THE WEAK LINK
Though the sun was bright that day, unseen forces were gathering in
the sky above town, mesa and mountains, not of weather but of fate, to
loose their lightnings. Sunday peace seemed to reign, the languid
summer Sunday peace of tranquil nature. Yet even through this there
was a faint breath of impending events, a quiver or excitement in the
air, an increasing expectation on the part of men, who sensed but did
not realize what was to come.
All day whispers and hints had passed among the people in San Mateo
and out to isolated farms and up nearby creeks, kindling in the
ignorant, brown-skinned Mexicans a lively interest and an exorbitant
curiosity. Nothing was said definitely; nothing was promised outright.
So in consequence speculation ran wild and rumors wilder. The hints
had to do with the manager of the dam who had shot the strange
Mexican: something was to be done with him, something was to happen to
him. He had been arrested, or was to be arrested; he had confessed, or
was about to confess the murder; he was going to kill other Mexicans,
or had killed other Mexicans; he was about to raid San Mateo with his
workmen and slay the town; he was to be hanged;--and so on eternally.
Uncertain as was everything else, what was sure apparently was that
something would happen at San Mateo that night.
Families visiting about in wagons spread the news. Horsemen were at
pains to ride to outlying Mexican ranch houses, for what messenger is
so welcome as he who brings tales of great doings? He might be sure of
an audience at once. So it was that the plan craftily put in operation
by Weir's enemies, to gather and inflame the people, under cover of
whose pressure and excitement when the engineer was arrested he might
be slain by a pretended rescue or popular demonstration, whichever
should serve best, produced the expected result. During the afternoon
wagons and horsemen and men on foot began to appear in town, to join
already aroused relatives or friends at their adobe houses or to loaf
along the main street in groups.
Outwardly there were few signs in the aspect of the Mexican folk of
something extraordinary developing. But to the sheriff, Madden,
aroused from an afternoon nap at his home by a telephoned message from
the county attorney requesting him to come to the court house, the
unwonted number in the town was in itself a significant fact.
"I didn't know this was a fiesta, Alvarez. What's up with you people?"
he asked of one he met on the street.
"The fiesta is to be to-night, eh?" the man laughed. "Have you this
engineer locked up yet?"
"What engineer?"
"The killer, the gun-man, that Weir. It is said he is already arrested
and is to be hanged from the big cottonwood at dark beside the jail.
It is also said he is still loose and bringing five hundred workmen to
burn the town, rob the bank, kill the men and steal the girls."
"If he is to do either, it's news to me," Madden said, and proceeded
to the office of Lucerio, the county attorney.
Madden was a blunt man, who for policy's sake might close his eyes to
unimportant political influence as exercised by the Sorenson crowd.
But he was no mere compliant tool. This was his first term in office.
He had never yet crossed swords with the cattleman and the others
associated with him, because the occasion had never arisen. When he
had allowed himself to be nominated for sheriff, though Sorenson might
imagine Madden to be at his orders, the latter had accepted the office
with certain well-defined ideas of his duty.
"What do you want of me?" he asked Lucerio, for whom he had little
liking.
"I desire to tell you, Madden, that at eight o'clock I'll have a
warrant for you to serve on the engineer Weir. You'll go to the dam
and arrest him and bring him in to the jail."
"Well, apparently the whole country except me knew this was to happen.
The town's filling up as if it were going to be a bull-fight."
"I know nothing of that."
"All right; give me the warrant."
"At eight o'clock. I don't want it served before then."
"Why?"
"I have my reasons."
"Sorenson? And Vorse and Burkhardt? They've stirred up this charge
against the man." Lucerio making an angry answer, he continued. "Well,
everybody knows you jump when they pull the string. I'll have to serve
the warrant, naturally. But I'm going to tell you what I think: you've
faked the evidence you've got; we had the truth from Martinez and
Janet Hosmer at the inquest; you're trying to railroad Weir to the
gallows."
"Mr. Sorenson shall know what you've said. As for me"--the Mexican
swelled with outraged dignity--"the evidence was placed in my hands.
It warrants the engineer's arrest and trial. You attend to your
department and I'll attend to mine."
"All to the good, Mr. County Attorney. I'll arrest him; he won't make
me any trouble on that score. But you won't find it so easy to prove
his guilt. And afterwards, just look out, for if he doesn't come
gunning for you and fill your carcass full of lead, I miss my guess.
You won't be able to hide behind Sorenson, either."
He left the county attorney at that, the latter unable despite all his
efforts to hide his uneasiness and alarm. Madden reaching the street
looked at his watch; it was half past five, so he started home for
supper.
Some way before him he saw Martinez walking. The lawyer did not stop
to converse with any of the loiterers along the street, but moved
steadily along. He had come out of Vorse's saloon and was going
towards his office. Just then the sound of an automobile caused Madden
to turn his head in time to see Weir speed along but stop with a
sudden application of brakes as he caught sight of the attorney.
A hail brought Martinez to the car. A few minutes' rapid speech there
followed. Then the lawyer mounted beside Weir, the machine went on,
turning into a side street and vanishing. To Madden there was nothing
unusual in the circumstance, and he only noted the surprise and
silence along the street at the engineer's passage. The Mexicans would
know the man wasn't yet arrested at any rate, he thought. But he
should like to learn what was the purpose in bringing them all to
town! He would keep an eye open for any lynching nonsense if it were
attempted.
Weir and Martinez were hastening to Judge Gordon's house, for shortly
before the engineer had received an unexpected call from Pollock for
him to join him there. Evidently the eastern lawyer had turned a card
of some sort; and Weir had gone at once, wondering what the meeting
might portend. The sight of Martinez, free and composed of hearing,
walking along the street, further amazed him.
He perceived, however, when the lawyer stepped out to the car from
Vorse's place that he was pale, his mouth tight-drawn and his eyes
glittering.
"You got my message?" the latter asked, quickly.
"The telephone message, yes. Janet Hosmer got the paper also."
"They dragged me to Vorse's cellar," Martinez whispered fiercely.
"They beat me with their fists, Vorse and Burkhardt. Then they tied me
and squeezed my eyeballs till I could stand the pain no longer and
told. I've been there ever since, bound and without food or water, the
devils! Sorenson came with them last night, afterwards. And now he and
Vorse came again--there they are back there in the bar yet--and gave
me a draft on a Chicago bank for a thousand dollars and said to get
out and stay out of New Mexico and never open my mouth about what had
happened."
"Get in with me," Weir ordered.
At Judge Gordon's house the lawyer said:
"You are going in here? He's one of them."
"I know it. Come in, however. I may need you. You're not going to
leave San Mateo, but there's no reason why you shouldn't cash the
draft. That's only part of the damages you'll make them pay for what
you underwent."
"It isn't money I want from them," Martinez replied, between his
teeth.
Judge Gordon lived in a rambling adobe house two squares from the
Hosmer dwelling. It was old but had been kept in good repair, and as
he had never married he had lived comfortably enough with an old
Mexican pair as servants. One of these, the woman, admitted the
visitors at their knock and conducted them, as if expected, to the
Judge's study, a long room lined with cases of books, mostly legal,
and filled with old-fashioned furniture.
That something had occurred to change the Judge's aspect during the
hours in which Pollock had been closeted with him was at once
apparent. He looked older, broken, haggard of face, terrified.
"I met Mr. Martinez and brought him along," Weir said.
"Was that necessary?" Judge Gordon asked, heavily.
"He's my attorney, for one thing."
"And I've been a prisoner in Vorse's cellar for twenty-four hours for
another, and you're one of those responsible for my being there and
for the torture to which I was subjected," Martinez exclaimed,
glaring.
"Mr. Martinez, I give you my word of honor that I knew nothing of your
incarceration until this morning."
"That for your word of honor!" the lawyer cried, snapping his fingers
in the air. "And in any case, you're an accessory after the fact. You
let me stay."
Pollock stepped forward.
"Is this Mr. Martinez? Glad to meet you, sir. Mr. Weir has spoken very
favorably of you and of your handling of legal matters for the
irrigation company, of which I am a director. Pollock is my name. Are
you a notary? Ah, that is good. There will be some papers to
acknowledge and witness and so on."
He pointed at seats, seemingly having direction of matters, and the
visitors sat down. Judge Gordon had sagged down in the padded leather
chair in which he sat; his face was colorless, his eyes moving
aimlessly to and fro, his white mustache and hair in disorder.
"Let us begin on business at once," Pollock stated, on his feet as was
usual when entering a discussion and removing his eye-glasses. "I
called on Judge Gordon this afternoon after my talk with you, Weir,
and disclosed the evidence which has been gathered relative to the
fraud perpetrated on your father and the crime against the man Dent. I
assumed, and rightly, that to a man of the Judge's legal mind the
facts we hold would prove the futility of resistance, and I set out to
convince him of the wisdom of sparing himself a long losing fight, in
which he would be opposing not only the evidence which was sure to
convict him, and not only you, Mr. Weir, but our company which
proposed to see the fight through. I went so far, Weir, as to promise
him immunity from your wrath and from public prosecution."
Weir arose slowly.
"No," said he, "no."
"But, my dear fellow----"
"No. He made my father's life a hell for thirty years. Why should I
spare him?"
"If granting him freedom from prosecution did actually spare him
anything, I should say 'No' also, standing in your place. But with the
facts made public as they will be, with Judge Gordon losing his
legislative office and the esteem in which he had been held, with him
relinquishing the bulk of his fortune as he agrees, with his finding
it necessary to go elsewhere to live at his time of life, with the
thought constantly in his mind of how low he has been brought, don't
you think he will be suffering quite adequately? I should think so. He
would probably die quicker in prison, but I believe he will suffer
more outside. See, I don't hesitate to measure the alternatives, for
the Judge and I have discussed and canvassed the whole situation,
which was necessary, of course, in order to arrive at a clear
understanding." And Pollock smiled genially.
"Does he admit my charges?"
"He hasn't denied them."
"Will he admit them?"
"I've outlined exactly what we must have--deeds to his property and an
acknowledged statement of the Joseph Weir and James Dent affair,
supplementing the Saurez affidavit, which by the way he at first
thought we did not possess but which an account of what happened last
night in the mountains and your recovery of the same"--Pollock's
eyelid dropped for an instant towards Weir--"convinced him of. This
statement is not to be produced as evidence against his associates
except in the last extremity, and if not needed is always to be kept
secret. We are to give him, when the papers are signed, a draft for
ten thousand dollars. This will permit him to have something to live
on. He states that he will want to go from San Mateo at once."
During this speech Weir's eyes had glanced to and fro between the
lawyer ticking off his words with his glasses and the figure in the
leather chair. Old and shattered as Judge Gordon had suddenly become,
wretched as Weir saw him to be, the engineer nevertheless felt no
pity. The man had been in the conspiracy that had ruined his father;
he suffered now not because of remorse but through fear of public
opinion; and was a fox turned craven because he found himself
enmeshed in a net. And to save his own skin he was selling out his
friends.
Weir's face went dark, but Pollock quickly stepped forward and drew
him into a corner of the room.
"Keep calm, man," was the lawyer's low advice. "Do you think if we had
him tied up as tightly as I've made him believe that I should propose
a compromise in his case. He's the weak link. Do you think I've had an
easy time the last three hours bringing him to the point he's at? I
had to invent evidence that couldn't possibly exist. I had to give him
a merciless mental 'third degree.' I told him if he refused I was
going to Sorenson with the same offer, who would jump at the chance.
And, my dear man, we haven't, in reality, enough proof to convict a
mouse since you lost that paper. So now, so far as he's concerned, you
must bend a little, a very little--and you'll be able to hang the
remaining three."
This incisive reasoning was not to be denied.
"I yield," said Weir.
Beaming, Mr. Pollock walked back to the table.
"Mr. Weir consents," he stated. "Mr. Martinez, if you will go to your
office and bring the necessary forms and your seal we can make the
transfers and statement and wind the matter up."
An hour later Judge Gordon had signed the deeds, stock certificates
from his safe and bills of sale spread before him, passing the
ownership of lands, cattle and shares in companies to Pollock for
equitable division between Weir and the Dent heirs if found. The old
Mexican servants were called in and witnessed his shaky signatures to
the papers.
At the statement regarding the Dent shooting and Weir fraud, which
Pollock had dictated to Martinez with Gordon's assistance, he
staggered to his feet while the pen dropped from his hand.
"I can't sign it, I can't sign it; they would kill me!" he groaned.
The two aged servants stared at him wonderingly.
"My dear Judge, they'll never know of it until it's too late for them
to do anything--if they ever know," came the easterner's words, in
smooth persuasiveness.
Judge Gordon brushed a hand over his eyes.
"Give me a moment," he muttered.
He stood for a time motionless. Then he walked across the room and
opened a door and entered an inner chamber.
"He won't live a year after this," Pollock whispered to his
companions.
The speaker could have shortened the time immensely and have still
been safe in his prophecy. For when at the end of five minutes he sent
the woman to request the Judge to return, she stumbled out of the
bed-chamber with affrighted eyes. She said the Judge was asleep on his
bed and could not be aroused.
Sleep of the profoundest, the men discovered on going in. And in his
fingers was an empty vial. So far as Judge Gordon was concerned Weir
had had his revenge.