_Settled In Full_.
On a lonely part of the trail to town--queerly, it was when he was
rounding the low, barren hill where he and Dill had first met--he took
out his brand-book and went over the situation. It was Barney he rode,
and Barney could be trusted to pace along decorously with the reins
twisted twice around the saddle-horn, so Billy gave no thought to his
horse but put his whole mind on the figures. He was not much used
to these things; beyond keeping tally of the stock at branding and
shipping time and putting down what details of his business he dared
not trust to memory, a pencil was strange to his fingers. But the
legal phrases in the paper left by Dill and signed by the cook and
night-hawk as witnesses gave him a heavy sense of responsibility that
everything should be settled exactly right. So now he went over the
figures slowly, adding them from the top down and from the bottom up,
to make sure he had the totals correct. He wished they were wrong;
they might then be not quite so depressing.
"Lemme see, now. I turned over 4,523 head uh stock, all told (hell
of a fine job uh guessing I done! Me saying there'd be over six
thousand!) That made $94,983. And accordin' to old Brown--and I guess
he had it framed up correct--Dilly owes him $2,217 yet, instead uh
coming out with enough to start some other business. It's sure queer,
the way figures always come out little when yuh want 'em big, and big
when yuh want 'em little! Them debts now--they could stand a lot uh
shavin' down. Twelve thousand dollars and interest, to the bank--I
can't do a darn thing about them twelve thousand. If Dilly hadn't gone
and made a cast-iron agreement I coulda held old Brown up for a few
thousand more, on account uh the increase in saddle-stock. I'd worked
that bunch up till it sure was a dandy lot uh hosses--but what yuh
going to do?"
He stared dispiritedly out across the brown prairie. "I'd oughta put
Dilly next to that, only I never thought about it at the time, and
I was so dead sure the range-stuff--And there's the men, got to have
their money right away quick, so's they can hurry up and blow it in!
If Dilly ain't back to-night, or I don't hear from him, I reckon
I'll have to draw m' little old wad out uh the bank and pay the
sons-uh-guns. I sure ain't going to need it to buy dishes and rocking
chairs and pictures--and I was going t' git her a piano--oh, hell!"
He still rode slowly, after that, but he did not bother over
the figures that stood for Dilly's debts. He sat humped over the
saddle-horn like an old man and stared at the trail and at the
forefeet of Barney coming down _pluck, pluck_ with leisurely
regularity in the dust. Just so was Charming Billy Boyle trampling
down the dreams that had been so sweet in the dreaming, and leveling
ruthlessly the very foundations of the fair castle he had builded
in the air for Dill and himself--and one other, with the fairest,
highest, most secret chambers for that Other. And as he rode, the
face of him was worn and the blue eyes of him sombre and dull; and
his mouth, that had lost utterly the humorous, care-free quirk at the
corners, was bitter, and straight, and hard.
He had started out with such naïve assurance to succeed, and--he had
failed so utterly, so hopelessly, with not even a spectacular crash
to make the failing picturesque. He had done the best that was in
him, and even now that it was over he could not quite understand how
everything, _everything_ could go like that; how the Double-Crank and
Flora--how the range, even, had slipped from him. And now Dill was
gone, too, and he did not even know where, or if he would ever come
back.
He would pay the men; he had, with a surprising thrift, saved nearly
a thousand dollars in the bank at Tower. That, to be sure, was when he
had Flora to save for; since then he had not had time or opportunity
to spend it foolishly. It would take nearly every dollar; the way
he had figured it, he would have just twenty-three dollars left for
himself--and he would have the little bunch of horses he had in his
prosperity acquired for the pure love of owning a good horse. He would
sell the horses, except Barney and one to pack his bed, and he would
drift--drift just as do the range-cattle when a blizzard strikes
them in the open. Billy felt like a stray. His range was gone--gone
utterly. He would roll his bed and drift; and perhaps, somewhere, he
could find a stretch of earth as God had left it, unscarred by fence
and plow, undefiled by cabbages and sugar-beets (Brown's new settlers
were going strong on sugar-beets).
"Well, it's all over but the shouting," he summed up grimly when
Hardup came in sight. "I'll pay off the men and turn 'em loose--all
but Jim. Somebody's got to stay with the Bridger place till Dilly
shows up, seeing that's all he's got left after the clean-up. The rest
uh the debts can wait. Brown's mortgage ain't due yet" (Billy had his
own way of looking at financial matters) "and the old Siwash ain't got
any kick comin' if he never gets another cent out uh Dilly. The bank
ain't got the cards to call Dilly now, for his note ain't due till
near Christmas. So I reckon all I got to do after I pay the boys is
take m' little old twenty-three plunks, and my hosses--if I can't
sell 'em right off--and pull out for God-knows-where-and-I-don't-care-
a-damn!"
* * * * *
Charming Billy Boyle had done all that he had planned to do,
except that he had not yet pulled out for the place he had named
picturesquely for himself. Much as at the beginning, he was leaning
heavily upon the bar in the Hardup Saloon, and his hat was pushed back
on his head; but he was not hilarious to the point of singing about
"the young thing," and he was not, to any appreciable extent, enjoying
himself. He was merely adding what he considered the proper finishing
touch to his calamities. He was spinning silver dollars, one by one,
across the bar to the man with the near-white apron, and he was
endeavoring to get the worth of them down his throat. To be sure,
he was being assisted, now and then, by several acquaintances; but
considering the fact that a man's stomach has certain well-defined
limitations, he was doing very well, indeed.
When he had spun the twenty-third dollar to the bartender, Billy meant
to quit drinking for the present; after that, he was not quite clear
as to his intentions, farther than "forking his hoss and pulling out"
when there was no more to be done. He felt uneasily that between his
present occupation and the pulling-out process lay a duty unperformed,
but until the door swung open just as he was crying, "Come on,
fellows," he had not been able to name it.
The Pilgrim it was who entered jauntily; the Pilgrim, who had not
chanced to meet Billy once during the summer, and so was not aware
that the truce between them was ended for good and all. He knew that
Billy had not at any time been what one might call cordial, but
that last stare of displeasure when they met in the creek at
the Double-Crank, he had set down to a peevish mood. Under the
circumstances, it was natural that he should walk up to the bar with
the rest. Under the circumstances, it was also natural that Billy
should object to this unexpected and unwelcome guest, and that the
vague, unperformed duty should suddenly flash into his mind clear, and
well-defined, and urgent.
"Back up, Pilgrim," was his quiet way of making known his purpose.
"Yuh can't drink on _my_ money, old-timer, nor use a room that I'm
honoring with my presence. Just right now, I'm _here_. It's up to you
to back out--_away_ out--clean outside and across the street."
The Pilgrim did not move.
Billy had been drinking, but his brain was not of the stuff that
fuddles easily, and he was not, as the Pilgrim believed, drunk.
His eyes when he stared hard at the Pilgrim were sober eyes, sane
eyes--and something besides.
"I said it," he reminded softly, when men had quit shuffling their
feet and the room was very still.
"I don't reckon yuh know what yuh said," the Pilgrim retorted,
laughing uneasily and shifting his gaze a bit. "What they been doping
yuh with, Bill? There ain't any quarrel between you and me no more."
His tone was abominably, condescendingly tolerant, and his look was
the look which a mastiff turns wearily upon a hysterical toy-terrier
yapping foolishly at his knees. For the Pilgrim had changed much in
the past year and more during which men had respected him because
he was not considered quite safe to trifle with. According to the
reputation they gave him, he had killed a man who had tried to kill
him, and he could therefore afford to be pacific upon occasion.
Billy stared at him while he drew a long breath; a breath which seemed
to press back a tangible weight of hatred and utter contempt for the
Pilgrim; a breath while it seemed that he must kill him there and
stamp out the very semblance of humanity from his mocking face.
"Yuh don't know of any quarrel between you and me? Yuh say yuh don't?"
Billy's voice trembled a little, because of the murder-lust that
gripped him. "Well, pretty soon, I'll start in and tell yuh all about
it--maybe. Right now, I'm going t' give a new one--one that yuh can
easy name and do what yuh damn' please about." Whereupon he did as
he had done once before when the offender had been a sheepherder.
He stepped quickly to one side of the Pilgrim, emptied a glass down
inside his collar, struck him sharply across his grinning mouth, and
stepped back--back until there were eight or ten feet between them.
"That's the only way _my_ whisky can go down _your_ neck!" he said.
Men gasped and moved hastily out of range, never doubting what would
happen next. Billy himself knew--or thought he knew--and his hand was
on his gun, ready to pull it and shoot; hungry--waiting for an excuse
to fire.
The Pilgrim had given a bellow that was no word at all, and whirled
to come at Billy; met his eyes, wavered and hesitated, his gun in his
hand and half-raised to fire.
Billy, bent on giving the Pilgrim a fair chance, waited another
second; waited and saw fear creep into the bold eyes of the Pilgrim;
waited and saw the inward cringing of the man. It was like striking a
dog and waiting for the spring at your throat promised by his snarling
defiance, and then seeing the fire go from his eyes as he grovels,
cringingly confessing you his master, himself a cur.
What had been hate in the eyes of Billy changed slowly to incredulous
contempt. "Ain't that enough?" he cried disgustedly. "My God, ain't
yuh _man_ enough--Have I got to take yuh by the ear and slit your
gullet like they stick pigs--or else let yuh _go_? What _are_ yuh,
anyhow? Shall I give my gun to the bar-keep and go out where it's
dark? Will yuh be scared to tackle me then?" He laughed and watched
the yellow terror creep over the face of the Pilgrim at the taunt.
"What's wrong with your gun? Ain't it working good to-night? Ain't it
loaded?
"Heavens and earth! What else have I got to do before you'll come
alive? You've been living on your rep as a bad man to monkey with, and
pushing out your wishbone over it for quite a spell, now--why don't
yuh get busy and collect another bunch uh admiration from these
fellows? _I_ ain't no lightning-shot man! Papa Death don't roost on
the end uh my six-gun--or I never suspicioned before that he did; but
from the save-me-quick look on yuh, I believe yuh'd faint plumb away
if I let yuh take a look at the end uh my gun, with the butt-end
toward yuh!
"Honest t' God, Pilgrim, I won't try to get in ahead uh yuh! I
couldn't if I tried, because mine's at m' belt yet and I ain't so
swift. Come on! Please--_purty_ please!" Billy looked around the room
and laughed. He pointed his finger mockingly "Ain't he a peach of a
Bad Man, boys? Ain't yuh proud uh his acquaintance? I reckon I'll have
to turn my back before he'll cut loose. Yuh know, he's just aching t'
kill me--only he don't want me to know it when he does! He's afraid he
might hurt m' feelings!"
He swung back to the Pilgrim, went close, and looked at him
impertinently, his head on one side. He reached out deliberately with
his hand, and the Pilgrim ducked and cringed away. "Aw, look here!" he
whined. "_I_ ain't done nothing to yuh, Bill!"
Billy's hand dropped slowly and hung at his side.
"Yuh--damned--coward!" he gritted. "Yuh know yuh wouldn't get any
more than an even break with me, and that ain't enough for yuh. You're
afraid to take a chance. You're afraid--God!" he cried suddenly, swept
out of his mockery by the rage within. "And I can't kill yuh! Yuh
won't show nerve enough to give me a chance! Yuh won't even _fight_,
will yuh?"
He leaned and struck the Pilgrim savagely. "Get out uh my sight,
then! Get out uh town! Get clean out uh the country! Get out among the
coyotes--they're nearer your breed than men!" For every sentence there
was a stinging blow--a blow with the flat of his hand, driving the
Pilgrim back, step by step, to the door. The Pilgrim, shielding his
head with an uplifted arm, turned then and bolted out into the night.
[Illustration: FOR EVERY SENTENCE A STINGING BLOW WITH THE FLAT OF HIS
HAND.]
Behind him were men who stood ashamed for their manhood, not caring to
look straight at one another with so sickening an example before them
of the craven coward a man may be. In the doorway, Billy stood framed
against the yellow lamplight, a hand pressing hard against the casings
while he leaned and hurled curses in a voice half-sobbing with rage.
It was so that Dill found him when he came looking. When he reached
out and laid a big-knuckled hand gently on his arm, Billy shivered and
stared at him in a queer, dazed fashion for a minute.
"Why--hello, Dilly!" he said then, and his voice was hoarse and
broken. "Where the dickens did _you_ come from?"
Without a word Dill, still holding him by the arm, led him unresisting
away.