. The lad took a chance and called for one card.
Culvera drew two. He left them lying on the table while he discarded leisurely.
"You're all in, Pheelip. It's a showdown. What you got?"
Philip had drawn the six of clubs. He spread his hand with a sweeping gesture. "All blue."
The Mexican shrugged. "Beats me unless I helped." He showed three eights, then faced the two cards he had drawn. The first was a king of diamonds, the second the fourth eight.
"Hard luck, Pheelip," he said, and all his teeth flashed in a friendly smile as he opened both arms to rake in the chips.
Philip sat silent, his mind seething with suspicions. Culvera had played his hand very strangely, unless—unless he had known that a fourth eight was waiting for him in the deck. The boy looked up, in time to catch a vanishing smile on the face of Mendoza.
"Just a moment, Ramon," he called sharply, covering the chips with his hands. "That play—it don't look good to me. A man don't play threes so strong as that."
Culvera still smiled blandly, though his eyes were very watchful. "Me, I have what you call a hunch, Pheelip."
Yeager took two steps forward. "You bet he did. Cold deck, kid. The other one is in his right-hand coat pocket."
The suavity went out of Culvera's face as a light does from a blown candle. Snarling, he rose from his seat and faced the cowpuncher.
"Liar! Cabrone!" he hissed, reaching for his gun.
Already the revolver of Mendoza was flashing in the air.
Like a streak Steve's arm swept up. Twice his revolver sounded. There was a crash of breaking glass from the incandescent lights. Yeager flung himself against the table and drove it against Culvera who reeled back against the wall and dropped his weapon. The sound of more shots, of men dodging their way to safety, of a sharp cry followed by groans, had trodden so swiftly on the heels of the range-rider's action that when he turned a moment later he saw in the semi-darkness a smoke-filled room in the confusion of chaotic movement.
Philip stood close to him, a smoking .38 in his hand, while Mendoza, clutching at his chair for support, sank slowly to the ground.
Close to the boy's ear spoke Steve. "Beat it. Make your getaway through that door. Meet me at Johanson's corral."
The boy plunged through the doorway into the darkness outside. Toward the exit after him backed the cowpuncher. Already scattered shots were being flung in his direction, but the dim light served him well. The last thing he saw before he vanished through the door was Culvera groping for his weapon.
* * *
CHAPTER VII
STEVE TELLS TOO MUCH TRUTH
Yeager ducked into the night. From the door through which he had just come bullets spat aimlessly. He crouched as he ran, dodging in zigzag little rushes. Voices pursued him, fierce a
nd threatening. Men poured from the gambling-house as seeds are squirted from a squeezed lemon.
Into a vacant lot behind a store Steve swerved, finding shelter among some empty drygoods boxes. He was none too soon, for as he sank to cover, the rush of feet padded down the sidewalk. Stealthily he crept to the fence, vaulted it lightly, and found a more secure hiding-place in the lumber yard beyond. From the top of a pile of two by fours he watched, every sense alert to catch any warning of danger.
Soon his pursuers returned in little groups to their interrupted games. Now that the first excitement of the chase was over, few of them wanted to risk a battle with desperate men in the dark. That was what the rurales and the rangers were for.
The cowpuncher slid down cautiously and left the lumber yard by way of the alley in the rear. He followed a barb-wire fence which bounded a pasture, and at the next corner crossed the street warily into United States territory. By alleys and back ways his feet took him to Johanson's stable. Noiselessly he crept toward it from the rear. Some one was inside saddling a horse. So much he could gather from the sounds. Was it Phil? Or was it some one getting ready for the pursuit? He moved a step nearer. A stick cracked beneath his foot.
The man saddling the bronco whirled, revolver in hand. "Who is it?" demanded a tense voice.
"All right, Phil." Steve moved forward, breathing easier. "Glad you made it. We'd better light a shuck out of here. They'll stir up the rurales to get after us, I reckon."
Already he was busy saddling Four Bits.
"Do you ... do you think I killed him?" jerked out the boy, a strangled sob of over-strained emotion in his throat.
"Don't know. He was asking for it, wasn't he?" answered Yeager in a matter-of-fact voice. He did not intend by an expression of sympathy to aid in any breakdown here. That could come later when they had put many miles between them and Arixico.
They led their horses out of the stable and swung to the saddles not a minute too soon. A man came running toward them.
"Hold on," he called. "Just a moment. I'm the sheriff. They say a man has been killed."
The fugitives put spurs to their broncos. The animals jumped to a canter. Over his shoulder Steve looked back. The sheriff was standing undecided. Before it penetrated his brain that these were the men he wanted they were out of range.
For a time they rode in silence except for the clicking of the hoofs. Yeager turned, his hand on the rump of his pony.
"Don't hear anything of them. We've made a clean getaway, looks like. But they'll keep the wires warm after us—if Mendoza is dead."
The boy broke down, sobbing. "My God, I couldn't help it. What else could I do? He was shooting when I fired."
"Sure he was, but that won't help you if they take you back to Mexico. My advice is for you to get into a hole and draw it in after you, for a few days anyhow. Where do you live?"
"At Los Robles—when I'm at home."
"Then you are Phil Seymour?"
"Who told you?" flashed the boy.
"I board with your mother. I'm a rider for the Lunar Company."
"Then you know Chad Harrison. Chad will get me out of this. He'll fix it."
"How'll he fix it?" demanded Yeager bluntly. "Back there across the line they're going to call this by an ugly name—if Mendoza cashes in his checks. Harrison can't fix murder, can he?"
A film of hard wariness covered the eyes of the boy as he looked across in the darkness at the other man. "He's got friends," was the dry, noncommittal answer that came to the range-rider after a moment's distinct pause.
Yeager asked no more questions. There had been a "No trespass" sign in Phil's manner. But as they rode silently toward Los Robles Steve's mind groped again with the problem of Harrison's relation to those in power across the border. Was the man tied up with old Pasquale? Or was he an agent of the Huerta Government? Just now the Federals had control of this part of the border. Did the boy mean that it was among them that Harrison had friends? It looked that way, and yet—The cowpuncher could not get it out of his head that the stolen cattle had been for old Pasquale. Huerta's lieutenants were too wary to stock their pantry from the United States in that fashion.
They rode into Los Robles in the first gray stirrings of dawn, long before anybody in the little town was afoot.
"Where are you going to hide? First place they'll look for you will be at home," suggested Yeager.
"There's a haystack out in the Lunar pastures. I'll lay low there. Tell Chad when you see him, and have Ruth fix me up something to eat."
They parted, each of them to get in what sleep was possible before day. When Steve was awakened by the sound of some one stirring in the next room it seemed as though he had been in bed only a few minutes.
He walked up to the hotel before breakfast and saw Harrison as the actor was going into the dining-room. The big man stopped in his tracks and shot out a heavy jaw at him.
"Thought you was giving our eyes a rest for a while," he growled.
Yeager declined to exchange compliments with him. "There's a friend of yours on the haystack in the pasture. He wants to see you soon as it's convenient."
The eyes of the pugilist narrowed. "Put a name to him."
"Phil Seymour."
"What's he doing here?" demanded Harrison blackly.
"Perhaps you'd better ask him." Steve turned on his heel and walked back to his boarding-house.
His arrival at the breakfast table was greeted with a chorus of exclamations. What was he doing back so soon? Had he got homesick? Had he run out of money already?
He let them worm out of him that he had ridden away and forgotten his purse and that upon discovering this he had come back for the supplies of war. They joked him unmercifully, even Daisy,—who was manifestly incredulous about his explanation,—and he accepted their hilarious repartee with the proper amount of sheepish resentment.
After the meal was over he lingered to see Ruth, who had just sat down to eat.
"Can I see you alone, Miss Ruth?"
She flashed a quick look at him, doubtful and apprehensive. "In the pergola, almost right away."
The girl reached the vine-draped entrance of the pergola shortly after Yeager. Manifestly her fears had been growing in the interval since he had left her.
"What is it?" And swift on the heels of that, "Is it about Phil?"
"Yes."
"He's in trouble ... again?" she breathed.
He nodded assent. "The boy's out in the pasture. He wants you to send him breakfast."
The dread that was always lying banked in the hearts of herself and her mother found voice. "What has he done now?"
The range-rider chose his words carefully. "There was some trouble—just across the border. He had to shoot ... and a man fell."
Her face mirrored terror. "You mean ... dead?"
"I don't know," he answered gravely.
"Tell me all about it, please,—the circumstances, everything."
"He will tell you himself. I'll just say this—the shooting was forced on him. He fired in self-defense."
She wrung her hands. "I knew ... I knew something dreadful would happen. Mr. Harrison promised me—he said he would look out for Phil."
Steve looked her straight in the eyes. "Harrison's a crook. He's been using your love for Phil as a lever. It's up to you and the boy to shake him off."
A swift, upblazing anger leaped to her face. "How dare you say that! How dare you!"
His blue eyes met her dark, stormy ones quietly and steadily. "I'm telling you the truth. Can't you see he's been leading Phil into deviltry? You're afraid of him, afraid of his influence over the boy. That's why you knuckle down to him."
"I'm not afraid. He's Phil's friend. You're against him just because he—he—"
"Say it, Miss Ruth. Just because he gave me the whaling of my young life. Nothing to that, nothing a-tall. My system can absorb a licking without bearing a grudge. But he ain't on the level. 'Course you'll hate me for saying it, but some one's got to t
ell you."
"It's none of your business. I dare say it was you that was with Phil when he—when he—got into trouble."
"Yes."
"I thought so." A sob swelled up in her throat. "You come here and make trouble. I do hate you if you want to know."
With that she turned tempestuously and went flying back to the house.
Steve smiled ruefully. He did not know much about women, but he had read somewhere that they were capable of injustice. She had plenty of spirit, anyhow, for all that she looked so demure and shy.
* * *
CHAPTER VIII
THE HEAVY GETS HIS TIME
Threewit came to Steve while Cummings was preparing the stage set for a dissolve.
"Wish you'd look over this scenario, Yeager. The old man sent it out to me to see if we can pull off the riding end of it. Scene twenty-seven is the sticker. Here's the idea: You've been thrown from your horse and your foot's caught in the stirrup. You draw your gat to shoot the bronch and it's bumped out of your hand as you're dragged over the rough ground. See? You save your life by wriggling your foot out of your boot. Can it be done without taking too many chances?"
The rider considered. "I reckon it could if a fellow's boot was fixed so he could slip his foot out at the right time. I'll take a whirl at it."
"There's another scene where you save Maisie by jumping from your horse to a wild steer that's pursuing her. You'll have to twist its head and throw the brute after you straddle it."
"All right. When you want to pull it off?"
"We can do the stirrup one to-day, before you go—if you still want to go."
"Got an answer yet from Arixico?"
"Just got it. Mendoza's still alive, but mighty badly hurt. I've sent the kid out to the animal farm. He'll lie low, and they won't find him there."
"I'm still curious about that bunch of cattle we lost. If you can spare me I'll run down and see if old Pasquale hasn't got 'em. It ain't likely we'll ever get hide or hair of 'em, but there's one thing I'd like to find out."
Steve Yeager Page 5
