SETH HUNTINGTON'S OPPORTUNITY
It was Thursday, the one day of the week when Paradise needed no
apologist. For on Thursdays the stage arrived from Tellurium, bringing
the mail and, now and then, a passenger, and always a whiff of the
outside world. No resident of Paradise Park would willingly have
missed the arrival of the stage; and on this occasion fully two-thirds
of the male population, with nine-tenths of the female, had already
assembled. But the stage was not due for an hour or more. The women
bargained and gossiped in Thompson's store; the men, most of them,
were gathered around a stiff game of freeze-out in the Square Deal
Saloon; and only the score or more of saddle horses hitched in front
of the store, and the dozen or so of buckboards and road wagons parked
in the rear of it, showed that Paradise was in its weekly state of
mild and patient expectancy.
So the three cow-punchers, the yellow horse, and Marion rode into
Paradise without being seen or heard, and halted in front of the
post-office.
"Hal-lo! Hallo!" sang out the leader of the cowboys. And then, with
the petulance of one that is "all in": "Is this a dam' graveyard?"
A thin man in his shirt sleeves, with a whisky glass in one hand and a
towel in the other, came to the door of the Square Deal Saloon. His
pallid face had the look of settled weariness that is characteristic
of keepers of such oases. Slavin had never, within the recollection of
the oldest frequenter of his establishment, betrayed the slightest
interest in anything. If there was a certain change in his expression
as he looked out between narrowed eyelids into the garish sunlight it
was one indicative of mild resentment at having been disturbed in his
methodic occupation behind the bar. He saw with neither interest nor
anticipation the three strangers, who ought to have had enough sense
to dismount and walk in if they wanted anything.
"Well," he began in a drawling and sarcastic tone, "what--"
It probably would have been a cautious and covered insult to the
presumed intelligence of the strangers, if he had finished the
question. But it died away on his thin lips. His fishy, blue eyes had
caught at last the gleam of Sunnysides, half in eclipse behind the
dull-hued cow ponies. For a few seconds he stared, while his mouth
stood open, and his features slowly responded to the first emotion he
had felt in years.
"Hell's bobcats!" he yelled.
The glass slipped from his hand, and fell tinkling in pieces on the
floor as he lunged out into the road.
In the saloon there was a moment of tense silence as the men there
slowly realized that a phenomenon had occurred. Slavin was excited!
The silence was followed by a hubbub of raised voices and a racket of
overturned chairs and the scrape and thud of boots on the sanded
floor. At that instant a woman in a pink calico dress, drawn by
Slavin's yell, came to the door of Thompson's, and promptly screeched.
The poker game was never finished; Thompson's trade was ruined for
the day; and the strange group in the roadway became the center of a
jostling, uproarious crowd of men and women, who alternately bombarded
the three cow-punchers with questions and stared at Sunnysides in
silent wonder. But they were careful to maintain a respectful distance
between themselves and the formidable captive, though he stood
motionless amid all the uproar, like a golden statue of a horse, with
his head raised proudly, his yellow-black eyes flashing defiance and
suspicion, and his lustrous hide gleaming in the sun.
Marion's enjoyment of this exciting scene was tinged with a vague
uneasiness. She had watched the men come tumbling out of the Square
Deal Saloon and the women swarming from Thompson's store, and had felt
a curious relief at seeing neither Seth nor Claire among them.
Though she could not have given any reason for her satisfaction,
their absence, and Seth's especially, seemed to her a piece of rare
good fortune. Haig's warning--"Tell him he's a fool to anger
me!"--was still echoing at the back of her brain; her recent act
of incomprehensible errancy still troubled and perplexed her; and
try as she would, she was unable to suppress the feeling that she had
become inextricably entangled in the feud between Haig and Huntington.
She was not yet ready to face Huntington. Thank Heaven, he was not
there!
But at the very instant of her self-congratulation, and when she was
just turning her attention again to the hubbub around the golden
outlaw, her eye was suddenly caught, across the heads of the crowd, by
a figure that caused her to stiffen in the saddle.
"Seth!" she gasped.
He came striding rapidly from the direction of the blacksmith's, the
most distant of the group of buildings,--a large and heavy but
well-built man, whose black, short-cropped beard and bushy,
overhanging eyebrows gave him a somewhat truculent expression, which
was heightened by his rough and domineering demeanor. He was better
dressed, or more carefully at least, than any of the other men. He
wore a coat and trousers of dark-brown corduroy, a light-gray flannel
shirt with a flowing black tie, and a wide-brimmed Stetson hat. His
belt, under the unbuttoned coat, was of elaborately stamped leather,
with a pocket at one side from which a heavy, gold watch chain was
looped to a silver ring, and with an ornate holster at the other where
the black butt of a revolver was visible as he moved.
He shouldered his way through the crowd in the heedless manner of most
bulky men, who seldom realize how much space they take that properly
belongs to others. At six feet from the golden horse he halted, and
surveyed him with shining eyes.
"Sunnysides, eh?" he said, turning toward the nearest of the
strangers.
"The's only one," replied the cow-puncher.
"Who caught him this time?"
"Us three. That's Jim Raley, with the busted arm. That other is Jud
Smith, My name's Larkin. We belong to the X bar O outfit on Lost
Soldier Creek."
"Second outfit below Forty-Mile," said Huntington, familiarly.
"Right!"
"Sanders still foreman?"
"Yes."
"Then what are you doing with that horse up here?"
The cow-puncher grinned.
"I ketch your meanin'," he replied. "It's like this. Sanders chased
Sunnysides three seasons, an' thought he'd roped him. But all he gits
's a cracked leg, an' not a yeller hair of the slippery beast. Then us
three takes on the job--not presumin' to be better'n Sanders, but
hopin' for luck. It comes our way, an' there you are. We offer him to
Sanders--for a price, natch'rally--but he says he don't believe in
ghosts, an' we c'n go to hell with him."
"You must have missed the road. This is Paradise," said Huntington.
The crowd roared its appreciation.
"The' ain't much in names," observed Larkin testily.
The crowd laughed again, though, of course, less heartily.
"Well, Heaven or Hell," said Huntington, "is the horse for sale?"
"He is--if he ain't sold already."
"How's that?"
"We're offered a price for him--if it still holds good. That's why
we've come to Paradise--an' no other reason, believe me!"
"How much?"
"Thousand."
There was a stir in the crowd.
"That's some price for a bronco," said Huntington, with an assumed
indifference.
"It sure is--if you're talkin' about a _bronco_," retorted the
cow-puncher.
There was a brief silence, in which all eyes were turned again upon
the golden horse, standing motionless but alert, as if keenly alive to
all that passed. The common ponies around him stamped, and champed
their bits, and moved restlessly in their places, but Sunnysides
remained calm and observant, with all the dignity and contempt of a
captive patrician in a crowd of yokels.
Marion saw admiration and desire growing in Seth's eyes, and knew that
her foreboding had not been without reason.
"And who's paying a thousand dollars for him?" asked Huntington.
"Haig's his name, Philip Haig," answered Larkin. "Know him?"
If Larkin had been a little nettled by the levity of the Paradisians
he now had his revenge, though much to his surprise, in the
extraordinary effect produced by his simple announcement. The smiles
faded from the faces assembled around him; significant glances were
exchanged; and there followed a silence so deep that the murmur of the
Brightwater could be heard quite clearly across the meadows. Then
there was a rustling movement in the crowd, and every face, as if by a
common impulse, or at a given signal, was turned toward Huntington.
Marion was not sure of the feelings of the others, but there could be
no mistake in what she read in Huntington's black countenance. She was
not only frightened, but surprised and pained. For all his coarseness
and crudity, she had until to-day believed him to be innately gentle,
with only a rough and ungracious exterior. She had seen him always
tender with Claire, whom undoubtedly he loved with all the best there
was in him. But now she perceived the other side of his character,
which she had indeed divined at first, but which she had firmly, on
account of Claire, refused to acknowledge. An unworthy passion glowed
in his eyes; his features were distorted by an expression of mingled
cunning and hate; and his head somehow seemed to sink lower between
his shoulders as he leaned slightly forward, studying the face of the
cow-puncher. Then swiftly he took himself in hand, and masked his
passions under an air of careless badinage that was, for the moment,
suited to his purpose.
"But I don't just understand," he drawled insinuatingly. "Haig hasn't
been away from the Park lately--unless he's gone an' come by night."
A snicker or two, and one loud guffaw rewarded him for this insult to
his absent foe. But Marion felt the color rising to her cheeks.
"It's a year ago he's seen him, 'way off, shinin' in the sun,"
explained Larkin. "He stops at the X bar O, an' says he'll give a
thousand for him."
"So that's all you've got to go on, is it?" sneered Huntington.
"Yes," answered Larkin uneasily.
"An' you think he'll make good, do you?"
"If a man's word ain't good he don't stay in this country long, does
he?"
"That's right--he won't stay long!" replied Huntington, with a savage
laugh.
"You mean to say--" queried Larkin pointedly, leaning across the neck
of his pony, and looking keenly into Huntington's eyes.
"Nothing," answered Huntington, lifting his huge shoulders.
"That's sayin' a lot an' sayin' nothing," retorted Larkin.
"You'll know more when you try to collect that thousand."
"All right," responded Larkin, gathering up the reins as if to
terminate the interview. "Where's his place--if it ain't a secret?"
"It's over beyond that ridge," said Huntington, pointing toward the
west. "You go back about three miles the way you came, an' there's a
branch road--"
"Hell!" snorted the cowboy whose arm hung limp at his side.
The three men exchanged glances. They were very weary; they had used
almost the last of their powers to bring the outlaw this far; and they
were plainly reluctant to undertake another tussle with the tireless
animal, now ready, without doubt, to renew his struggle for liberty.
Huntington watched them narrowly.
"I'm all in!" grumbled Raley.
"You look it," said Huntington. Then he added lightly: "Still, you
ought to fetch up at Haig's place before morning."
Marion felt disgust and resentment rising in her at this misrepresentation
of the distance to Haig's ranch. Whatever Haig had done, this was
cowardly and unfair. She looked eagerly at the other men, expecting to
hear some one correct the gross exaggeration. But the faces were all
blank, and no one spoke.
Something like a groan escaped from the lips of the injured cowboy. He
looked as if he might tumble from the saddle at any instant.
"Sure we can!" said Larkin doggedly. "Come, men! Let's move on."
"Well, good luck!" said Huntington carelessly. And then, as if on
second thought: "But see here! You fellows look all right to me, and
if Haig's changed his mind, or hasn't got the cash handy, bring the
horse back here, and I'll talk business with you."
"Talk business now!" Smith blurted out, averting his eyes from
Larkin.
"Very well. I'll give you five hundred for him--if you don't want to
go any farther. He ain't worth it, but he's a kind of a curiosity,
and--"
"That ain't talkin' business worth a dam'!" cried Larkin. "Come along,
men!"
He turned his pony's head, and took a fresh grip on the halter that
held the prisoner. Smith moved also, though slowly, but Raley did not
budge.
"I'm damned if I go any further!" he growled.
Smith stopped, and looked uncertainly from Raley to Larkin, from
Larkin to Huntington, who was studying him craftily.
"The five hundred isn't wind," said Huntington sneeringly. "It's over
there in Thompson's safe, if you want it."
"We'll see Haig first," said Larkin, compressing his lips, and
speaking more to his companions than to Huntington.
Smith shifted uneasily in his saddle, while Raley avoided Larkin's
eyes, and looked appealingly at Huntington. The ranchman, in his
turn, took a sidelong glance, furtive and questioning, at the faces of
his neighbors. The moment was critical, and much more was involved in
the crisis than the possession of the golden outlaw. For a long time
Huntington had assumed a certain leadership in the Park, but it had
not always been unquestioned. His qualifications for leadership were
not as apparent to all his neighbors as they were to himself, and
there were some who even resented his pretensions. Nevertheless he
had, in a way, succeeded; and he had been permitted to represent the
entire valley as far as he liked in the war with Philip Haig. One and
all, indeed, regarded Haig as an intruder; many of them had more than
once threatened violence against him; and there was not among them one
whom Haig, if he had wanted a defender, could have counted on. Yet,
for all that, Huntington was practically alone in the depth of his
hatred and the violence of his methods. If Haig had no friends in the
Park, he had only a few, perhaps no more than two or three, inveterate
enemies, of whom Huntington was the active representative.
Huntington now saw in the faces of the men around him that they were
doubtful of him, and that the time was opportune to turn their
passivity into energetic support of his plans. Moreover, he had
already "put his foot in it," had gone too far to withdraw without
discredit. Having openly insulted the absent enemy, and having clearly
revealed his intention to cheat him of this prize, to weaken now would
be to abandon forever all hope of ascendency. For an instant he
regretted what he had done, and cursed himself under his breath.
Then, taking a new grip on himself, he returned to the attack.
"Seven hundred and fifty, then!" he said with a swagger. "And it's
cash, not words."
There was a moment of suspense. The three men, who were moving slowly
away, turned in their saddles. Not a muscle quivered, not a foot
stirred in the expectant crowd. Marion felt that in another minute she
would cry out, shrieking at Seth, shrieking the warning Haig had sent
by her.
"That's good enough, for me!" declared Raley, throwing the reins over
his pony's head, and preparing painfully to dismount.
"No, Jim!" cried Smith. "Let him say a thousand, an' I'm with you.
'Tain't exactly on the square, but the's no use killin' ourselves
for--"
His speech was cut short by a shrill cry from a woman who stood on a
horse block at the outer edge of the crowd.
"Look! Look!" she called, pointing a finger toward the long white
road.