THE SILENT DUEL
As July sped on Homer Conrad's visits to Golden grew more and more
frequent. When Curtis returned from his northern journey, still ignorant
of Delafield's identity, Homer was greatly relieved, and tried once more
to dissuade his brother. "Anyway, Curt," he urged, "don't do anything
more about it now. Let it rest a while, and think about it more coolly
and carefully; you'll see how foolish it is if you do that." As Curtis
did not mention the subject again, he concluded that his advice had been
taken and that there was no reason for immediate anxiety. His mind at
rest on that score, he devoted himself more than ever to Lucy Bancroft.
He talked of her so much to his brother that Curtis soon saw how
complete was his absorption. "I guess they're hitting it off together
all right," he concluded.
Curtis Conrad tried to accustom himself to the idea of Lucy as his
brother's wife. It cost him many a painful twinge, and once the
rebellious thought came into his mind, "If it hadn't been for the
Delafield affair I might--" But a little shock, as if he had fallen away
from some ideal or been guilty of an irreverence, stopped the notion.
Now and then, too, he had misgivings as to what Lucy would think of him
if she knew. He shrank from the feeling that her condemnation would be
as unsparing as his brother's, with more of horror and disgust. For the
first time he began to think about what might lie beyond that longed-for
meeting with Delafield. One day, musing upon Homer and Lucy, he had a
sudden vision of himself as a commiserated kinsman, and smiled grimly as
he reflected, "It might be a good thing for them if I got my quietus in
the scrimmage."
These signs of a change slowly going on within him sometimes came as a
flash of feeling, while again the thoughts induced held him for hours.
The emotion that had so powerfully rushed over him when he first
realized his love for Lucy had jarred his grip upon his purpose; and
afterward intimate daily association with his brother and knowledge of
the young man's severe disapproval united to move him now and then from
his old point of view and to give him brief visitations of more
wholesome feeling. If his love for Lucy, so suddenly realized, had met
with no check, it alone might have been enough in time to turn him from
his plans. A man of his temperament cannot be fired by two enthusiasms
at the same time. He must give himself wholly to his absorbing desire.
Since at the core Conrad's nature was sound and sweet, it is likely
that after a little his love would have overmastered his desire for
revenge. But Lucy's flirtation with his brother, induced by pique and
disappointment at his constant association with Mrs. Ned Castleton, and
Homer's prompt infatuation had led him to believe that the two younger
people were in love with each other. Consequently he did his best to
restrain his own feelings, and so limited their check upon the older
sentiment. Francisquita little knew, or would ever guess, what grave
consequences were flowing from her innocent effort to keep her
sister-in-law within bounds. But for that the outcome of the Delafield
affair would have been "another story."
Conrad returned from Santa Fe much disappointed by the failure of the
clews that had promised so much. He debated whether it would be worth
while to try to compel Gonzalez to disclose the name of his employer
should the Mexican attack him again. He was doubtful of the success of
such a plan, for he believed Jose as likely to give up his life as his
secret. Nevertheless, he decided it would be worth trying. For several
weeks after his return it chanced that whenever he went from home it was
with Peters or some of the men, while there was always somebody about
the corral and the house. He knew Gonzalez was watching him constantly,
awaiting the moment when they should be alone. Toward the end of July he
made up his mind to provide the opportunity and bring matters to a
focus.
On the day he reached this decision his brother returned from Golden
looking dejected. "They've quarrelled," was Curtis's inward comment. He
said nothing, nor did Homer mention Lucy's name, contrary to his custom
of talking much about her after a day in her society. He was also
less talkative than usual upon other subjects. During the evening,
while Curtis read, Homer sat by the open door and smoked in gloomy
silence, listening to the pouring rain and the rolling and echoing
thunder. He was wondering, half in lover's anger and half in lover's
downheartedness, why Lucy had been so unreasonable that day, and why
she had acted as if she did not care whether he came or stayed away.
Well, he would not trouble her with his company again very soon. He
and Pendleton had been talking about a camping and hunting trip in the
Mogollon Mountains, and he would see if they couldn't get up the party
and go at once.
The next morning a sky of pure, deep, brilliant blue shone over a
freshening, greening plain. Homer rose from the breakfast table and
walked out into the corral, throwing back his shoulders and breathing
deeply of the dry, cool, exhilarating air. It seemed a different world
from that of yesterday. There was no hurry about the camping trip, after
all. "I think I'll ride over to Golden," he said to his brother, "and
see if that storm last night did much damage. It looked black in the
mountains when I was coming home in the afternoon, and a bad flood may
have come down the ravine."
Curtis smiled quizzically. A certain eager masterfulness in the young
man's air brought to his mind conviction of the real purport of his
brother's errand, and he felt no doubt of its result. "A good idea," he
assented. "It was a bad storm and may have done a lot of harm. But I'll
have to use Brown Betty myself to-day. You can have your pick of the
others."
He stood by and called out, "Good luck, old fellow!" as Homer mounted
his horse, and laughed and swung his sombrero as the other turned away a
blushing face. Curtis gazed after him, a swift vision filling his mind
of the look that countenance would wear when he returned to tell him
proudly that he had won Lucy's promise to be his wife. "And by that time
I'm going to know who Delafield is," he thought, his lips compressed, as
he turned quickly into the corral.
"Jose," he called, "I want you to go to Adobe Springs this morning and
see if any of the cattle are mired in the overflow from the storm last
night. Then deepen the outlet so the water will all be carried away.
You'd better start at once. I'll come after you in about half an hour
and show you about digging out the outlet."
As Gonzalez mounted his horse at the corral gate he looked back and saw
Conrad standing beside his mare, making her hunt through his pockets for
sugar. "A brave man is Don Curtis," his thoughts ran. "He is so brave
it does not seem right that he must die. But--" and he shrugged his
shoulders with the air of one who says, "What would you?"
When Jose was well out of sight Conrad started after him, at first at a
slower pace than usual. His mind was not upon the expected encounter,
with its doubtful issue, nor upon the information, so long and ardently
desired, that he hoped to extort from the Mexican. A month previous he
would have been intent on that one thing, his thoughts absorbed in it,
and his heart on fire with anticipation. Now he dwelt upon the idea of
marriage between Lucy and Homer. "The lad's a better man than I," he was
thinking. "There's more in him, and ten years from now I shan't be able
to stack up alongside of him and make any showing at all--even if I'm
not in prison or hanged by the neck until dead long before."
He bared his brow, curiously white above the rest of his sunburned face,
to the south wind. His lips tightened and his eyes glowed as he looked
out over the gray road stretching before him, while his inward vision
flashed down the grim and lonely path that led into the future. It was
the way he had chosen, the one he had travelled with eager feet for
fifteen years, and he must follow it to the end. A few miles farther on
that gray track, perhaps just beyond that next hill, the longed-for
knowledge was awaiting him. He would force it from Gonzalez, and
then--Delafield! The thought fired his heart once more and his eyes
blazed with the old indignation as his mind went back to the grief and
loss of his early years, to that lonely night of hate and anger when his
deadly purpose was born. He touched Brown Betty with his spur,
quickening her pace to a smart gallop as he searched the road and plain
with ardent eyes. His heart was bounding forward with anticipation, the
savor of longed-for vengeance once more strong in his throat. In front
of him lay a wide, shallow valley, with steep, storm-torn rims and brows
shaggy with mesquite.
"I reckon, Betty B.," he said aloud, "it's about time to be looking for
Jose, and this draw seems a likely sort of place for him."
He drew his revolver, glanced at its chambers, held it across the pommel
in his right hand, and made sure of the handful of cartridges he had put
in his pocket on leaving home. Brown Betty cantered across the bottom of
the valley and, as she climbed the steep bank on the other side, lifted
her head and neighed. From somewhere in the distance came an answering
whinny. "It's one of our horses," thought Conrad.
At the hilltop he carefully searched the plain; a little way down the
road, beside a clump of bushes, he saw a riderless horse. He chuckled.
"Jose's sure hiding out around there somewhere," was his instant
conviction. His head was high, his eyes flashing, and his face set in
hard lines as he started the mare forward at a brisk trot. His gaze
travelled toward the other horse, studying every bunch of mesquite and
questioning every clump of amole and yucca that grew between.
His eye caught the motion of branches in a tall, spreading thicket of
mesquite a hundred yards away, not far from the road. They swayed
against the wind for a moment, trembled back and forth, and then bent
before the breeze like their fellows. The growth was dense, but behind
it he could distinguish the outlines of a darker mass, and an instant
later he saw a tiny flash of light reflected from some small, bright
object. "That must be the sun on his gun-sight," said Curtis, "and I
reckon it's time to prepare for war."
Dismounting, he threw the mare's bridle over her neck. "No; she'll
follow me," he thought, "and she doesn't need to mix up in the Delafield
affair."
His eye still on the suspicious clump of bushes, Conrad fastened the
mare to an outreaching mesquite limb at the roadside. "This is a better
place for you, Brown Betty, nice old girl," he said, reaching back to
pat her neck as she nickered after him.
His pistol in his hand and his vision holding the dark object behind the
feathery green plumes of the mesquite, he went on briskly until he had
covered half the distance between them. Then he saw the object move
cautiously a little to one side, where the leaves were not so thick.
Plainly visible now were the straw sombrero, the dusky face below it,
the outline of the body, and the revolver held steadily between the
branches.
Half a dozen strides more, and he fixed his eyes upon those of Gonzalez,
dark and brilliant, gleaming through the scant, fern-like foliage like
two coals of brown fire. Conrad's six-shooter pointed straight between
them as he walked slowly toward the bush. He knew that Jose's was
levelled at his breast. Revolver cocked and finger at trigger he came
on, his eyes holding those of the Mexican. Jose's pistol hand he
disregarded, trusting to his perception of the change, the instant's
flash of decision, that would light Gonzalez's face when he pulled the
trigger. He knew that, should he stumble or miss his footing and so give
advantage, or should any hesitation show in face or eye, that second
would the Mexican's bullet fly for his heart.
It was Curtis's intention not to hurt Jose unless the need became
imperative. Therefore he did not fire, but came silently on, and
Gonzalez stood, silent and still, behind the sheltering bush, each with
pistol cocked and held at steady aim, the gaze of each holding
insistently that of the other. It was a silent duel of eyes, of wills
behind the eyes, of purposes behind the wills, and of temperament behind
the purposes.
"Will he never shoot?" Conrad asked himself once and again as he
approached.
"A brave man! A brave man!" was Jose's thought as he watched that steady
advance, secure in his own advantage.
Curtis came on with resolute step--fifteen yards, a dozen yards, ten
yards. Barely a score of feet separated the muzzles of the two
revolvers, and still the blue eyes and the brown stared into each other
with dauntless challenge.
"Why doesn't he shoot?" thought Jose. "A brave, bold man! It is a pity
to kill him."
"A moment more, and I'll have him!" exulted Conrad. Fifteen feet, twelve
feet, ten feet--still the space between them lessened, and still the
silence was unbroken and their guns at unchanging aim.
Another step, and Curtis saw Jose's eyes waver; another, and heard him
draw a little, gasping breath. He saw irresolution flash across the
Mexican's face, saw his finger leave the trigger, his right arm tremble,
and drop to his side.
Conrad felt cold sweat break out over his body and there was a loud
buzzing in his ears. Yet neither in face nor eyes was there a sign that
he had seen any change. With his gaze still fixed on the other's
downcast lids, he moved sidewise around the bush, and stood beside
Gonzalez.
"Give me your gun, butt first," he commanded in a low, tense voice. Jose
raised his eyes to meet the muzzle of the gun looking blankly between
his brows.
"You can take it if you like, Don Curtis," he said unsteadily. "I am
not going to shoot you. Here it is."
"Now," said Curtis, pointing both guns at Jose's head, "tell me the name
of the man who hired you to kill me."
The Mexican started in surprise. He shrugged his shoulders, looked at
the guns again, shuffled his feet uneasily. "Don Curtis, how can I?" he
exclaimed in a reproachful tone. "You should not ask that question. It
is not fair."
"Neither was it fair for you to try to stick me in the back before I was
onto your game. So we're even now, as you told me once before. You've
got to tell! I don't want to kill you, Jose; but, by God! I will, if you
don't give up that man's name. I'll give you one minute to think it
over; and if you don't speak out then, I'll blow your head off."
Gonzalez sent one searching glance into Conrad's set face, and dropped
sullen eyes to the ground. He knew there was only one thing to do if he
wished to live. For half the minute he stared downward, then looked
blankly up at Curtis. "Fifteen seconds more," said the stern voice. His
face worked, his lips opened and closed again. Then he seemed to gather
himself together for the unwilling effort, and the words fairly rushed
from his mouth:
"It is your friend, Senor Bancroft."
"What!" exclaimed Curtis, in a voice that had sunk back into his throat.
Gonzalez repeated his words. Conrad leaned forward, white with anger,
and thrust the two revolvers close to the other's face. "Jose," he said
slowly, in hard, sharp tones, "a little while ago a man told me that. I
shook him as if he'd been a dog and told him that he lied. I ask you
once more, the last time, who is it?"
Gonzalez threw back his head, crossed his arms, and looked his
antagonist angrily in the eye. "I am not a liar, Don Curtis," he said
proudly. "I may kill sometimes, if my _patron_ wishes. But I do not
lie." He placed the muzzle of one of the pistols against his heart. "I
have told you the truth, Senor Conrad," he went on. "I swear to you, by
the Mother of God, that I could not say different if you pulled that
trigger now."
Conrad trembled and his white face went suddenly crimson. "It is hard to
believe," he said; but he lowered the pistols. "I know you are not a
liar, Jose, and you seem to be speaking the truth. You understand, don't
you," he added in a tone almost apologetic, "that it is hard for me to
believe what you say?"
"It is the truth, senor."
Curtis put his own pistol away, and looked thoughtfully at the other.
"Jose," he said, "I shall have to think about this thing. In the
meantime I'm going to keep your gun."
"As you like, Don Curtis," replied Gonzalez, indifferently. "I shall do
nothing more. To-morrow I shall ask for my time."
Conrad eyed him keenly. "Well, then, here's your gun. Go on to Adobe
Springs and do the work, as I told you. To-morrow morning, if you want
it, you can have your time."
Jose took the gun, turned the cylinder, and one by one dropped the
bullets to the ground.
"It is ended, Don Curtis," he said. Mounting his horse, he galloped down
the road.