A CLASH
From behind the cover of a huge boulder on the steep hillside a man
watched a car labor up the grade and give up. He trained field-glasses
on the occupants. From his throat there came a sound like the snarl of
a wild animal. He had recognized the driver and the girl in the tonneau.
Out of a hip pocket he drew an automatic revolver. His teeth bared like
the fangs of a wolf. Not once did his eyes lift from the driver and the
young woman with him until they disappeared round a bend in the road
above.
He rose and stretched his cramped limbs, then moved cautiously down
the hill slope to the car. A child was in the back seat playing with a
puppy.
“Mamma’s gotta go to town an’ buy Baby Fifi some shoes wif silver
buckles ’n’ a new blue dress ’n’ free pair of stockings. ’N’ while
she’s gone, you better bee-have or Mamma’ll have to spank you good when
she gets back,” the little girl advised.
At the sound of footsteps she looked up.
The gay make-believe fled her face. Surrounded by love though she had
always been, some instinct told her that this man represented for her
the opposite of it. She felt a sudden imperative desire to call to her
father.
“Wot’s yer name?” the man asked.
“Ruth Reed.”
“That Clint Reed yer dad?”
She told him he was.
The man’s teeth showed like fangs. “Wot luck! We’re pals, him an’ me.
I’ll take yer along with old Cig.”
“I don’ wantta go. I want my daddy,” Ruth announced promptly.
His grin widened. It was an evil thing to see.
“He’ll want you, too, a while before he gets yer,” he jeered.
He opened the door of the tonneau and stood on the running-board. “Come
here, kid,” he ordered.
Ruth shrank back to the farther side of the car. “You go ’way. I’ll
call my daddy.”
He caught her by the frock and dragged her forward. “Cut out that
stuff, missie. When Cig says to step lively, why, you get a hop on yer.
See?”
She began to scream. He clapped a dirty hand over the child’s mouth and
turned to climb the mountainside with her in his arms.
Ruth kicked fiercely, impelled by terror. His right arm tightened on
the struggling legs. The tramp climbed fast. He had to get over the
summit before Reed came back or he would be in trouble.
At an altitude of a mile and a half the breath comes short when a
strain is put on the lungs and heart. Cig panted as he struggled up the
rock-strewn slope. The weight in his arms dragged him down. More than
once he slipped on the dry grass and just recovered himself without
stumbling. Before he reached the divide, he was hot and exhausted.
But he dared not stop to rest. Once, near the crest, he turned for an
instant to make sure he had not been seen. His eyes swept the road
anxiously. Nobody was in sight.
Ruth twisted her mouth free and began to shriek. He clamped his hand
over her lips again with an oath. It was all he could do to stagger
with her over the rocky brow.
Here, for the moment, he was safe. With the sleeve of his coat he wiped
the perspiration out of his eyes and from his face.
A saddled horse was tied to a stunted pine not far away. He dragged the
child to it, mounted, and hauled her up in front of him. A moment, and
the hoofs of the cowpony rang out as they struck the stony rubble.
Cig had never been on a horse till recently. It could not be claimed
that he really knew how to ride now. But he could stick on if the
animal was gentle. The ways of the West were not his ways. He could not
walk out a mile from the cabin where he was staying and not get lost,
unless he followed familiar trails. For he was up in the high lands of
the Rockies, in a district broken with ravines of twisted pines and
jutting rock outcroppings. Each hill and draw and gorge looked to him
just like its neighbor.
Cig rode into a small cañon the entrance of which was well concealed by
a growth of young quaking asps. Through these he pushed to a cabin on
the edge of the grove.
He dropped the child to the ground and swung down.
“You take me back to my daddy,” she sobbed.
“Nix on that stuff. Old Cig’s gonna keep yer right here with him. I’ll
learn Clint Reed how safe it is to beat me up like his men done.”
“I wantta go to my daddy. You take me to my daddy,” the child wailed.
The hobo picked up a switch lying on the ground. “Youse stop whinin’.
Hear me? I’ll not have it!” he snarled.
His manner was so threatening that the sobs stuck in her throat. She
shivered with dread, while she tried to fight back the expression of it.
“I--I want my sister Betty an’ my daddy,” she whimpered.
“Cut it out!” he ordered from a corner of his mouth.
Ruth flung herself to the ground and gave way to a passionate outbreak
of grief and terror. The violence of her emotion shook the small body
of the little girl.
Cig took a step toward her, switch in hand. He stopped. A sound had
reached him. Something was moving in the quaking asps.
Two men emerged along the winding trail. They were on horseback. The
one riding in front was Jake Prowers, the other Don Black.
The tramp waved a hand at them. “Woilcome to our city,” he called,
grinning toward them. “An’ look who’s here.”
Prowers pulled up. “What the jumpin’ Jehosaphat!” he exclaimed.
“I got lonesome, so I brought back comp’ny for myself,” explained Cig.
It was plain that he was proud of himself.
“Where’d you get her?” asked Black.
“Down above Elk Creek?”
“Was she lost?”
“Lost!” The tramp snickered. “Not so you could notice it none. She was
sittin’ in a car waitin’ for Clint Reed an’ that high-heeled goil of
his to come back.”
“But--what’s she doing here?” inquired Black, still in the dark.
“Why, I brought her.”
“What for?”
Cig sneered contempt. “Ain’t you got any brains under that big lid you
wear? I brought her because she’s Clint Reed’s kid, an’ I ain’t squared
my account with him. See?”
Any one watching closely would have seen a change in Black’s eyes.
Something hard and steely passed into them. “What you aimin’ to do with
her?” he asked quietly.
“Ain’t made up my mind. Mebbe I never will give her back. Mebbe I’ll
stick that bird Reed for a ransom. No can tell.”
“So?” Black swung from the saddle and lounged forward in the
bandy-legged, high-heeled fashion of the range rider. “I’ll do a li’l
guessin’ my own self. Mebbe I’ll take her right back to Clint p.d.q.”
The eyes of the crook narrowed. “Say, where d’youse get that stuff,
fellow? When was youse elected king o’ Prooshia?”
“What kind of an outfit do you figure this is?” the range rider asked.
“Think we’re makin’ war on kids, do you? Well, we’re not.”
“Who asked youse to butt in on my business?” Cig crouched, snarling, a
menace and a threat. “That ain’t supposed to be safe for black-headed
guys, I’ll tell the world.”
“Not yore business any more’n mine. We’re in this together. I’ll tell
you right now you can’t pull a play like that an’ get away with it.”
“Can’t I?” The New Yorker’s lip curled in a sneer. “Says _you_.”
“Says _I_.” Black’s steady gaze did not waver a thousandth part of an
inch.
Cig spoke to Prowers, jerking the thumb of his left hand toward the
cowpuncher. “What’s eatin’ this black bird? He claims to be sore at
this Reed guy, same as we are. He ain’t above stampedin’ cattle onto
sleepin’ men and croakin’ ’em. Mebbe he’s yellow an’ gettin’ ready to
rap to the bulls. Mebbe--”
The quid of tobacco stood out in Black’s cheek like a marble. His jaws
had stopped moving. He, too, addressed the old cattleman.
“Call off this wolf of yore’s, Jake, onless you want him sent to
Kingdom Come. Nobody can tell me I’m yellow without a come-back,” he
said in a low, even voice.
Prowers had been watching them both, curious, vigilant, small intent
eyes sweeping from one to the other as the quarrel progressed. Now he
spoke, curtly, first to the homesteader, then to the crook.
“Don’t pull yore picket pin, Don. That’ll be enough, Cig. I don’t need
any demonstration.”
Black did not for an instant relax his rigid wariness. “Tha’s what I’m
waitin’ to find out, Jake. He said I was yellow an’ gettin’ ready to
squeal.”
“Back water, you,” the ranchman ordered Cig.
Cig hesitated, still defiant. “I ain’t lookin’ for no trouble--”
“So, of course, you’ll tell Don there’s nothin’ to what you said, that
you was a li’l’ het up under the collar.”
“--but I ain’t duckin’ it either. I’m willing to eat what I said, but
he can’t dictate about the kid. See?”
The cattleman’s light eyes stabbed bleakly at the man. “You ain’t
playin’ a lone hand, Cig. Don’s right about it. We’re all in this. An’
another thing. Don’t you forget for a minute that you’ll do as I say,
you an’ Don both.”
Black looked at his employer with a kind of fierce resentment. He had
followed this man a good many years, not to his own good. There had
been times when he had been close to a break with him, but Prowers
held for him a sinister attraction. He never had liked him, yet could
not escape his influence.
“What about the kid? I’m standin’ pat on that, Jake,” he said sullenly.
The old cattleman reflected. By nature he had in him a vein secretive
and malignant. The thought of striking at Clint Reed through his little
girl was not repellent to him. But he had lived fifty years in the
West and knew its standards. The thing that Cig had done, unless it
were promptly repudiated by him, would make Paradise Valley and the
adjoining mountains buzz like a hornets’ nest. His allies would fall
away from him instantly.
“You’ll take the kid back home to Clint, Don,” Prowers said. “You’ll
tell him we sent her back soon as we found she had been taken. An’
that’s all you’ll tell him. No mention of Cig here. Understand?”
Black’s jaws began to move again regularly and evenly. “Suits me,” he
agreed. “When do I go?”
“Why, the sooner the quicker.”
The instinct of a child as to grown-ups is not always sound, but Ruth
knew which of these three was her friend. She had run to Black and
caught him by the coat, screening herself behind him. His hand rested
on the soft flaxen hair gently. Don was a bad _hombre_, a hard, tough
citizen. But something tugged at his heart now. He knew that if it had
been necessary bullets would have stabbed the air to save the little
girl who had put herself under his protection.
“Don’t forget, Don. Turn her over to Clint with my compliments. An’ you
brought her home soon as we found her. No explanations. Let him take it
or leave it.”
Black nodded. “I getcha. It’ll be thataway.”
After he had swung to the saddle he lifted the child to the back of the
horse. She was still sobbing.
“Don’cha, honey,” he soothed. “I’m takin’ you right home to yore paw.
That bad man ain’t ’a’ gonna hurt you none.”
He rode out of the cañon and across the hills. Nobody knew this country
better than Black. All his life he had ridden it. Following the path of
least resistance, he deflected many times from the airline that led to
the Diamond Bar K; but none could have traveled a shorter distance to
reach it.
Within the hour he was jogging down into Paradise Valley.
A cloud of dust in the distance caught his eye. It was moving swiftly
along a road toward him.
“Some folks in a powerful hurry,” he murmured aloud, and guessed at
once the reason for their haste.
His fingers closed for an instant on the butt of a revolver to make
sure there would be no hitch in the draw in case of need.
As the riders drew near, he held up the palm of his hand to stop them.
He counted eight. Clint Reed and Lon Forbes were in the lead. Betty was
among the others.
“I reckon I got here what you want, Clint,” Black said evenly.
He lowered Ruth from the saddle and she ran to her father. Clint swung
down and caught her into his arms with a sound in his throat that was
like a dry sob. He murmured broken endearments while he fondled her.
“Oh, daddy, my daddy!” Ruth wailed.
Betty swung from the saddle and ran to them. Clint passed the child
to her. They clung together, Betty crooning little love words of
happiness. “Ruthie--Ruthie--darling--precious!”
Between hugs and kisses Ruth explained. “A bad man tooked me ’way ’way
off on a horse ’n’ we rode ’n’ we rode. ’Nen anuvver man comed ’n’ said
he’d bring me home, ’n’ he did bring me, the nice man did.”
Reed strode across the road to the man who had brought back his child.
“I’ll hear your story, Black,” he said sternly.
“I don’t reckon I’ve got any story to tell, Clint--none in particular.
She was lost. I found her an’ brought her back. Ain’t that enough?”
“No. Where did you find her? Who took her?”
“Nothin’ doing on that witness-stand stuff,” the other answered. “Jake
Prowers an’ me was lookin’ for strays up on Elk Creek when we found
her. Jake told me to tell you here she was with his compliments. That’s
all I know.”
“You and Jake found her?”
“Yessir. Didn’t I tell you that twict?”
“Was she alone?”
“There was a guy with her, but I didn’t know him. He lit out.”
“What kind of lookin’ fellow?”
“Why, I didn’t see him right close.” The quid of tobacco stuck out in
the homesteader’s cheek. He watched Reed closely, jaws motionless.
“You’re not a good liar, Black. You know a lot more than you’re
telling,” the owner of the Diamond Bar K accused. “I’m gonna have it
out of you, man, if I have to tear it from your throat.”
Black’s figure stiffened. “Try any funny business with me, an’ I’ll
show you where to head in at, Clint,” he said quietly.
“Why don’t you ask the kid?” Forbes said in an aside to his employer.
“Black didn’t steal her. A blind man could see that.”
“He knows who did.”
“Sure, an’ he’s hell-bent not to tell. You won’t get it outa him. I
know Don.”
“It’s some of Jake Prowers’s work.”
“I don’t think it, Clint.” The foreman turned to Ruth. “Who was it took
you outa the automobile, honey?”
“A man. He was gonna whip me wiv a great big stick, like he said Daddy
did him.”
“What? Whip you, like--” Lon stopped to wrestle with and overthrow
a thought. “Why, dog-gone my hide, it’s that tramp Daniels has been
lookin’ for.”
Clint fired questions at Black like shots out of a machine gun. “Was he
a small man? Lean? Town clothes? Talk outa the corner of his mouth? A
rat-faced fellow? Fingers cigarette-stained?”
Black shook his head. “You’ve sure enough got me there, Clint. I only
seen him at a distance, but seemed like he was a big husky guy. Yes,
I’m ’most sure he was. Big as the side of a barn.”
“Did he seem big to you, Ruthie?” Lon asked gently.
“Umpha!” She nodded her head vigorously. “He was a nawful man, ’n’ he
said he’d whip me like Daddy did him.”
“Talk like this, honey?” Lon drew down a corner of his mouth and spoke
out of it. “‘De king o’ Prooshia on de job.’”
Her curls danced violently up and down with acquiescence.
The foreman turned to Reed. “He’s sure enough the same bird. Where’s
he been keepin’ himself at, you reckon?”
“Jake Prowers could tell us that,” his employer replied grimly.
This suggested another question to Forbes. “Listen, honey Ruth. This
here bad man--did him an’ Black here act kinda like they was friends?”
“They had a fuss,” she said.
“What about?” her father asked.
“’Bout me. The bad man said I wasn’t comin’ home to Daddy, ’n’ he said
I was too. They had a nawful fuss.”
“The bad man an’ Black here?”
She nodded. “’N’ he tooked me on his horse ’n’ broughted me.”
Forbes drew aside his friend and spoke low. “Looks like he’s got it
on you, Clint. Here’s about the size of it, the way I figure it. This
scalawag Cig’s hidin’ out in the hills. Jake Prowers is likely lookin’
after him. Well, he steals Ruth, an’ Don here bumps into him whilst
he’s makin’ his getaway. They have a rumpus, an’ Don brings her home.
He acted pretty near like a white man, seems to me. ’Course, he ain’t
gonna give away this tramp if he’s one of Prowers’s push. That wouldn’t
be hardly reasonable to expect.”
“No, I reckon not,” admitted Reed.
“You got no kick at Black. Hadn’t been for him I’ll bet Ruth wouldn’t
’a’ been here a-tall. Point is, that with him there Jake and this Cig
couldn’t put over any shenanigan.”
The owner of the Diamond Bar K stepped across to the homesteader. “Take
it all back, Don. I’m mightily obliged to you for bringing my li’l’
girl home. If I ever get a chance--”
Black interrupted. “Oh, that’s all right. What do you take me for,
anyhow? I ain’t any Apache. Why wouldn’t I bring a kid home when I find
her lost? You birds make me tired.”
He nodded brusquely, wheeled his horse, and rode away.