by Max Brand
He did not go in the daytime. He went after dark to the house of Duval. It was not by the gate onto the road that he approached, but from the side, cautiously squirming his way through the hedge of shrubbery now advancing with the season into big leaf.
He had tethered his new mare fully half a mile away for fear she would whinny as she approached her former home.
Once inside the hedge, he took careful account of his bearings. Before him were several fences, surrounding the corral and the straw stack, that leaned in a lop-sided manner toward the south, under the pressure of occasional north winds. Beyond the bars of the fences, he could see the lamplight shining through the window of the cabin, and as he was looking at it, striking across the field with a pleasant golden shaft, the marshal found himself unusually thoughtful and depressed. For he was remembering with an uncanny vividness the pale face and the gray, unflinching eye of the stranger of Moose Creek.
This state of mind did not last long. He went deliberately to the first fence, and slipped between the bars, crossed it, and was going through the straw stack enclosure, when the whistle of a quail from the hedge disturbed him.
He flattened himself against the straw stack and whirled, gun in hand, as though enemies were already charging upon him. But then he heard the call repeated, and a distinct, though soft, rustling of the foliage far behind him.
He analyzed the notes of the whistle with care, but it was the perfect call. Four short notes in a quick ripple, and after the last a slight break in the rhythm and the final touch.
Yet the marshal waited, to make surety doubly sure. He knew that he was now invisible, pressed as he was against the side of the stack. He felt the chaff work loose, and stream down inside his shirt collar, working deep against his skin. However, despite this discomfort, he remained for a long time in this manner, motionless. Then he started again for the house, but not in a straight line. He first got out of the straw-stack enclosure, and stole down toward the side of the horse shed, inside of which he heard the horse and the mule nosing at the sweet hay, and stamping in their content. From the shed he then angled up on a new course toward the cabin.
It was an unnecessary precaution, of course, but there was nothing that Richard Kinkaid was fonder of than needless precautions. The public, considering his achievements and regarding his mighty form, were prone to look upon him as a man who advanced headlong upon any difficulty and any danger. But, as a matter of fact, Kinkaid was apt to use the tactics of an Indian. He loved battle, but he saw no purpose in throwing away chances.
From a new line, therefore, he went on toward the house, all because a quail had been disturbed in the hedge behind him and given bobwhite’s familiar call. On this new line he went with a redoubled caution, stooping very low, so that no one would be apt to see him from any point of view against the radiance of the lighted window, no matter how dim. Creeping, now, he slipped toward the house, bending so low that he touched the ground before him with the tips of his fingers, and so explored it more accurately than with a light, to make sure that his following footfall would make no noise.
His attention was by no means confined to the house, to which he drew closer and closer, but now and again he paused and scanned everything around him, to either side and to the rear.
When he made these pauses, however, he could hardly have been expected to see the form that slid behind him and also paused, disappearing against the flat blackness of the ground by lying face down.
So the marshal went on until he was in touching distance of the house itself.
All was still inside, except for two sounds, each wonderfully faint, but perceptible by his keen ear. One was the singing of a kettle on the stove, and the other was the occasional soft crackle of paper, as though the pages of a large book were being turned. One of the two occupants was doubtless in bed — hence the lack of conversation. The other sat immersed in his book, allowing something to cook on the late fire.
Kinkaid stood up straight. He was now close against the wall of the house, so that his background would prevent him from being seen at more than a few paces. He stood up, and as he did so, something cold and very hard was laid against the back of his neck.
“Hoist your hands,” said the voice of Duval.
The marshal, for a moment, was speechless. He had faced vast dangers in his life, but this was unique in all his tales of war. In that first dreadful flash of apprehension, it seemed to him that he could hear Duval’s quietly regretful voice stating how the lurking form had approached his house, how he hailed, challenged, fired.... And so the end of famous Richard Kinkaid, obscurely shot.
He could not speak; he could only slowly obey the command.
“Wait a minute,” said Duval. “I see you’re hitched up to a gun. Unbuckle that belt, stranger, and do it slow...and don’t try to turn, because if you do, you’ll turn into a ghost. Salt that idea away, partner!”
“Duval,” began Kinkaid, “I’m Richard Kinkaid and....”
“And I’m Napoleon,” Duval declared pleasantly. “Sure. I understand. Let that belt drop, and the gun with it, or you’ll be Kinkaid no more!”
The marshal did not hesitate. The firm, cold pressure against the nape of his neck spoke to him in a more penetrating manner than words could ever do.
He unbuckled his gun belt, and the gun and the cartridges above it dropped with a solid thump to the ground. For the first time in his mature days, the famous marshal was unarmed.
“Now, we’ll have those hands up good and high,” said Duval. “Think what mamma told you. Stretch yourself and try to pick a star out of the sky, and sashay right around the house, and go in through the front door, big boy. Now, there, walk slow and easy, and don’t stumble if you love your life.”
Kinkaid neither argued nor protested. He followed these orders exactly as they were given. A man with a sense of humor might even have smiled, but Kinkaid did not smile. He rigidly held his hands above his head and marched slowly, solemnly in advance of his captor. There was only one thing that would have made him fight for his life against even these odds, and that was an audience. But since the soft hand of night had covered the eyes of the world, he was willing to submit. As for the story afterward, who would believe it of the great Dick Kinkaid?
He gained the door, and strode rather awkwardly into the room. Arrived at the exact center of it, he halted. His fingertips were touching the low ceiling, and willingly he would have pulled down that ceiling upon himself and his captor. Yet another thought came into his mind — the consternation of Duval when at last he should know who his prisoner was.
He heard Duval saying: “You can turn around, keeping your hands still resting on the ceiling, partner.”
The marshal turned slowly, as he had been ordered, and stood eye to eye with Duval.
The latter stared at him without amazement, with a keen and curious interest.
“Well, Kinkaid,” he said, “I can see that folks don’t do right by you, calling you a pretty stern and gloomy gent. Here I find you out playing hide-and-seek. Who were you playing with, Kinkaid? You can tell me while you put your hands down.”
The marshal lowered his hands, but his heart was not lightened. He did not answer, but looked at Duval in a great effort to learn how far the other would carry his point.
“Speaking personal,” said Duval, “I always liked to see a gent that would get out and join the kids and be jolly. But I couldn’t tell whether you was playing hide-and-seek, or sneaking up to rob a hen roost, or what. Robbing hen roosts was a favorite game of mine when I was a kid. Now, tell me, did you ever do it, Kinkaid?”
“Duval,” the marshal said gravely, “you’ve made a tolerable fool out of me. It’s up to me to tell you why I’m here, though, and I’ll do it. I’m here because I came for your hired man...Henry. Where is he?”
“Henry? You want Henry? Don’t tell me, Kinkaid, that you want to play hide-and-
seek with Henry, because he never could run fast enough to make you enjoy the game.”
“Are you gonna keep this up?” Kinkaid asked sourly. “D’you know who you’re talking to?”
“Why, Dick,” said Duval, “I guess that I’m pretty nigh the only man in Moose Creek that really knows you, and the playful way you got with you. Other folks wouldn’t hardly believe it possible that you’ve been up here and visited me and played hide-and-seek this way. And with old Henry, too. They’ll sure be a pile amused by that. Everybody from Pete the bartender to Marian Lane.”
The last name was a thrust at the very vitals of the marshal’s pride.
He swallowed hard. “Duval,” he said, “I aim to think that you’re gonna try to spread the news of this here around?”
“Why,” Duval said, “I wouldn’t think of talking about the game at all. I wouldn’t be dreaming of it. Because most likely all idea of it will drop out of my head. I’ll forget it, complete, and I’ll ask Henry if he won’t forget it, too.”
He whistled, imitating beautifully, the call of the quail chick, repeated it, and eventually there was the sound of a footstep outside the house. Henry appeared in the doorway, with an apprehensive look in his face.
“What d’you think, Henry?” said Duval. “The marshal’s been up here to play hide-and-seek with you. Like he wanted to tag you, only he got tagged first, and he was wondering if we could forget about it, if the marshal, say, was to forget about your bad finger.”
Henry started violently.
“By gravy!” the marshal said through his teeth. “It was the old man. What’re you trying to do, Duval? Blackmail me to keep me silent? You chump, I’ll have you both in jail before the world’s a day older.”
“Jail?” Duval said, flashing a smile at the larger man. “Why, that’d sure wake us up and make us talk, Kinkaid. I figure that everybody would be mighty interested, too, to hear about how Richard Kinkaid, he come slipping along in the dark, like he was after chickens on the roost....”
He chuckled, and Henry, suddenly understanding, smiled his crooked smile, his eyes gloating on the marshal.
“I see what you’re driving at,” Kinkaid said. “You think I’ll shut up sooner than have you talk. You jackass, what difference does it make to me what you say? Will people believe you against me?”
Duval took from behind his back the cartridge belt and the gun.
“Maybe they wouldn’t believe me,” he said, in a soothing voice. “And they’d think that I picked these up on the road, somewhere? Maybe they’d think that. A mighty disbelieving crowd we got around this here town of Moose Creek, old-timer.”
At this, as the full point of the remark came home to him, Kinkaid felt his soul shrivel like dead leaves. He was dizzy with rage, and with helplessness.
“I’ll tell you, son,” said Duval, “the fact is that you and me and Henry are all gonna be friends. I could sort of see it in you when I first clapped eyes on you. The sort of a gent that I’d like to have for a friend. What about you, Henry?”
“I like him right off,” Henry said, grinning enormously.
“The mare, too,” Duval said, and putting away his gun inside his coat with a swift gesture, he took out a wallet from which he extracted the $1,500 that the marshal had paid him for the horse that same morning. This he extended, with his left hand.
Kinkaid hesitated. It would be a simple thing to throw himself upon Duval — if only he could estimate the speed with which the latter might be able to get his gun out of his coat. Besides, there was old Henry looking grimly on, and the latter decided the marshal on passivity. He took the money that was offered to him.
“What’s it for?” he asked. “D’you want the mare back?”
“Wouldn’t dream of taking her back,” said Duval, “considering the price that you paid for her, but the fact is that you found out during the day that she wouldn’t stand up under your weight, and so that was why you come back here to see me. You wanted to know if I’d call the sale off. Wanted to know if I’d give you back the money and take the mare, instead. And Duval, being a kind of poor businessman and a mighty good fellow, he said sure, that he’d take the mare back, and look on today as though it never had happened.”
What Kinkaid saw, first of all, was the face of the girl in the store, that morning, as she had looked up to him with astonished excitement — she, his wife to be, helpmate, companion in arms, as it were. When she had seen that the mare belonged to him, it was as though she already saw Duval mastered and his problem and mystery solved.
That satisfaction would have to be surrendered. He saw all the advantages that he already had gained stripped away from him by this polite, cheerful, smiling Duval. And though he strove to struggle against him, he was held by a silken thread.
For he dared not allow Duval to go abroad and show the captured revolver. It was so well known — even the appearance of a new holster in place of the famous old brown and shiny one would cause infinite comment — and the gun itself, wedded to his hand these years, marked with nine small, regular, neat notches....
The marshal burst into a profuse perspiration.
“I know how it is,” Duval said sympathetically. “It’s a mighty big relief to get rid of a horse that you spent so much money for, after you find out that she really ain’t meant for you, as you might say. But you’re busy...you’re mighty busy, Kinkaid. I suppose you’ll want to be hurrying away? Can’t persuade you to stay here and have a bite of something to eat with us? No?”
Kinkaid gave no answer. Shame, rage, horror overwhelmed him, and he rushed out into the night.
Chapter Twenty-One
When the marshal had fled outdoors with his shame, Duval sat down in his chair, beside which, on the table, lay an open book, the leaves of which, rustled by the wind now and again, had made the comfortably domestic sound that had so lulled the last suspicions of Kinkaid in approaching the place.
“You knew he’d come,” Henry said, frowning from his station at the door. “I dunno how you worked that.”
“That’s simple. He wouldn’t have wanted the mare so badly if he hadn’t had some way of connecting her with the crime. He came for her. He got her out of me, and I hated parting with her worse than death. I hope she’ll be back soon.”
“You gave him the money,” Henry said, “but you paid him before you got the mare.”
“There’s no danger,” said Duval. “He might slip around with another gun, however, and shoot through the window....”
“Him?” Henry gasped, and jumped.
“No,” said Duval. “On second thought, I believe that he won’t attempt anything this evening. He’ll be contented to return the mare to me and....”
“Aye,” said Henry. “That’s what I thought when he went out. He’s finished, and he’s flat.”
“He is for the time being,” said Duval. “He’s no more than an Indian without a scalp.”
“What does that mean?”
“An Indian without a scalp never can get into the happy hunting grounds. But Kinkaid may come to life later on. He will come to life, in fact, and we’ll have more trouble with him.”
“Then let’s get out,” Henry said fervently. “If you’ve won one stake, what’s the use of bettin’ on every race that’s left on the program? Let’s go home, sir!”
“What’s home, then?”
“Any place on the wing. What’s home for the wild geese? Goin’ north or goin’ south. We better do the same way, eh?”
This suggestion Duval considered quietly for a time, and then he said: “I’ve had the same idea, Henry, but I don’t think that I can go yet. I have unfinished business....” He paused, here, and Henry watched him anxiously.
“The marshal knows,” Henry said, “and as long as the marshal knows, it won’t be long before other folks know, too. It’ll be in the air. And then we’re both cooked.”
Duval shook his head. “Kinkaid can’t talk...except to us. His mouth is shut.” He laughed with a sudden and fierce burst of pleasure. “The giant’s down on one knee, and I’m David.”
“He’s likely to get up and paste you when you’re standin’ around to crow,” Henry suggested sourly. “What should keep you on here, when you came here for safety and quiet, and now you’ve got neither of ’em?”
“I was getting so tired of safety, Henry, that I hated to open my eyes in the morning and look at the day coming. I was so weary of the good, quiet life, that I was almost delighted to see you come with the mare in one hand and blackmail in the other.”
Henry shrugged his lean shoulders as he replied: “I don’t know just how you’ve managed it, but you’ve kept me away from Kinkaid, and there’s no blackmail in my mind now, sir. When a man gets old, he’s apt to try bad lines. I’m through with that one.”
“Of course you are,” said Duval. “Tell me, Henry. Don’t you enjoy a time like this, when we can’t tell how luck may jump against us the next moment?”
“Ask a new man if he enjoys walkin’ a tight wire over Niagara, sir.”
“Of course he does, or he wouldn’t be there. D’you mean to tell me that you’re not an artist in your field?”
“What, sir?”
“D’you mean to tell me that you were talking through your hat when you said that the only thing you wanted was the fun and not the money? No, no. I understand you better than that. Here’s a chasm under our feet a thousand feet to the bottom. If we miss a step, we’re lost...and that’s why this is only the beginning of the greatest sport we’ve ever had.”
“I understand what you mean,” muttered Henry. “But I’ve got two hundred thousand up on this race, and I want to win.”
“Of course you do.”
“Rule that dark horse, that Kinkaid, out of it, and I don’t mind.”
