by Max Brand
CHAPTER XV
OLD GARY PETERS
For some moments after this Buck Daniels remained at the bar with hishand clenched around his glass and his eyes fixed before him in thepeculiar second-sighted manner which had marked him when he sat so longon the veranda.
"Funny thing," began O'Brien, to make conversation, "how many fellers gowest at sunset. Seems like they let go all holts as soon as the darkcomes. Hey?"
"How long before sunset now?" asked Buck Daniels sharply.
"Maybe a couple of hours."
"A couple of hours," repeated Daniels, and ground his knuckles acrosshis forehead. "A couple of hours!"
He raised his glass with a jerky motion and downed the contents; thechaser stood disregarded before him and O'Brien regarded his patron withan eye of admiration.
"You long for these parts?" he asked.
"No, I'm strange to this range. Riding up north pretty soon, if I canget someone to tell me the lay of the land. D'you know it?"
"Never been further north than Brownsville."
"Couldn't name me someone that's travelled about, I s'pose?"
"Old Gary Peters knows every rock within three day's riding. He keepsthe blacksmith shop across the way."
"So? Thanks; I'll look him up."
Buck Daniels found the blacksmith seated on a box before his place ofbusiness; it was a slack time for Gary Peters and he consoled himselffor idleness by chewing the stem of an unlighted corn-cob, whose bowlwas upside down. His head was pulled down and forward as if by theweight of his prodigious sandy moustache, and he regarded a vaguehorizon with misty eyes.
"Seen you comin' out of O'Brien's," said the blacksmith, as Buck tookpossession of a nearby box. "What's the news?"
"Ain't any news," responded Buck dejectedly. "Too much talk; no news."
"That's right," nodded Gary Peters. "O'Brien is the out-talkingest man Iever see. Ain't nobody on Brownsville can get his tongue around so manywords as O'Brien."
So saying, he blew through his pipe, picked up a stick of soft pine, andbegan to whittle it to a point.
"In my part of the country," went on Buck Daniels, "they don't lay muchby a man that talks a pile."
Here the blacksmith turned his head slowly, regarded his companion foran instant, and then resumed his whittling.
"But," said Daniels, with a sigh, "if I could find a man that knowedthe country north of Brownsville and had a hobble on his tongue I couldgive him a night's work that'd be worth while."
Gary Peters removed his pipe from his mouth and blew out his droppingmoustaches. He turned one wistful glance upon his idle forge; he turneda sadder eye upon his companion.
"I could name you a silent man or two in Brownsville," he said, "butthere ain't only one man that knows the country right."
"That so? And who might he be?"
"Me."
"You?" echoed Daniels in surprise. He turned and considered Gary as iffor the first time. "Maybe you know the lay of the land up as far asHawkin's Arroyo?"
"Me? Son, I know every cactus clear to Bald Eagle."
"H-m-m!" muttered Daniels. "I s'pose maybe you could name some of theoutfits from here on a line with Bald Eagle--say you put 'em ten milesapart?"
"Nothin' easier. I could find 'em blindfold. First due out they'sMcCauley's. Then lay a bit west of north and you hit the Circle KBar--that's about twelve mile from McCauley's. Hit 'er up dead northagain, by east, and you come eight miles to Three Roads. Go on to--"
"Partner," cut in Daniels, "I could do business with you."
"Maybe you could."
"My name's Daniels."
"I'm Gary Peters. H'ware you?"
They shook hands.
"Peters," said Buck Daniels, "you look square, and I need you in squaregame; but there ain't any questions that go with it. Twenty iron men forone day's riding and one day's silence."
"M'frien'," murmured Peters. "In my day I've gone three months withoutspeakin' to anything in boots; and I wasn't hired for it, neither."
"You know them people up the line," said Daniels. "Do they know you?"
"I'll tell a man they do! Know Gary Peters?"
"Partner, this is what I want. I want you to leave Brownsville inside often minutes and start riding for Elkhead. I want you to ride, and I wantyou to ride like hell. Every ten miles, or so, I want you to stop atsome place where you can get a fresh hoss. Get your fresh hoss and leavethe one you've got off, and tell them to have the hoss you leave readyfor me any time to-night. It'll take you clear till to-morrow night toreach Elkhead, even with relayin' your hosses?"
"Round about that, if I ride like hell. What do I take with me?"
"Nothing. Nothing but the coin I give you to hire someone at every stopto have that hoss you've left ready for me. Better still, if you canhave 'em, get a fresh hoss. Would they trust you with hosses that way,Gary?"
"Gimme the coin and where they won't trust me I'll pay cash."
"I can do it. It'll about bust me, but I can do it."
"You going to try for a record between Brownsville and Elkhead, eh? Gota bet up, eh?"
"The biggest bet you ever heard of," said Daniels grimly. "You can tellthe boys along the road that I'm tryin' for time. Have you got a fasthoss to start with?"
"Got a red mare that ain't much for runnin' cattle, but she's greasedlightnin' for a short bust."
"Then get her out. Saddle her up, and be on your way. Here's mystake--I'll keep back one twenty for accidents. First gimme a list ofthe places you'll stop for the relays."
He produced an old envelope and a stub of soft pencil with which hejotted down Gary Peters' directions.
"And every second," said Buck Daniels in parting, "that you can cut offyour own time will be a second cut off'n mine. Because I'm liable to beon your heels when you ride into Elkhead."
Gary Peters lifted his eyebrows and then restored his pipe. He spokethrough his teeth.
"You ain't got a piece of money to bet on that, partner?" he queriedsoftly.
"Ten extra if you get to Elkhead before me."
"They's limits to hoss-flesh," remarked Peters. "What time you ridin'against?"
"Against a cross between a bullet and a nor'easter, Gary. I'm goingback to drink to your luck."
A promise which Buck Daniels fulfilled, for he had need of even borrowedstrength. He drank steadily until a rattle of hoofs down the streetentered the saloon, and then someone came in to say that Gary Peters hadstarted out of town to "beat all hell, on his red mare."
After that, Buck started out to find Dan Barry. His quarry was not inthe barn nor in the corral behind the barn. There stood Satan and BlackBart, but their owner was not in sight. But a thought came to Buck whilehe looked, rather mournfully, at the stallion's promise of limitlessspeed. "If I can hold him up jest half a minute," murmured Buck tohimself, "jest half a minute till I get a start, I've got a rabbit'schance of livin' out the night!"
From the door of the first shed he took a heavy chain with the key inthe padlock. This chain he looped about the post and the main timber ofthe gate, snapped the padlock, and threw the key into the distance. Thenhe stepped back and surveyed his work with satisfaction. It would be apretty job to file through that chain, or to knock down those ponderousrails of the fence and make a gap. A smile of satisfaction came on theface of Buck Daniels, then, hitching at his belt, and pulling hissombrero lower over his eyes, he started once more to find Dan Barry.
He was more in haste now, for the sun was dipping behind the mountainsof the west and the long shadows moved along the ground with aperceptible speed. When he reached the street he found a steady drift ofpeople towards O'Brien's barroom. They came by ones and twos and idledin front of the swinging doors or slyly peeked through them and thenwhispered one to the other. Buck accosted one of those by the door andasked what was wrong.
"He's in there," said the other, with a broad and excited grin. "He's inthere--waitin'!"
And when Buck threw the doors wide he saw, at the farther end o
f thedeserted barroom, Dan Barry, seated at a table braiding a smallhorsehair chain. His hat was pushed far back on his head; he had hisback to the door. Certainly he must be quite unaware that allBrownsville was waiting, breathless, for his destruction. Behind the barstood O'Brien, pale under his bristles, and his eyes never leaving theslender figure at the end of his room; but seeing Buck he called withsudden loudness: "Come in, stranger. Come in and have one on the house.There ain't nothing but silence around this place and it's getting on mynerves."
Buck Daniels obeyed the invitation at once, and behind him, steppingsoftly, some of them entering with their hats in their hands and ontiptoe, came a score of the inhabitants of Brownsville. They lined thebar up and down its length; not a word was spoken; but every head turnedas at a given signal towards the quiet man at the end of the room.
