The Forfeit

by Ridgwell Cullum

  CHAPTER VIII

  JEFF CLOSES THE BOOK

  Ju Penrose was a mild sort of sun-worshipper. But he confined hisregard to the single blessings of light and warmth. Some of hisdeity's idiosyncrasies were by no means blessings in his estimation.He blamed the sun for the flies. He blamed it that it made necessarythe adoption of light cotton shirts, which required frequent washing.He, furthermore, blamed it for the temperature of drinks in summertime, in a place where no ice was procurable. This he regarded aswholly unfair. Then, too, possessing something of an artistic eye, hefailed to appreciate the necessity for changing the delicate hues ofnature in spring to a monotonous summer tone by the overbearing processof continuing its spring blessing _ad nauseam_. And as for winter, itwas perfectly ridiculous to turn off its "hot" tap when it was mostneeded. Yes, there were moments when he certainly felt that he couldorder matters far more pleasantly if he were given a free hand.

  Still, just now winter was a long way off. So that did not trouble himgreatly as he lounged in his doorway, and reposefully contemplated theruddy noonday light which was endeavoring to lend picturesqueness to ascene which, he assured himself, was an "everlastin' disgrace an' stainon the lousy pretensions of a museum of bum human intellec's." He wasreferring to the rest of the buildings which comprised the township, asapart from his own "hotel." The word "saloon" had been struck out ofhis vocabulary, except for use in scornful depreciation of all otherenterprises of a character similar to his own.

  Just now he was chewing the cud, and, incidentally, a wad of tobacco,of a partial peace. He felt that the recent break up of the Lightfootgang, so successfully achieved through the agency of hangings andshootings, should certainly contribute to his advantage. He arguedthat the long-endured threat against Orrville removed, money shouldautomatically become easier, and, consequently, a considerable vista ofhis own personal prosperity opened out before his practical imagination.

  Yes, Ju was undoubtedly experiencing a certain mild satisfaction. Butsomehow his ointment was not without taint. He detected a fly in it.And he hated flies--even in ointment.

  To understand Ju's feelings clearly one must appreciate the fact thathe loved dollars better than anything else in the world. And somethinghe hated with equal fervor was to see their flow diverted into anyother channel than that of his own pocket. Ten thousand of thesedelectable pieces of highly engraved treasure had definitely flowedinto some pocket unknown, as a result of the Lightfoot gang episode.The whole transaction he felt was wicked, absolutely wicked. Whatright had any ten thousand dollars to drift into any unknown pocket?Known, yes. That was legitimate. It always left an enterprisingindividual the sporting chance of dipping a hand into it. But theother was an outrage against commercialism. Why, if that sort of thingbecame the general practice, "how," he asked himself, "was an honesttrader to live?"

  The enquiry was the result of extreme nervous irritation, and hescratched at the roots of his beard in a genuine physical trouble ofthat nature.

  He was so engrossed upon his meditations that he entirely failed toobserve some mounted strangers debouch upon the market-place from thewestern end of the township. Nor was it until they obstructed his viewthat he awoke to their presence. Then he became aware of two men ontwo horses, leading two pack ponies.

  He scrutinized them narrowly without shifting his position, and, longbefore they reached him, he decided they were strangers.

  They dismounted in silence and without haste. They went round theirhorses and loosened cinchas. Then they tied the four beasts to thetie-posts in front of the saloon.

  They approached the saloon-keeper. The larger of the two surveyed theunmoved Ju with steady eyes. Then he greeted him in deep, easy tones.

  "Howdy," he said. "You run this shanty?"

  The reflection upon his business house was not lost upon its proprietor.

  "Guess I'm boss of this--hotel."

  "Ah--hotel." Bud's gaze wandered over the simple structure. Itsettled for a moment upon a certain display of debris, bottles, cases,kegs, lying tumbled at an angle of the building. Then it came back toJu's hard face, and, in passing, it swept over the weather-boarding ofthe structure which was plastered thick with paint to rescue it fromthe ravages of drip from the shingle roof to which there was noguttering. "Then I guess we'll get a drink."

  By a curious movement Ju seemed to fall back from his position andbecome swallowed up by the cavity behind him. And Bud and hiscompanion moved forward in his wake.

  The place was entirely empty of all but the reek of stale tobacco, andthe curious, pungent odor of alcohol. The two customers loungedagainst the shabby bar in that attitude which bespoke saddle weariness.Ju stood ready to carry out their orders, his busy, enquiring mindsearching for an indication of the strangers' identity.

  "Rye?" he suggested amiably, testing, in his own fashion, their quality.

  But these men displayed no enthusiasm.

  "Got any lager?" demanded Bud. "A long lager, right off the ice."

  "Ice?" There was every sort of emotion in the echo of the word as thesaloon-keeper glanced vengefully across at a window through which thesun was pouring. "Guess we don't grow ice around these parts, 'cep'when we don't need it, an' I don't guess the railroad's discovered theyhatched Orrville out yet. We got lager in soak, an' lager by the keg,down in a cool celler. Ef these things ain't to your notion I don'tguess you need the lager I kep."

  "We'll have the bottled stuff in soak. Long."

  "Ther's jest one size. Ef that don't suit, guess you best duplicate."

  There was no offense in Ju's manner. It was just his cold way ofplacing facts before his customers, when they were strangers.

  He uncorked the bottles and set them beside the long glasses, andwaited while Bud poured his out. Then he accepted the price and madechange. Jeff silently poured out his and raised it to his lips.

  "How, Bud."

  "How."

  The two men drank and set down their half-emptied glasses.

  The sharp ears of the saloon-keeper had caught the name "Bud," and henow stood racking his fertile brains to place it. But the stranger'sidentity entirely escaped him.

  "Been times around here, ain't ther'?" Bud remarked casually.

  And Ju promptly seized the opportunity.

  "Times? Sure. Say, I guess you don't belong around. Jest passin'thro'?"

  Bud nodded. Jeff had moved off toward the window, where he stoodgazing out. The saloon-keeper's gaze followed him.

  "Why, yes. We're passin' through," returned Bud, without hesitation."You see, we belong down south in the 'T.T.' an' 'O----' country."

  "That so?" Ju reached a box of cigars and thrust them at the newcustomer. "Smoke?" he enquired. His generosity was by no meansuncalculated.

  Bud helped himself, and in response to Ju's "Your friend?" he calledacross to Jeff at the window. But Jeff shook his head, and thesaloon-keeper was given an opportunity of studying his set features,and the premature lines he saw graven upon them. He withdrew the boxand turned his attention to the more amenable Bud.

  "It's a swell country down your ways," he observed cordially. Then headded, "You ain't been cussed with a gang o' toughs raidin' stock,neither, same as we have fer the last fi' years. But they're out. Oh,yes, they're sure out. Yes, siree, you guessed right. Ther's surebeen some play around here. As neat a hangin' as I've see inthirty-five year tryin' to figger out the sort o' sense stewin' in thethink tanks o' the crazy guys who live in cities an' make up po'tryabout grass. Mebbe you've heard all the play?"

  Bud shook his head. He drank up his lager, and took the opportunity ofglancing over his glass at Jeff's back. Then he set his glass down andordered another bottle for both of them.

  "No," he observed. "I ain't heard much. I heard there's been somehangin'. The Lightfoot gang, eh? Seems to me I've heard talk of 'emdown our way. So you boys here got in on 'em?"

  Ju set the two fresh bottles on the counter while Bud lit his ci
gar.

  "That's so," he said with appreciation, and propped his folded armsupon the bar. "It sort o' come sudden, too." He smiled faintly. "Itcome as I said it would right here in this bar. The boys was settin'around sousing, an' pushin' round the cyards, an' the VigilanteCommittee was settin' on a pow-wow. I was tellin' 'em ef the folks hadthe sense of a blind louse they'd dope out a reward, an' make it big.I guessed they'd get the gang quick that way. Y'see, it don't matterwho it is, folks is all after dollars--if there's only enough of 'em.Life's jest made up of two sorts o' guys, the fellers with dollars an'them without. Wal, I guess it's a sort o' play goes right on all thetime. You just raise hell around till you get 'em, the other fellersraise hell till you ain't. It's a sort o' give and take, though Ireckon the taking seems to be the general scheme adopted. That's howit comes Lightfoot an' his gang got a nasty kink in most o' theirnecks. It's them dollars. Some wise guy around here jest took himselfby the neck and squeezed out a present of ten thousand dollars to thefeller who'd sell up Lightfoot's good-will an' business. Whathappened? Why, it took jest about twenty-four hours for thetransaction to be put through. Say, ever hear tell of a time whenther' wa'an't some feller waiting ready to grab on to ten thousanddollars? No, sir. You never did. No, nor no one else, 'cep' he spentthe whole of his life in the foolish house."

  "Some one betrayed 'em--for ten thousand dollars?"

  Bud's question came with a sharp edge to it.

  "Don't guess 'betray's' the word, mister. It was jest a commercialtransaction. You jest need to get a right understanding of themthings. When I got something to sell, an' you're yearnin' to dope outthe dollars for it--say ten thousand of 'em--why, I don't guess there'sanything else to it but a straight business proposition."

  "So you netted the ten thousand?" enquired Bud, in his simplest fashion.

  "Me? Gee! Say, if them ten thousand dollars had wafted my way I'dhave set this city crazy drunk fer a week. No, sir," he added, with acoldly gloomy shake of the head. "That's jest about the pain I'msufferin' right now. Some mighty slick aleck's helped hisself to themdollars, an' I don't know who--nor does anybody else, 'cep' him whopaid 'em."

  Bud realized the man's shameless earnestness, but passed it by. He wasseeking information. It was what he and Jeff had come for. The mannerof this man was coldly callous, and he knew that every word he utteredwas a lash applied to the bruised soul of the man by the window.Irresistible sympathy made him turn about.

  "Here's your lager, Jeff," he said, in his easiest fashion. He had nodesire that Ju should be made aware of the trouble that Jeff waslaboring under.

  Jeff replied at once. His readiness and even cheerfulness of mannersurprised Bud. But it relieved him as well.

  "Bully!" he cried, as he came back to the bar. "I was just gettin' alook around at the--city." He turned to Ju with his shadowy smilewhich almost broke Bud's heart. "Quite a place, eh?"

  "Place? Wal, it's got points I allow. So's hell ef you kin look at itright." Ju lit a cigar and hid nearly half of it in his capaciousmouth. "I'd say," he went on, with a certain satisfaction, "ther'smore mush-headed souses in this lay out to the square yard than I'veever heard tell of in any other city. Ef it wa'an't that way Icouldn't see myself wastin' a valuable life lookin' at grass, hearin'talk of grass, smellin' grass, an' durned nigh eatin' grass. I tellyou right here it takes me countin' my legs twice a day to keep me fromthe delusion I got four, an' every time I got to shake my head at somehaf soused bum who's needin' credit I'm scared to death my blamedears'll start right in flappin'. Why, yes, I guess it's some place--ifyou don't know no other."

  Bud was eager to get to the end of the task he had assumed for hisfriend. He wanted the facts, all the facts as far as they wereavailable, of the terrible enactments in that valley of his early youth.

  "An' who antied the price?" he demanded.

  "Who? Why, the President of the Western Union Cattle Breeders'Association--Dug McFarlane."

  "And you don't know who--accepted it?"

  It was Jeff who put the question, and Bud, looking on, saw the steelygleam that lit the man's eyes as he spoke.

  But Ju's amiability was passing. He was getting tired of a subjectwhich dealt with another man's profit. He rolled his cigar across hismouth.

  "Here. Guess I best tell you the yarn as we know it. Y'see," he addedregretfully, "we ain't learned a heap 'cep' jest the racket of it. Dugset up the reward overnight. Next night twenty-five of the boys rodeout with him to the hills. Ther' was some guy with 'em leadin'. Butnone of the boys come up with him. He rode with Dug. We've allguessed, but I don't reckon we know, or'll ever know. You see, he gotshot up they say by Lightfoot himself. However, it don't signify. Igot my notions 'bout it, an' anyway I guess they're jest my own. Theboys guess it was one of the gang itself. Mebbe it was. Can't rightlysay. After they'd located the camp they set out to surround it. Itwas in a bluff. The scrap started right away, an' there was a deal o'shootin'. One or two o' the boys got shot up bad. Then some one firedthe bluff, an' burned 'em right out like a crowd of gophers. Afterthat the scrap came good an' plenty, an' it seems to've lasted nigh anhour. Anyways, they got three of 'em. They shot up several others,an' not more than three got clear away."

  "An' what about Lightfoot?" It was Bud who spoke. His voice waschanged from its usual deep tone. It was sharp, and almost impatient.

  "They got him," said Ju, with a delight so evident that Bud felt likekilling him for it. "Oh, yes, they got him, sure. A dandy gent withhis blue eyes an' curly, tow hair. They don't guess that's his rightname tho'. But it don't signify. He was the boss all right, allright, an' they took him, an' hanged him with the other two, right outof hand. Gee, I'd have give a deal to have seen----"

  "We'll have to be pushing on now, Bud."

  Jeff spoke with his head bent, examining the face of his goldtimepiece. Bud glanced at him. He could see the ghastly hue of theaverted features, and his answer came on the instant.

  "You git the ponies cinched up, Jeff," he said quickly. "I'll be rightwith you."

  Ju watched Jeff hurry out of the bar. Then his eyes came searchinglyback to Bud's grimly set face.

  "Kind o' seems in a hurry, don't he?" he demanded, with a curious lookin his hard eyes. "Looks sick, too. Say, I didn't git his name right.Mebbe he's traveling around incog.--ain't that the word?"

  There was no mistaking the suggestion in the man's half-smiling,half-sneering manner. The ranchman understood it only too well. Heunderstood most of the ways and expressions of the men of the prairie.The hot blood surged under his calm exterior. His gray eyes, soaccustomed to smiling, snapped dangerously. But his reply came withthe same ease which he had displayed most of the time.

  "Wal, I don't guess ther's no myst'ry 'bout either of us, which youkind o' seem you'd like to think. Jeff Masters of the 'O----'s' iswell enough known to most folks, who got any sort o' knowledge of theseparts. An' ther's quite a few folks around here, including DugMcFarlane, li'ble to remember the name of Bud Tristram, of the'T.T.'s.' But you're sure right in guessin' he's in a hurry to quit.Ther's some places, an' some folks, it ain't good to see a heap of.Ther's fellers with minds like sinks, an' others with natures likerattlers. Neither of them things is as wholesome as a Sunday-school, Iallow. Jeff ain't yearnin' to explore no sinks, human or any other.An' I've generally noticed his favorite pastime is killin' rattlers.So it's jest about the only thing to do--quit this saloon, same as I'mgoin' to do. But say, 'fore I go I'd jest like to hand you this.Justice is justice, an' we all need to take our dope when it comes ourway. But ther' ain't no right on this blamed earth fer any feller towhoop it up at another feller's misdoin's, an' his ultimate undoin'.An' you kin take it how you fancy when I say only the heart of a lousecould feel that-a-way--an' that's about the lowest I know how to handyou."

  Bud's eyes were shining dangerously. They were squarely looking intothe hard face of the saloon-keeper. Not the movement of an eyelidescaped h
im. He literally seemed to devour the unwholesome pictureconfronting him. The aggressive chin beard, the continual masticationof the cigar which protruded from the corner of the mouth. There wasdeadly fury lurking behind Ju's cruel eyes. But the looked-forphysical display was withheld, and Bud finally turned and walked slowlyout of the bar.

  * * * * * *

  It was some minutes since a word had passed between the two men. Jeffhad nothing to say, and Bud's sympathy was too deep for words. He waswaiting for the younger man to fight his battle to its logical end. Heknew, only too well, all that Jeff had suffered since the moment ofthat gruesome discovery in the Cathills valley. It had been no figureof speech when Jeff had described his twin brother as part of himself.The shock the man had received was, to Bud's mind, as though his hearthad been torn asunder. Hanged as a cattle thief! Was there anythingmore dire, more terrible in the imagination of man than to suddenlyfind that his well-loved brother, twin body of his own, was a cattlethief, possibly a murderer, and had been hanged by his fellow-men? Itwas a thought to leave the simple Bud staggered. And for the victim ofthe shock it might well mean the mental breaking point.

  Jeff was fighting out his battle with an almost super-human courage.Bud knew that. It was written in every detail of his attitude. In thestraining of his blue eyes, in the deep knitting of his fair strongbrows, in the painful lines ploughing deeper and deeper about hismouth, and the set of his strong jaws.

  No. There was no thought of breaking in upon the boy's black momentsof suffering. He must fight his own battle now, once and for all.When victory had been achieved, then perhaps his sympathy might becomehelpful. But till then nothing but the necessities of their journeymust be allowed to intrude between them.

  So they rode over the southern trail. The noontide sun scorched theparching earth with a blistering heat, drinking up the last moisturewhich the tall prairie grass sought to secrete at its attenuated roots.The world about them was unchanged. Every scene was similar in itscharacteristics to all that which had become their lives. Yet Bud knewthat for one of them, at least, the whole of life, and everythingpertaining to it, had been completely and terribly distorted.

  But the character of Jeffrey Masters was stronger and fiercer than Budknew. For all his suffering there was no yielding in him. There hadbeen moments when his soul had cried out in agony. There had beenmoments when the hideousness of his weak brother's fall had driven himto the verge of madness. But with each yielding to suffering had comea rally of passionate force that would not be overborne, and graduallymastery supervened.

  Ten miles out of Orrville on the homeward journey Bud received hisfirst intimation that the battle was waning. It came almost as ashock. They had passed a long stretch of flat grass-land, and werebreasting an incline. Jeff, on the lead, had reined his horse down toa walk. In a moment they were riding abreast, with Bud's pack pony inbetween them. Jeff turned his bloodshot eyes upon his friend, thenthey turned again to the trail.

  "There's nothing now, Bud, but to get ahead with all our plans andschemes," he said. "We must drive ahead without any looking back.There's still things in life, I guess, that's worth while, and I'd saynot the least of 'em is--work."

  He paused. He had been gazing straight ahead to disguise his effort.Now he turned and looked into the face of his friend, and thrust hishat back on his head.

  "It's been tough, Bud. So tough I don't know how I got through. GuessI shouldn't have without you. You see, Bud, you never said a thing,and--and that saved me. Guess I'm sort of tired now. Tired ofthinking, tired of--everything. But it's over, and now I sort of feelI've got to get busy, or I'll forget how to play the man. I don'tguess I'll ever hope to forget. No, I don't want to forget. Icouldn't, just as I couldn't forget that there's some one in the worldtook ten thousand dollars as the price of Ronny's poor foolish life.Oh, it's pretty bad," he sighed wearily. "But--I've closed the book,Bud, and please God I'll never open it again."