Just a touch of pause, then the other replied through a yawn: "Sure, I
got 'em on. Had to get up in the night, and I was too plumb sleepy to
take 'em off again when I come back."
"Ah," said Andrew, "I see."
He stepped to the door into the horse shed and paused; there was no
sound. He opened the door and stepped in quickly. Both horses were on
the ground, asleep, but he took the gelding by the nose, to muffle a
grunt as he rose, and brought him to his feet. Then, still softly and
swiftly, he lifted the saddle from its peg and put it on its back. One
long draw made the cinches taut. He fastened the straps, and then went
to the little window behind the horse, through which had come the vague
and glimmering light by which he did the saddling. Now he scanned the
trees on the edge of the clearing with painful anxiety. Once he thought
that he heard a voice, but it was only the moan of one branch against
another as the wind bent some tree. He stepped back from the window and
rubbed his knuckles across his forehead, obviously puzzled. It might be
that, after all, he was wrong. So he turned back once more toward the
main room of the cabin to make sure. Instead of opening the door softly,
as a suspicious man will, he cast it open with a sudden push of his
foot; the hulk of Hank Rainer turned at the opposite door, and the big
man staggered as though he had been struck.
It might have been caused by his swift right-about face, throwing him
off his balance, but it was more probably the shock that came from
facing a revolver in the hand of Andrew. The gun was at his hip. It had
come into his hand with a nervous flip of the fingers as rapid as the
gesture of the card expert.
"Come back," said Andrew. "Talk soft, step soft. Now, Hank, what made
you do it?"
The red hair of the other was burning faintly in the moonlight, and it
went out as he stepped from the door into the middle of the room, his
finger tips brushing the ceiling above him. And Andrew, peering through
that shadow, saw two little, bright eyes, like the eyes of a beast,
twinkling out at him from the mass of hair.
"When you went after the shells for me, Hank," he stated, "you gave the
word that I was here. Then you told the gent that took the message to
spread it around--to get it to Hal Dozier, if possible--to have the men
come back here. You'd go out, when I was sound asleep, and tell them
when they could rush me. Is that straight?"
There was no answer.
"Speak out! I feel like shovin' this gun down your throat, Hank, but I
won't if you speak out and tell me the truth."
Whatever other failings might be his, there was no great cowardice in
Hank Rainer. His arms remained above his head and his little eyes
burned. That was all.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account