STRATEGY
Racey Dawson and Rack Slimson, rising a hill on the way to Farewell,
simultaneously turned their heads and looked at each other. Rack's
expression was dolefully sullen. Racey's was hard and uncompromising.
"Who was it put you up to this?" asked Racey.
"What?"
"Coming out here after me."
"I didn't come out after you, I tell you!"
"Shore, shore," soothed Racey, "I know all about that. Who put you up
to it?"
"I dunno what yo're talkin' about."
"The ignorance of some people," said Racey, recalling sundry occasions
when other folk had oddly failed to grasp his meaning.
They rode onward silently.
When they reached the southern slope of Indian Ridge, Racey headed to
the east. A spirit of unease lit heavily upon the sagging shoulders of
Rack Slimson.
"You ain't goin' straight for Farewell," he remarked at a venture.
"I ain't--no."
"I thought you was."
"I am--but not straight."
"Huh?" Rack Slimson wrinkled his forehead at this.
"We're goin' in town from the side," explained Racey Dawson.
This, too, was a puzzler. "Why?" queried Rack Slimson.
"So's nobody will know we're coming till we're there." The smile with
which Racey garnished his answer was chilling to the soul of Mr.
Slimson.
"But I don't see--"
"You wouldn't. I'll tell you how it is all in words of one syllable.
You and me are coming into town from the east where that draw is and
those shacks behind the dance hall. We'll leave our hosses in the
draw, and proceed, like they say in the army, on foot. Then you and
me--"
"But why me?" Rack Slimson desired to know. "What are you always
putting 'me' in for?"
"Because yo're a-going with me, Rack, that's why. Yo're a-going with
me while I'm hunting for Coffin and Honey Hoke and Punch-the-breeze
Thompson and Peaches Austin. Those four will likely be together, see,
and I wanna use you for a breastwork sort of."
"A breastwork!" cried the now thoroughly upset Mr. Slimson. "A
breastwork!"
"Shore a breastwork. I'll shove you ahead of me into the saloon and if
they--there's four of 'em, y'understand--cut down on me you'll be in
the way."
"But they'll down me!"
"I'm counting on that."
"But--"
"Aw, shut up, you ---- skunk! You come out to Moccasin Spring on
purpose to get me to come to Farewell and be peaceably shot by Doc
Coffin and his gang. Can't tell me you didn't. I know better."
"I didn't! I didn't! I--"
"Aw right you didn't. In that case you got nothing to scare you. If
Doc and his outfit ain't got any harsh thoughts against me they won't
shoot when we run up on 'em. That'll prove yo're telling the truth,
and I'll beg yore pardon. I'll do more'n beg yore pardon. I'll eat
yore shirt an' my saddle."
Racey's assurance that he would do the right thing if his suspicions
proved unfounded did not appear to cheer Rack Slimson.
"I--lookit here," he began, desperately, "can't we fix this here up
some way? I dunno as--"
"Shore we can fix it up," interposed Racey, heartily. "Go after yore
gun any time you feel like it. I been letting you keep it on purpose."
Rack Slimson did not accept the invitation. He had not the slightest
desire to go after his gun. He was not fast enough, and he knew it.
"It ain't necessary to do that," said he.
"Suit yoreself," Racey told him calmly. "Hop into action any time you
feel like it. Of course before we get to that draw outside Farewell
where we're gonna leave our hosses I'll have to take yore gun away.
Later I might be too busy to do it--and I can't afford to take _every_
chance. Not with four or five men. You can see that yoreself."
Rack Slimson saw. He saw other things too. Oh, there was no warmth in
the sunlight, and the sky was a drabby gray, and he was filled with
bitterness unutterable.
"We'll be at the draw some time soon," suggested Racey ten minutes
later.
But Rack Slimson's hands continued to remain in plain sight, the while
Rack gnawed a thin and bloodless lip.
When at long last the draw opened before them Racey calmly reached
over and removed the saloon-keeper's sixshooter. After satisfying
himself that the weapon was fully loaded he stuffed it down inside the
waistband of his trousers. Then he buttoned the two lower buttons of
his vest and pulled the garment in question over the protruding butt.
For a space of time they rode the bottom of the draw. Where a few
heavy willows grew about a tiny spring Racey pulled in.
"We'll leave the cayuses here," said he. "We're right close in back of
Marie's shack."
They dismounted, tied the horses to separate willows, and climbed the
side of the draw.
"No hurry," cautioned Racey, for Rack Slimson was showing signs of a
nervous haste. "Besides, I want to pat you all over for a hideout."
Behind the blind end of Marie's shack Rack Slimson submitted to
being searched for concealed weapons. Racey found none, not even a
pocket-knife.
"Let's go," said Racey Dawson. "We'll go to yore saloon first. And you
pray hard that nobody sees us from the back window."
They diagonalled down past the stage company's corral to the house
next door to the Starlight.
"They haven't seen us yet," Racey observed, cheerfully, to Rack
Slimson whose wretched knees had been knocking together ever since he
had dismounted. "Slide over this way a li'l more, Rack. Now take off
yore spurs."
Racey stooped and removed his own. And not for an instant did he lose
the magic of the drop. As a matter of fact, he had kept Rack covered
from the moment Rack set his boot-soles to earth. Rack's spurs jingled
on the ground. Racey let them lie. His own spurs he jammed each into a
hip pocket.
"I'll have to be careful how I sit down now," he remarked, jocularly,
to Rack Slimson. "You ready? Aw right. You know the way to the
Starlight's back door."
The back door of the saloon was wide open. They entered on tiptoe, the
proprietor in the lead.
"Remember," whispered Racey, when he discovered the back room to be
empty, "remember, I'm right behind you. Keep on yore toes."
He held Rack Slimson by the belt and pushed him toward the door giving
into the front room. This door was shut. They paused behind it.
"He oughta be along pretty soon," complained a fretful voice that
Racey recognized as belonging to Honey Hoke.
"We don't mind waiting," chimed in Punch-the-breeze Thompson.
"It's the best thing we do." This was big Doc Coffin speaking.
The two behind the door heard a bottle-neck clink against the rim of a
glass.
"You better not take too much," advised Thompson.
"Aw, who's takin' too much?" flung back Honey Hoke.
"Well, you don't see the rest of us touching a single drop, do you?
Speaking personal, I wouldn't drown _my_ insides with liquor when I'm
due to go up against a proposition like Racey Dawson."
Here was praise indeed. Racey thumbed Rack Slimson in the ribs. Rack
turned his head and saw that Racey was grinning. Rack grew even more
spineless.
"You see," pointed out Racey in a sardonic whisper. "Yo're up against
the pure quill, feller."
Which remark at any other time would have been in the worst possible
taste, but license is extended to men in peril of their lives.
"They're at the table in the corner beside the bar, this end, ain't
they?" resumed Racey. "Ain't it lucky the door opens that way?"
Then he was silent for a time while he strove to catch the accents of
Peaches Austin. He wanted to know if they were all four at the one
table. But Peaches was either not talking or elsewhere. A moment later
the question was answered for him by Honey Hoke.
"If he slips by Peaches without Peaches seem' him--" began Honey.
"Aw, hownell can he?" sneered Doc Coffin. "They's Peaches camped down
in front of the blacksmith shop right where he can see the trail alla
way down Injun Ridge. A dog couldn't get past Peaches without being
seen, let alone a two-legged man on a four-legged hoss."
"S'pose he goes round the ridge," offered the doubter, unconsciously
hitting the nail on the head.
"He won't," declared the confident Doc. "He'll come boiling right in
like he owned the place. Don't you lose no sleep over _that_."
"Maybe Rack couldn't find him," pursued Honey Hoke, and an answering
quiver ran through the frame of Rack Slimson.
"Rack will find him all right," said Punch-the-breeze Thompson.
"He might be suspicious of Rack, alla same," Honey Hoke wavered on.
"Not the way Rack will tell him. Didn't we fix it up just what Rack
was to say and all before he went? Shore we did. He won't make no
mistake, Rack won't. You'll see."
"And anyway," broke in Doc Coffin, "they's four of us to take care of
any mistakes."
At which the three laughed loudly.
"I hope," Racey whispered in Rack's rather grimy left ear, "I hope you
heard all those fellers said. Proves I was right, don't it? Nemmine
nodding yore head more'n once. Hold still. Yo're doin' fine. Yep, I'm
shore glad we stood here a-listenin' like we have. Makes me feel a
heap easier in my mind about you. Otherwise I might always have had a
doubt I did right. I'd have been shore, y' understand, but I wouldn't
have been _dead_ shore."
At which the unfortunate Rack came within an eyewink of fainting. As
it was his stomach seemed to roll over and over. He began to feel a
little sick.
"The bartender now," went on Racey after a moment, "is he likely to
mix into this?"
"I dunno," breathed Rack.
"Who is he? I ain't been in yore place for some time."
Rack told him the name of the bartender, and Racey nodded quite as if
Rack were facing him and could see everything he did.
"Then that's all right," whispered Racey. "I know that feller. He's a
friend of Mike Flynn's. He won't do anythin' hostyle. Let's go right
in. Open the door. G'on, damn yore soul, or I'll blow you apart!"
Rack Slimson opened the door and immediately endeavoured to spring to
one side. But he reckoned not on the strength of Racey Dawson. The
latter swung Rack back into place between himself (Racey Dawson) and
the table at which Doc Coffin and his two friends were sitting.
It was a painfully surprised trio that confronted Racey and his
unwilling barricade. The bartender was likewise surprised. He
immediately fell flat on the floor. Not so the three men at the table.
They sat quite still and stared at the man and the gun behind the body
of their friend Rack Slimson. They said nothing. Perhaps there was
nothing to say.
"I hear you were expectin' me, Doc," drawled Racey, his eyes bright
with cold anger. "Whatsa matter?" he added. "Ain't three of you enough
to take care of any mistakes?"
At which Doc Coffin's right hand flashed downward. Racey drove an
accurate bullet through Doc Coffin's mouth. The bullet ranging upward,
and making its exit through the parietal bone, let in the light on
Doc's hitherto darkened intellect in more ways than one.
Doc Coffin's forefinger, tightening convulsively on the trigger of its
wearer's sixshooter, sent an unaimed shot downward. But previous to
embedding itself in a floor board, the bullet passed through Honey
Hoke's foot. This disturbed Honey's aim to such an extent that instead
of shooting Racey through the head he shot Rack through the hat.
Racey, attending strictly to his knitting, bored Honey Hoke with a
bullet that removed the top of the second knuckle of Honey's right
hand, shaved a piece from the wrist bone, and then proceeded to
thoroughly lacerate most of the muscles of the forearm before finally
lodging in the elbow. Thus was Honey Hoke rendered innocuous for the
time being. He was not a two-handed gunfighter.
As yet Punch-the-breeze Thompson had remained strictly neutral. His
hands were on the table top, and had been from the beginning.
"It's yore move, Thompson," Racey said with significance.
"Then I'll be goin'," said Thompson, calmly. "See you later--maybe."
So saying he rose to his feet, turned his back on Racey, and walked
out of the place. Racey had no illusions as to Thompson, but he
obviously could not shoot him in the back. He let him go. Watching
from a window he saw Thompson go to the hitching-rail in front of the
saloon, untie his horse, mount, and ride away northward.
And the blacksmith shop in front of which Peaches Austin was supposed
to be on guard lay at the south end of the street. Where, then, was
Thompson going?
"Where's he goin'?" he demanded of the now wriggling Rack Slimson.
"Huh? Who? Punch? I dunno."
"Where's Jack Harpe?"
"I dunno."
"Yo're a liar. Where is he?"
"I dunno! I dunno! I tell you! Yo're gug-gug-chokin' me!"
"Yo're lying again. If I was choking you you couldn't talk. Yo're
talkin', ain't you? Where's Jack Harpe?"
"I dud-dud-dunno," insisted Rack Slimson, his teeth chattering as
Racey shook him.
"Is he in town?"
"I dud-dunno."
"Is Thompson going after him, do you think?"
"I dud-dunny-dunno!"
"I guess maybe you don't, after all," Racey said, disgustedly,
flinging the unfortunate saloon-keeper from him with such force that
the fellow skittered quite across the floor and sat down in the
washpan into which the bartender was accustomed to throw the broken
glassware.
"Ow-wow!" It was a hearty, full-lunged howl that Rack Slimson uttered
as he bounded erect and clutched at his trousers.
Racey's eyes brightened at the sight. "Y' oughta known better than to
sit down in all that glass. I could 'a' told you you'd get prickles in
you. Why don't you stand still and let yore barkeep pick 'em out for
you? You can get at most of the big pieces with yore fingers," he
added to the bartender, who was gingerly emerging on all fours round
the end of the bar. "And the little ones you can dig out with a
sharp knife. Yep, Rack, old-timer, I'll bet you won't carry any more
messages on horseback for a while."
There was a sudden crashing thud at the back of the room. Honey Hoke
had fallen out of his chair. Now he lay on the floor, his legs drawn
up and the back of his frowsy head resting against a rung of the chair
in which still sat the dead body of Doc Coffin.
Racey went to Honey and spread him out in a more comfortable position.
Calloway and Judge Dolan entered the saloon together.
"We thought we heard shootin'--" began Galloway, staring in
astonishment at the grotesque posture Rack Slimson had assumed the
better to endure the ministrations of the bartender.
"We heard shootin', all right," said Judge Dolan, his glance sweeping
past Slimson and the bartender to the rear of the room.
"What's happened, Racey?" queried Dolan, striding forward. "Both of
'em cashed?"
Racey shook his head. "Doc Coffin passed out," said he in a hard, dry
voice. "But Honey Hoke's heart is beatin' regular enough. Guess he's
only fainted from loss of blood."
The Judge nodded. "They do that sometimes." Here he looked at Doc
Coffin's body lying humped over the table, an arm hanging free, the
head resting on the table-top.
"Were they rowin' together?" was the Judge's next question.
Racey gave him a circumstantial account of the shooting and the
incidents that had led up to it. The Judge heard him through without a
word.
"They asked for it," said he, when Racey made an end. "'Sfunny Punch
didn't pick up a hand. Tell you what you do, Racey: You come to my
office in about a hour. Nothing to do with this business. I got no
fault to find with what you done. Even break and all that. Something
else I wanna see you about. Huh? What's that, Piggy?"
The place was beginning to fill up with inquisitive folk from the
vicinity, and Racey decided to withdraw. He went out the back way.
Closing the door, he set his shoulders against it, and remained
motionless a moment. His eyes were on the distant hills, but they
neither saw the hills nor anything that lay between.
"I had to do it," he muttered, bitterly. "I didn't want to down
him. But I had to. They were gonna down me if they could. And
he--they--they asked for it."