It was a truth long after wondered at, when the story of Andrew Lanning
was told and retold, that he had lain in perfect security within a
six-hour ride from Tomo, while Hal Dozier himself combed the mountains
and hundreds more were out hunting fame and fortune. To be sure, when a
stranger approached, Andrew always withdrew into the horse shed; but,
beyond keeping up a steady watch during the day, he had little to do and
little to fear.
Indeed, at night he made no pretense toward concealment, but slept quite
openly on the floor on the bed of hay and blankets, just as Hank Rainer
slept on the farther side of the room. And the great size of the reward
was the very thing that kept him safe. For when men passed the cabin, as
they often did, they were riding hard to get away from Tomo and into the
higher mountains, where the outlaw might be, or else they were coming
back to rest up, and their destination in such a case was always Tomo.
The cabin of the trapper was just near enough to the town to escape
being used as a shelter for the night by stray travelers. If they got
that close, they went on to the hotel.
But often they paused long enough to pass a word with Hank, and Andrew,
from his place behind the door of the horse shed, could hear it all. He
could even look through a crack and see the faces of the strangers. They
told how Tomo was wrought to a pitch of frenzied interest by this
manhunt. Well-to-do citizens, feeling that the outlaw had insulted the
town by so boldly venturing into it, had raised a considerable
contribution toward the reward. Other prominent miners and cattlemen of
the district had come forward with similar offers, and every day the
price on the head of Andrew mounted to a more tempting figure.
It was a careless time for Andrew. After that escape from Tomo he was
not apt to be perturbed by his present situation, but the suspense
seemed to weigh more and more heavily upon the trapper. Hank Rainer was
so troubled, indeed, that Andrew sometimes surprised a half-guilty,
half-sly expression in the eyes of his host. He decided that Hank was
anxious for the day to come when Andrew would ride off and take his
perilous company elsewhere. He even broached the subject to Hank, but
the mountaineer flushed and discarded the suggestion with a wave of his
hand. "But if a gang of 'em should ever hunt me down, even in your
cabin, Hank," said Andrew one day--it was the third day of his
stay--"I'll never forget what you've done for me, and one of these days
I'll see that Uncle Jasper finds out about it."
The little, pale-blue eyes of the trapper went swiftly to and fro, as if
he sought escape from this embarrassing gratitude.
"Well," said he, "I've been thinkin' that the man that gets you, Andy,
won't be so sure with his money, after all. He'll have your Uncle Jasper
on his trail pronto, and Jasper used to be a killer with a gun in the
old days."
"No more," smiled Andrew. "He's still steady as a rock, but he hasn't
the speed any more. He's over seventy, you see. His joints sort of creak
when he tries to move with a snap."
"Ah," muttered the trapper, and again, as he started through the open
door, "Ah!"
Then he added: "Well, son, you don't need Jasper. If half what they say
is true, you're a handy lad with the guns. I suppose Jasper showed you
his tricks?"
"Yes, and we worked out some new ones together. Uncle Jasper raised me
with a gun in my hand, you might say."
"H'm!" said Hank Rainer.
When they were sitting at the door in the semidusk, he reverted to the
idea. "You been seein' that squirrel that's been runnin' across the
clearin'?"
"Yes."
"I'd like to see you work your gun, Andy. It was a sight to talk about
to watch Jasper, and I'm thinkin' you could go him one better. S'pose
you stand up there in the door with your back to the clearin'. The next
time that squirrel comes scootin' across I'll say, 'Now!' and you try to
turn and get your gun on him before he's out of sight. Will you
try that?"
"Suppose some one hears it?" "Oh, they're used to me pluggin' away for
fun over here. Besides, they ain't anybody lives in hearin'."
And Andrew, falling into the spirit of the contest, stood up in the
door, and the old tingle of nerves, which never failed to come over him
in the crisis, was thrilling through his body again. Then Hank barked
the word, "Now!" and Andrew whirled on his heel. The word had served to
alarm the squirrel as well. As he heard it, he twisted about like the
snapping lash of a whip and darted back for cover, three yards away. He
covered that distance like a little gray streak in the shadow, but
before he reached it the gun spoke, and the forty-five-caliber slug
struck him in the middle and tore him in two. Andrew, hearing a sharp
crackling, looked down at his host and observed that the trapper had
bitten clean through the stem of his corncob.
"That," said the red man huskily, "is some shootin'."
But he did not look up, and he did not smile. And it troubled Andrew to
hear this rather grudging praise.
In the meantime, three days had put the gelding in very fair condition.
He was enough mustang to recuperate swiftly, and that morning he had
tried with hungry eagerness to kick the head from Andrew's shoulders.
This had decided the outlaw. Besides, in the last day there had been
fewer and fewer riders up and down the ravine, and apparently the hunt
for Andrew Lanning had journeyed to another part of the mountains. It
seemed an excellent time to begin his journey again, and he told the
trapper his decision to start on at dusk the next day.
The announcement brought with it a long and thoughtful pause.
"I wisht I could send you on your way with somethin' worthwhile," said
Hank Rainer at length. "But I ain't rich. I've lived plain and worked
hard, but I ain't rich. So what I can give you, Andy, won't be much."
Andrew protested that the hospitality had been more than a generous
gift, but Hank Rainer, looking straight out the door, continued: "Well,
I'm goin' down the road to get you my little gift, Andy. Be back in an
hour maybe."
"I'd rather have you here to keep me from being lonely," said Andrew.
"I've money enough to buy what I want, but money will never buy me the
talk of an honest man, Hank."
The other started. "Honest enough, maybe," he said bitterly. "But
honesty don't get you bread or bacon, not in this world!"
And presently he stamped into the shed, saddled his pony, and after a
moment was scattering the pebbles on the way down the ravine. The dark
and silence gathered over Andrew Lanning. He had little warmth of
feeling for Hank Rainer, to be sure, but the hush of the cabin he looked
forward to many a long evening and many a long day in a silence like
this, with no man near him. For the man who rides outside the law
rides alone.
He could have embraced the big man, therefore, when Hank finally came
back, and Andrew could hear the pony panting in the shed, a sure sign
that it had been ridden hard.
"It ain't much," said Hank, "but it's yours, and I hope you get a chance
to use it in a pinch." And he dumped down a case of .45 cartridges.
After all, there could have been no gift more to the point, but it gave
Andrew a little chill of distaste, this reminder of the life that lay
ahead of him. And in spite of himself he could not break the silence
that began to settle over the cabin again. Finally Hank announced that
it was bedtime for him, and, preparing himself by the simple expedient
of kicking off his boots and then drawing off his trousers, he slipped
into his blankets, twisted them tightly around his broad shoulders with
a single turn of his body, and was instantly snoring. Andrew followed
that example more slowly. Not since he left Martindale, however, had he
slept soundly. Take a tame dog into the wilderness and he learns to
sleep like a wolf quickly enough; and Andrew, with mind and nerve
constantly set for action like a cocked revolver, had learned to sleep
like a wild thing in turn. And accordingly, when he wakened in the
middle of the night, he was alert on the instant. He had a singular
feeling that someone had been looking at him while he slept.