NEAR THE END OF A LONG CROOKED TRAIL
When West awoke, Morse was whittling on a piece of wood with his sharp
hunting-knife. It was a flat section from a spruce, and it had been
trimmed with an axe till it resembled a shake in shape.
The outlaw's curiosity overcame his sullenness at last. It made him
jumpy, anyhow, to sit there in silence except for the muttering of the
sick man.
"Whajamakin'?" he demanded.
Morse said nothing. He smoothed the board to his satisfaction, then
began lettering on it with a pencil.
"I said whajadoin'," growled West, after another silence.
The special constable looked at him, and in the young man's eyes there
was something that made the murderer shiver.
"I'm making a tombstone."
"What?" West felt a drench of ice at his heart.
"A marker for a grave."
"For--for him? Maybe he won't die. Looks better to me. Fever ain't so
high."
"It's not for him."
West moistened his dry lips with his tongue. "You will have yore li'l
joke, eh? Who's it for?"
"For you."
"For me?" The man's fear burst from him in a shriek. "Whajamean for
me?"
From the lettering Morse read aloud. "'Bully West, Executed, Some
Time late in March, 1875.'" And beneath it, "'May God Have Mercy on
His Soul.'"
Tiny beads of sweat gathered on the convict's clammy forehead. "You
aimin' to--to murder me?" he asked hoarsely.
"To execute you."
"With--without a trial? My God, you can't do that! I got a right to a
trial."
"You've been tried--and condemned. I settled all that in the night."
"But--it ain't legal. Goddlemighty, you got no _right_ to act
thataway. All you can do is to take me back to the courts." The heavy
voice broke again to a scream.
Morse slipped the hunting-knife back into its case. He looked steadily
at the prisoner. In his eyes there was no anger, no hatred. But back
of the sadness in them was an implacable resolution.
"Courts and the law are a thousand miles away," he said. "You know
your crimes. You murdered Tim Kelly treacherously. You planned to
spoil an innocent girl's life by driving her to worse than death.
You shot your partner in the back after he did his best to help you
escape. You tortured Onistah and would have killed him if we hadn't
come in time. You assaulted my friend here and he'll probably die from
his wounds. It's the end of the long trail for you, Bully West. Inside
of half an hour you will be dead. If you've anything to say--if you
can make your peace with heaven--don't waste a moment."
The face of West went gray. He stared at the other man, the
horror-filled eyes held fascinated. "You--you're tryin' to scare me,"
he faltered. "You wouldn't do that. You couldn't. It ain't allowed by
the Commissioner." One of the bound arms twitched involuntarily. The
convict knew that he was lost. He had a horrible conviction that this
man meant to do as he had said.
The face of Morse was inexorable as fate itself, but inside he was a
river of rushing sympathy. This man was bad. He himself had forced the
circumstances that made it impossible to let him live. None the less
Tom felt like a murderer. The thing he had to do was so horribly
cold-blooded. If this had been a matter between the two of them, he
could at least have given the fellow a chance for his life. But not
now--not with Win Beresford in the condition he was. If he were going
to save his friend, he could not take the chances of a duel.
"Ten minutes now," Morse said. His voice was hoarse and low. He felt
his nerves twitching, a tense aching in the throat.
"I always liked you fine, Tom," the convict pleaded desperately. "Me
'n' you was always good pals. You wouldn't do me dirt thataway now. If
you knew the right o' things--how that Kelly kep' a-devilin' me, how
Whaley was layin' to gun me when he got a chanct, how I stood up for
the McRae girl an' protected her against him. Goddlemighty, man, you
ain't aimin' to kill me like a wolf!" The shriek of uncontrollable
terror lifted into his voice once more. "I ain't ready to die. Gimme a
chance, Tom. I'll change my ways. I swear I will. I'll do like you say
every minute. I'll nurse Beresford. Me, I'm a fine nurse. If you'll
gimme a week--jus' one more week. That ain't much to ask. So's I can
git ready."
The man slipped to his knees and began to crawl toward Morse. The
young man got up, his teeth set. He could not stand much of this sort
of thing without collapsing himself.
"Get up," he said. "We're going over the hill there."
"No--no--no!"
It took Morse five minutes to get the condemned man to his feet. The
fellow's face was ashen. His knees shook.
Tom was in almost as bad a condition himself.
Beresford's high voice cut in. In his delirium he was perhaps living
over again his experience with Pierre Poulette.
"Maintiens le droit. Get your man and bring him in. Tough sledding.
Never mind. Go through, old fellow. Bring him in. That's what you're
sent for. Hogtie him. Drag him with a rope around his neck. Get him
back somehow."
The words struck Tom motionless. It was as though some voice were
speaking to him through the sick man's lips. He waited.
"Righto, sir," the soldier droned on. "See what I can do, sir. Have
a try at it, anyhow." And again he murmured the motto of the Mounted
Police.
Tom had excused himself for what he thought it was his duty to do on
the ground that it was not humanly possible to save his friend and
bring West back. It came to him in a flash that the Mounted Police
were becoming so potent a power for law and order because they never
asked whether the job assigned them was possible. They went ahead and
did it or died trying to do it. It did not matter primarily whether
Beresford and he got back alive or not. If West murdered them, other
red-coats would take the trail and get him.
What he, Tom Morse, had to do was to carry on. He could not choose the
easy way, even though it was a desperately hard one for him. He could
not make himself a judge over this murderer, with power of life and
death. The thing that had been given him to do was to bring West to
Faraway. He had no choice in the matter. Win or lose, he had to play
the hand out as it was dealt him.