THE FEDERAL AGENT.
Federal Agent James H. Grant sat in conference with United States
District Attorney Sawyer and United States Marshal Sam Putney in the
Attorney's office in the Federal building in Phoenix. Ranger Captain
Johnston was there also.
"It was sure a right funny break," Johnston was saying. "It wasn't
the outfit we were after at all, son. We heard that Gomez was comin'
across, and so we was kinda ridin' herd on him, when these jaspers came
runnin' plumb into the net. What-all happened to Gomez's outfit I don't
know. Maybe-so they heard the ruckus and went home."
"You were fishing for minnows and caught a whale, captain," said
Jimmie Grant, his lean, browned face lighting up as he smiled at the
old Ranger captain, who had more notches on his old Colt than he cared
to count, not including Mexicans. "I know it ties in somewhere with
the gang we're after, but where, I'm frank to say, I can't see at the
moment. One thing I do know, and that is that those Chinamen that were
killed were Chang Kwang Tong men. No one touched the bodies, I suppose,
until we got there?"
"I don't reckon they did, son," answered Johnston. "At least I left
orders with the boys, and my orders ain't always disobeyed."
"I'll bet they're not," Grant smiled cordially. "Well, they didn't have
anything on 'em; but one of them had the high Tong mark on his wrist;
and if he was a Chang Kwang it's a cinch the others were also. This
bird we're after does business with them; we now know that much."
"Is that going to help you any, Jimmie?" asked the District Attorney.
Jimmie Grant was working openly, not under cover; and he smiled as he
answered: "It ought to, in some way; but how? I wish I knew. It may be
that when I get the reports of the under-cover men that are on it with
me, it may fit in. I've got a bearcat planted--"
The door opened, and the District Attorney's secretary stuck her pretty
little head in a few inches. "Mr. Sawyer, Ranger James Earpe wants to
know if you're right busy?"
"Tell him to come in, Betty," answered Sawyer, then as the door closed
behind her: "Bud, you're always bragging about this Jimmie Earpe of
yours, maybe he can give Mr. Grant here a line."
"Who--me?" demanded Johnston, as the door opened and Earpe came in.
"Brag 'bout that no-'count scoundrel? That Earpe boy is just naturally
worthless, yes, suh! I'm talkin' about you, Jimmie--you-all come on
over and shake hands with another Jimmie. This here one's name is
Grant, and he's a Federal agent from Washington."
Earpe smiled cheerfully; he knew that old Ranger Captain Johnston was
telling them, and him, how much he loved him. "I'm right glad to meet
up with you, Mr. Grant," he said as he shook hands. With the first
quick glance of his keen young blue eyes he knew that Grant "belonged."
Jimmie Grant's hand tightened in Earpe's. "Being as how we're two
Jimmies," he said, "let's you and me sink the mister stuff. You be
Jimmie No. 1, and I'll be Jimmie No. 2. How is that?"
"Suits me down to the ground," young Earpe answered promptly. "I got
me something that might interest you a whole lot, Jimmie. That's the
reason I came up, to show it to Mr. Sawyer here."
"Light and sit," said Marshal Putney, who had ridden the range in the
old days with both Johnston and Sawyer, and had looked through the fog
of gun smoke with Jimmie Earpe's father many times.
* * * * *
"Well, suh," said Jimmie Earpe, slouching into a chair. "Yesterday
Jinny--that's my sister," he explained to Grant, "and old Ma Collins
that's visitin' us down on the Lazy W, went up to see how Grizzly
Callen was gettin' along. He's an old prospector that got him a dig
up back of Snake Cañon. On the way back they sights a car coming, so
they holes up behind a bunch of mesquite to watch 'em, it not being
natural for a car to wander up thataway. Jinny, she's packing her
thirty-thirty. The car stops and two men get out and begin to do what
Jinny thought was some kind of surveyin' or locatin'.
"Old Ma Collins can't see right good, and she allus totes Slim's field
glasses around with her--bein' loco about birds and such. All at once
one of the men pitches forward, and Jinny says she could just make out
that the other threw something. Old Ma Collins had the glasses on 'em,
and she lets out a hoot and grabs Jinny's thirty-thirty and begins
tryin' to get her the feller that was standing. She did lift his hat
off, Jinny says, and--"
"Dog-gone," said old Ranger Captain Johnston. "Ma still's got some of
her shootin' eye left anyway. Darn good thing for that jasper that she
was gettin' a little near-sighted. Time was when Sarah Collins could
outshoot old Shotgun himself with a pistol for a rifle.
"You hombres remember the time she stood off the Waco Kid and his gang
and got her three of them to boot? Man--"
"Gettin' old, gettin' old," moaned United States Marshal Putney,
turning to Sawyer. "Talkin' all the time, pore ole man. Too bad, ain't
it, Bill?"
"He is, old and feeble," answered Sawyer. "He was a right good man
once, too, wasn't you, Bud?"
"Go on, son," Johnston told Earpe. "Never mind these two old polecats
always buttin' in. Ma cracked down on him; then what?"
"Why, Jinny says that she grabbed the glasses, and could see the sand
fly up all around this gent that was foggin' it right smart toward his
car. He got away and they slid down to see what for. The jasper lying
on the ground was dead, with a knife in his heart. They didn't stay
around no more, but burned the wind gettin' back to the ranch. Jinny,
she telephones me, and I come out with Bob Beardsley.
"The man that was dead is the one that we took in night before
last--the young, smilin' one they called Kid. The other jasper, from
the description Ma and Jinny gives, is the little feller that got right
fussed up when I called him a coyote. We got the knife out and wrapped
it right careful so's not to disturb the finger-prints; and on the
Kid's body, tucked under the lining of his waistband, we found this."
Earpe tossed on the table a half sheet of notepaper. The three men bent
toward it as one. On it was written in a very good hand:
KENTUCK:
The Kid is the Chang Kwang Tong man for Mexico. Do whatever he says.
It was signed by a square in the middle of which the numbers 2-0-0-0
were written. That was all.
"My gosh," gasped Jimmie Grant; "it's gettin' like Alice in Wonderland.
You say the Kid and the bird that knocked him off were together last
night in one of the cars; they must have been acting as pilot car
for the others, and the border patrol turned them--that's easy. But
why does Jimmie's little 'coyote' knock this buddy off the next day,
especially if he knows he's a representative of the hardest-boiled Tong
in the world?
"Unless he's a damn fool he would know that they'd boil him in oil
sooner or later. Wait--maybe he didn't know. I'm just thinking out
loud. Any one got a line on who this Kentuck is? There's forty Kentucks
in every neck of the woods."
* * * * *
"I reckon," Johnston put in, "this here Kentuck is George Mears, the
gambler over at the Ace of Spades across the line. This here Kid and
the little jasper have been seen with him once or twice, my boys tell
me."
"Yeah? Well, let's go on the basis that he is. Then he has been top
cutter for this bird who makes a square with 2-0-0-0 in the middle of
it for his John Hancock. This Kentuck has been falling down and--No,
that's wet. They'd simply put him on the spot and send another man in.
Maybe-so the Chang Kwang can't understand why so many of its members
get knocked off. Have you been turning many back lately, Mr. Sawyer?"
"Don't get a chance," answered Sawyer grimly. "We've been finding
quite a few dead, like this time. I heard that when the Barracuda left
Martinique she had forty on board; but when the coast guard picked her
up she was empty."
"That's just what makes me want to kill these birds first and arrest
'em after," said Jimmie Grant grimly. "They'll throw the Chinese
overboard or shoot them the moment they think they are in danger of
getting knocked off. That darn thing," and he pointed to the square
and numbers in it, "reminds me of something--Holy Mackinaw! Monckton!
See--2000--2000 pounds to a ton!
"He's the bird higher up that we're after--that's cold turkey! He's
shipping in yellow brothers for the Chang Kwang; Kentuck is one of his
lieutenants; the Kid was working in the gang as the Tong man. There
may not have been any trouble; he came on to look at this end--didn't
show this to Kentuck--so, after the other day's knock-off, Kentuck, not
knowing who the Kid is, any more than that he's one of the mob, orders
him taken for a ride as a squealer--and the little man does it.
"I don't get that walking up and down stuff, but it doesn't matter.
Kentuck has pulled a frightful boner, having the Kid killed. I was in
China long enough to know how the Tongs feel about a thing like that!"
"How come this jasper Monckton to be so careless as to give this here
Kid writin', Jimmie?" asked Earpe.
"I don't know. Maybe the Kid asked for something to show Kentuck, if
he had to. Maybe Kentuck would not take word of mouth. There's nothing
criminal in representing a Tong, Jimmie; the Five Companies have lots
of white men doing business for them. It's a darn good job, on the
legitimate end.
"There was no danger to Monckton. He could have addressed it to Mr.
George Mears and signed it Charles L. Monckton, and asked the D. A.
here to deliver it.
"If the Kid had 've been killed with the Chinese in the car and the
note found, Monckton would have said: 'Certainly; I do business with
the Chang Kwang, as I do with a good many Chinese societies. On their
request I gave their representative a note to one of my friends.'
"What does the 'Do as he says' mean? Why, it seems that a Chinaman
absconded with a temple idol--or any old thing, see, Jimmie? The Kid
was sent to round him up, and Monckton, out of the goodness of his
heart, ordered one of his men-Fridays to help him. Just try to prove
anything different! Suppose we ask him: 'How about the Kid being found
with some Chinamen running the line, Mr. Monckton?' He smiles and
says: 'You will have to ask him; I know nothing of his--er--personal
activities.' You can't prove anything. His attorney will jump up and
say: 'Just what is the charge against my client?' Isn't that right, Mr.
Sawyer?"
"Boy," answered the District Attorney with deep feeling, "who knows
that better than I? That paper doesn't mean a thing as far as evidence
goes."
* * * * *
"That's right," agreed Jimmie Grant. "But I wonder just how strong
Monckton is now with the Chang Kwang? Here's four of their high-binders
cold-meated, and the next day one of their white brothers. If it was
only the high-binders, they might pass it off as the fortunes of war;
but the Kid's death is going to take some fast explaining. Monckton
will unquestionably throw Kentuck to the wolves, but will that satisfy
them?
"If I could only frame something that would lead them to blame it
all on Monckton--I know it's there, if I can dope it out. Their
headquarters are in San Francisco. Well, I'll get on it; maybe it'll be
the weak link in the chain. He's suspected of more than slipping yellow
brothers over the line. There was a big gem robbery abroad not long
ago that included some foreign government stuff, that he's tabbed with
engineering."
"We might have the sheriff bring in this man that killed the Kid,"
suggested the District Attorney, "on a murder charge, if Jinny and Ma
Collins will swear to the information. That will put him away in a safe
place, and he might break enough to give us some stuff to go on. Would
it make this Monckton suspicious, Jimmie?"
"Natural thing for the sheriff to do," answered Grant promptly. "Go get
him, hold him _incomunicado_--maybe-so we can open him up."
"Please, suh," said Jimmie Earpe, his eyes shining, as he turned to
Ranger Captain Johnston, "can you-all get me that warrant to serve?"
"That's a sheriff's warrant, and it's up to his deputies," began the
old Ranger captain sternly. Then, as he saw the disappointment in
Earpe's eyes, he finished with: "But if you-all got a feud with this
here little feller, I reckon it might be arranged."
"And listen to me," the District Attorney added, "I want this hombre
alive."
"Yes, suh," answered Jimmie Earpe, standing up. "I'll shore bring him
in for you, Mr. Sawyer. No shootin'--"
"Unless to protect your life," Johnston finished for him.
"Unless to protect my life," Jimmie repeated gravely. "I'll go and get
Jinny and Ma Collins right away."