by Lou Cameron
Before the match went out, I seen a lot of junk over in a corner covered up with a tarpaulin, and when I was fixing to strike another match I heard men coming up the trail outside. So I quick clumb up the broken wall and laid on a ledge about ten feet up and listened.
From the sounds as they arriv at the cave mouth, I knowed it was two men on foot, running hard and panting loud. They rushed into the cave and made the turn, and I heard ’em fumbling around. Then a light flared up and I seen a lantern being lit and hung up on a spur of rock.
In the light I seen them two murderers, Bill and Jim, and they looked plumb dilapidated. Bill didn’t have no shirt on and the other’n was wearing just one boot and limped. Bill didn’t have no gun in his belt neither, and both was mauled and bruised, and scratched, too, like they’d been running through briars.
“Look here,” said Jim, holding his head which had a welt on it which was likely made by my fist. “I ain’t certain in my mind as to just what all has happened. Somebody must of hit me with a club some time tonight, and things is happened too fast for my addled wits. Seems like we been fightin’ and runnin’ all night. Listen, was we settin’ in the wagon-yard shack talkin’ peaceable, and did a grizzly b’ar bust through the wall and nigh slaughter us?”
“That’s plumb correct,” said Bill. “Only it warn’t no b’ar. It was some kind of a human critter—maybe a escaped maneyack. We ought to of stopped for our horses—”
“I warn’t thinkin’ ’bout no horses,” broke in Jim. “When I found myself outside that shack my only thought was to cover ground, and I done my best, considerin’ that I’d lost a boot and that critter had nigh unhinged my hind laig. I’d lost you in the dark, so I made for the cave, knowin’ you would come there eventually, and it seemed like I was forever gettin’ through the woods, crippled like I was. I’d no more’n hit the path when you come up it on the run.”
“Well,” said Bill, “as I went over the wagon-yard wall a lot of people come whoopin’ through the gate, and I thought they was after us, but they must of been after the feller we fought, because as I run I seen him layin’ into ’em right and left. After I’d got over my panic, I went back after our horses, but I run right into a gang of men on horseback, and one of ’em was that durned feller which passed hisself off as a cowboy. I didn’t need no more. I took out through the woods as hard as I could pelt, and they hollered. “There he goes!’ and come hot-foot after me.”
“And was them the fellers I shot at back down the trail?” asked Jim.
“Yeah,” said Bill. “I thought I’d shooken ’em off, but just as I seen you on the path, I heard horses comin’ behind us, so I hollered to let ’em have it, and you did.”
“Well, I didn’t know who it was,” said Jim. “I tell you, my head’s buzzin’ like a circle-saw.”
“Well,” said Bill, “we stopped ’em and scattered ’em. I dunno if you hit anybody in the dark, but they’ll be mighty cautious about comin’ up the trail. Let’s clear out.”
“On foot?” said Jim. “And me with just one boot?”
“How else?” said Bill. “We’ll have to hoof it till we can steal us some broncs. We’ll have to leave all this stuff here. We daren’t go back to Grizzly Claw after our horses. I told you that durned cowboy would do to watch. He ain’t no cowpoke at all. He’s a blame detective.”
“What’s that?” broke in Jim.
“Horses’ hoofs!” exclaimed Bill, turning pale. “Here, blow out that lantern! We’ll climb the ledges and get out of the cleft, and take out over the mountain where they can’t foller with horses, and then—”
It was at that instant that I launched myself offa the ledge on top of ’em. I landed with all my two hundred and ninety pounds square on Jim’s shoulders and when he hit the ground under me he kind of spread out like a toad when you step on him. Bill give a scream of astonishment and when I riz and come for him, he tore off a hunk of rock about the size of a man’s head and lammed me over the ear with it. This irritated me, so I taken him by the neck, and also taken away a knife which he was trying to hamstring me with, and begun sweeping the floor with his carcass.
Presently I paused and kneeling on him, I strangled him till his tongue lolled out, betwixt times hammering his head against the rocky floor.
“You murderin’ devil!” I gritted between my teeth. “Before I varnish this here rock with your brains, tell me why you taken my Uncle Jeppard’s scalp!”
“Let up!” he gurgled, being purple in the face where he warn’t bloody. “They was a dude travelin’ through the country and collectin’ souvenirs, and he heard about that sculp and wanted it. He hired me to go git it for him.”
I was so shocked at that cold-bloodedness that I forgot what I was doing and choked him nigh to death before I remembered to ease up on him.
“Who was he?” I demanded. “Who is the skunk which hires old men murdered so’s he can collect their scalps? My God, these Eastern dudes is worse’n Apaches! Hurry up and tell me, so I can finish killin’ you.”
But he was unconscious; I’d squoze him too hard. I riz up and looked around for some water or whiskey or something to bring him to so he could tell who hired him to scalp Uncle Jeppard, before I twisted his head off, which was my earnest intention of doing, when somebody said: “Han’s up!”
I whirled and there at the crook of the cave stood that cowboy which had spied on me in Grizzly Claw, with ten other men. They all had their Winchesters p’inted at me, and the cowboy had a star on his buzum.
“Don’t move!” he said. “I’m a Federal detective, and I arrest you for manufactorin’ counterfeit money.”
“What you mean?” I snarled, backing up to the wall.
“You know,” he said, kicking the tarpaulin off the junk in the corner. “Look here, men! All the stamps and dyes he used to make phony coins and bills! All packed up, ready to light out. I been hangin’ around Grizzly Claw for days, knowin’ that whoever was passin’ this stuff made his, or their, headquarters here somewheres. Today I spotted that dollar you give the barkeep, and I went pronto for my men which was camped back in the hills a few miles. I thought you was settled in the wagon-yard for the night, but it seems you give us the slip. Put the cuffs on him, men!”
“No, you don’t!” I snarled, bounding back. “Not till I’ve finished these devils on the floor. I dunno what you’re talkin’ about, but—”
“Here’s a couple of corpses!” hollered one of the men. “He kilt a couple of fellers!”
One of them stooped over Bill, but he had recovered his senses, and now he riz up on his elbows and give a howl. “Save me!” he bellered. “I confesses! I’m a counterfeiter, and so is Jim there on the floor! We surrenders, and you got to pertect us!”
“You’re the counterfeiters?” said the detective, took aback as it were. “Why, I was follerin’ this giant! I seen him pass fake money myself. We got to the wagon-yard awhile after he’d run off, but we seen him duck in the woods not far from there, and we been chasin’ him. He opened fire on us down the trail while ago—”
“That was us,” said Bill. “It was me you was chasin’. He musta found that money, if he had fake stuff. I tell you, we’re the men you’re after, and you got to pertect us! I demands to be put in the strongest jail in this state, which even this here devil can’t bust into!”
“And he ain’t no counterfeiter?” said the detective.
“He ain’t nothin’ but a man-eater,” said Bill. “Arrest us and take us out of his reach.”
“No!” I roared, clean beside myself. “They belongs to me! They scalped my uncle! Give ’em knives or gun or somethin’ and let us fight it out.”
“Can’t do that,” said the detective. “They’re Federal prisoners. If you got any charge against them, they’ll have to be indicted in the proper form.”
His men hauled ’em up and handcuffed ’em and started to lead ’em out.
“Blast your souls!” I raved. “Does you mean to pertect a couple of dirty scalpers?
I’ll—”
I started for ’em and they all p’inted their Winchesters at me.
“Keep back!” said the detective. “I’m grateful for you leadin’ us to this den, and layin’ out these criminals for us, but I don’t hanker after no battle in a cave with a human grizzly like you.”
Well, what could a feller do?
If I’d had my guns, or even my knife, I’d of taken a chance with the whole eleven, officers or not, I was that crazy mad. But even I can’t fight eleven .45-90’s with my bare hands. I stood speechless with rage whilst they filed out, and then I went for Cap’n Kidd in a kind of a daze. I felt wuss’n a horse-thief. Them fellers would be put in the pen safe out of my reach, and Uncle Jeppard’s scalp was unavenged! It was awful. I felt like bawling.
Time I got my horse back onto the trail, the posse with their prisoners was out of sight and hearing. I seen the only thing to do was to go back to Grizzly Claw and get my outfit, and then foller the posse and try to take their prisoners away from ’em someway.
Well, the wagon-yard was dark and still. The wounded had been carried away to have their injuries bandaged, and from the groaning that was still coming from the shacks and cabins along the street, the casualties had been plenteous. The citizens of Grizzly Claw must have been shook up something terrible, because they hadn’t even stole my guns and saddle and things yet; everything was in the cabin just like I’d left ’em.
I put on my boots, hat and belt, saddled and bridled Cap’n Kidd and sot out on the road I knowed the posse had taken. But they had a long start on me, and when daylight come I hadn’t overtook ’em. But I did meet somebody else. It was Tunk Willoughby riding up the trail, and when he seen me he grinned all over his battered features.
“Hey, Breck!” he said. “After you left I sot on that log and thunk, and thunk, and I finally remembered what Jack Gordon told me, and I started out to find you again and tell you. It was this: he said to keep a close lookout for a fellow from Grizzly Claw named Bill Jackson, which had gypped yore Uncle Jeppard in a deal.”
“What?” I said.
“Yeah,” said Tunk. “He bought somethin’ from Jeppard and paid him in counterfeit money. Jeppard didn’t know it was phony till after the feller had plumb got away,” said Tunk, “and bein’ as he was too busy dryin’ some b’ar meat to go after him, he sent word for you to git him.”
“But the scalp—” I said wildly.
“Oh,” said Tunk, “that was what Jeppard sold the feller. It was the scalp Jeppard took offa old Yeller Eagle the Comanche war-chief forty years ago, and been keepin’ for a souvenear. Seems like a Eastern dude heard about it and wanted to buy it, but this Jackson must of kept the money he give him to git it with, and give Jeppard phony cash. So you see everything’s all right, even if I did forget a little, and no harm did—”
And that’s why Tunk Willoughby is going around saying I am a homicidal maneyack, and run him five miles down a mountain and tried to kill him—which is a exaggeration, of course. I wouldn’t of kilt him if I could of caught him. I would merely of raised a few knots on his head and tied his hind laigs in a bow-knot around his fool neck and done a few other little things that might of improved his memory.
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