The Round-Up
The remainder of the journey was made in silence, and without further
mishap. The thick of the crude trail was left behind and they got on
to the well-beaten highway, trudging along at a fast gait until they
came to the Snake Loop with its two roads--one leading for a mile or
so along the lower shore line; the other running round Big Horn
Hills.
Jim stopped at the forks.
"Say!--I'm thinking three of us had better go by one way and four of
us by the other;--just in case of accidents.
"McLean, Phil and I can go the low way. You four go by the high road.
We can wait for each other at the junction further on."
The crowd split up and parted.
Jim, Phil and McLean had only got along about half a mile, when they
stopped up at the sound of the fast beating of horse hoofs on the
highway behind them.
They listened intently.
"Coming from Redmans," whispered McLean.
"Run on ahead and get in among the bushes at the bend there," shouted
Jim. "I'll keep to the road, and whoever he may be I'll stop him as he
comes up. If he tries to beat me to it,--shoot! See your ropes are
O.K., Mack, for you might have to use them quick."
The two hurried ahead and disappeared. Jim kept jogging along in the
middle of the road, slowly and innocently.
The clatter of the oncomer grew louder and louder, and beat faster.
A horseman came tearing along at breakneck speed. When he was some
twenty paces off, Jim swung round, levelled his rifle and shouted.
"Stop! Throw up your hands! Quick!"
The horse drew back on its haunches and sprang up in fear, but the
rider had it in check and held his seat. He steadied his beast and put
his hands up slowly.
Jim went forward. As he drew closer he recognised the rider--Red
McGregor.
"Get down!" ordered Jim, smiling grimly to himself.
McGregor seemed to recognise Langford at the same time and, thinking
Jim was alone, took a chance.
His off hand lowered and he pulled a gun quickly, but a shot and a
flash from the side of the road were quicker still. His arm dropped
limply and he yelled in pain and surprise.
"Get down!" ordered Jim again.
"You be damned!" cried McGregor, swinging his horse round and setting
spurs.
The horse sprang in response. Jim thought he was going to make it,
when a lariat flew out like a long snake, poised for a second over
Red's head and, in a second more, stretched him on the roadway,
half-choked.
McLean held the rope taut, while Jim and Phil ran in and secured their
prisoner.
"What'n the hell's the matter with you bunch," gasped Red. "Can't a
man go to Vernock when he damned-well wants to?"
"Not always, Red!" answered Jim. "It isn't always healthy to want to
go to Vernock."
"By God!--let me go and I'll take you on one at a time--two at a time
if you like. You, Langford,--I'll fix you for this anyway."
"We're going to fix you first, Rob Roy McGregor O!"
"I pretty near done you in last time, Langford. I'll make good and
sure next time,--you bet!"
"Oh, shut up!" exclaimed Jim, "you're wearing your windpipe out
talking."
They half pulled McGregor and half dragged him to a nearby tree, to
which they tied him securely, divesting him of his knife and other
articles that they considered he might feel constrained to use.
He cursed them roundly, until Jim tied Red's cravat round his mouth.
"Come on, boys! That's good enough! We don't want to take him along.
If we don't hurry up, that bunch may beat us to it yet."
They reached the junction of the two roads without further adventure.
Five minutes later, along came Morrison, Thompson, Deputy Chief Howden
and Blair, with one more--an unrecognised--in their company.
"What did you catch?" asked Jim.
"Just little Stitchy Summers!" replied Howden. "We found him out for a
constitutional, hoofing it for Vernock. Says he does it every morning
early for the good of his health. So we brought him along."
"We found a somnambulist, too," said Jim, "Rob Roy McGregor. We tied
him up at the roadside, in case he might wake up and hurt himself."
"Foxy trick that all the same--one each way to make sure of one
getting through!"
"Say!--you don't suppose they're wise?" asked Morrison.
"Sure they are!"
"But who could give the show away?"
"I'm thinking that sprained ankle of Brenchfield's was a darned
_lame_ excuse," Jim answered. And that was all they could get out of
him on the subject.
It was sufficient, however, to set all of them a-wondering. But no
shadow of suspicion had ever before crossed their minds, and they soon
dismissed the suggestion as one more distorted ridiculous romance from
the fertile brain of Jim Langford.
The whimpering Stitchy--like most of his kind; never a hero when
alone--was secured in the same way as Red had been, then the men
hunters continued to the top of the hill, where, as soon as dawn came
up, a good view would be had of the single road as it wound,
snake-like, for half a mile on the incline.
"It is five o'clock," remarked Jim. "With no mishaps, they should be
here any time now."
The seven men distributed themselves in the ditches and bushes--three
on one side and four on the other, at intervals of ten yards, covering
a distance of seventy yards in all.
As they lay there in the ditches by the roadside, the early morning
air bit sharp and chilly, having a touch of frost in it--the harbinger
of colder weather to come--but still retaining a dampness that
searched into the marrow.
A grey light was just beginning to spear the darkness on the top of
Blue Nose Mountain away to the east. A heavy blanket of cold fog
completely enveloped the low-lying lands. Suddenly, the dark leaden
sky seemed to break up into ten thousand sections of gloomy
puff-clouds, all sailing hap-hazard inside a dome of the lightest,
brightest blue. The sun, cold to look at but shining with the light of
a blazing ball, rode up over the hills, sending great shafts of
searchlight down the sides of the hills and filling the ghostly valley
below, with its tightly-packed firs and skeleton-like pine trees, with
a warm, yellow mist, suggestive of luminous smoke rising from some
fairy cauldron of molten gold; transforming the dead, chilly night
into a crisp, living, moving, late-autumn morning.
As the mists completely melted away, Jim signalled to Phil and Phil
repeated to McLean. The sign was passed along the other side as well.
Away down the roadway, at the turn between the low-lying hills, a
heavy team appeared, struggling in front of a great wagon, piled high
with produce of some kind. Another came into view, and still another,
until eight of them, following closely on one another, crept along in
what seemed to be a caterpillar movement.
As they came unsuspectingly onward, the drivers urging their
horses--cheerful in the knowledge that the worst of their journey was
successfully over--the silent watchers crept closer to cover, fearful
that the brightening day would betray their whereabouts. But nothing
untoward happened, except that a closer view of the oncomers gave out
the fact that every wagon was loaded high with alfalfa, while what
were looked for were wagon-loads of flour and feed.
McLean wormed his way past Phil and along to Jim.
"Dommit,--we're fooled!" he whispered angrily.
"Deevil the fool! Get back, Mack,--get back!"
"But it's alfalfa they've got. You canna risk holding them up when
maybe the bunch we're after are comin' along hauf a mile ahin'."
Jim bit his lip. This was something he had not reckoned on.
All at once his knowledge of Scottish History came to his aid.
"Something tells me they're the crowd we're after," he answered in a
low voice. "And we've got them--every mother's son o' them. Lord sake,
Mack! I'm surprised at ye. You a Scot and you canna remember the
takin' o' Linlithgow Castle! What was under the hay-carts then,
laddie?--what? but good, trusty highlanders. And what's under the
alfalfa now but good feed and flour that'll show in your next Profit
and Loss Account in red figures if you don't recover it. It's a fine
trick, but it is too thin.
"Go back! Signal the others to hold them up at all costs."
And McLean went back, bewildered but as nearly convinced as a Scot can
be who has not the logical proof right under his nose.
Slowly the teams came straggling up the incline, coming nearer and
nearer the men in ambush, until the latter could see clearly that
every driver was a half-breed and that every man of them had a
rifle across his knees. When they were well within the line, the
preconcerted signal--Howden's rifle--rang out.
Taking chances, the deputy chief sprang out into the centre of the
road and shouted, covering the leader. Three men on one side and three
on the other sprang up and covered six of the drivers.
Some of the half-breeds immediately threw up their hands, taken
completely by surprise. But a shot, fired by one of the uncovered
drivers, sang out and big McLean dropped with a bullet through his
thigh.
Howden sprang on to the first wagon, knocked the driver over, kicked
his rifle aside and climbed right on top of the load, bringing down
the man who shot McLean as neatly as could be with his revolver.
That ended what little fight there was in the gang. The half-breeds
had no chance, with their horses getting excited and their heavy loads
beginning to back on them down-hill.
In a short time, they were all unarmed and secured. McLean and the
wounded half-breed were made comfortable on top of some alfalfa, the
other seven drivers were set in front of their wagons, under guard,
and the entire outfit was soon making its return trip to Vernock.
"Cheer up, Mack!" shouted Jim, by way of heartening.
"Tell me," groaned McLean, "what is under the alfalfa?"
"Just what I told you already, Mack,--good honest flour and feed in
one hundred pound sacks, which will help to swell the credit side of
your next balance sheet."
"The Lord be thankit!" he groaned. "But I wish one of them had been
loaded up with King George's Special."
Jim shot out his tongue.
"Me too!" he answered pawkily.
They had not got very far on their journey, when a lone horseman came
dashing toward them over the hill from the direction of Vernock.
It was Chief Palmer. His horse was in a lather and the Chief looked as
if he had ridden hard and had been out all night to boot. He wore a
crestfallen expression when he drew up alongside.
"Hullo!" he cried, with an assumption of gaiety. "Holding up the quiet
farmer on the public highway? Captured the gang, eh?"
Immensely proud of himself and his achievement, Howden jumped down,
intending to give his chief a full account of the capture, but Palmer
seemed in no mood to listen, and told him he had better keep his story
for later on, and look after his prisoners.
"You don't seem particularly gay over it, Chief!" commented Jim.
"Why should I?" he replied. "I've ridden for two hours, hoping to be
in time for the scrap, and you fellows beat me to it."
The journey townward continued.
When nearing their destination, they were joined by two more horsemen,
Brenchfield--his left foot heavily bound round the ankle--and one of
his white ranch hands. The Mayor was surly as usual and seemed in
desperation to get in touch with Chief Palmer, who obligingly dropped
behind with him. As they brought up the rear, they indulged in a very
earnest conversation.
When the wagons were safely harboured in the Police Yard and the
thieves safely jailed under lock and key, the Chief, as if to make
amends for his previous surliness, shook hands all round and
congratulated the men on their coup.
"This will help to make an interesting calendar for the next Assizes,
boys. I'll be after all of you for witnesses, so don't get on the
rampage anywhere in between times."
"I guess, Morrison, old chap," broke in Brenchfield, "this will end
the flour and feed racket for some time to come. We fellows will have
a chance to make a little profit out of our businesses at last."
"Oh, you haven't much to worry over," replied Morrison. "You haven't
all your eggs in one basket like I have. It is just pin-money for you,
but it means bread and butter and bed for me and mine."
Brenchfield steered his horse alongside and laid his hand sympathetically
on the old man's shoulder.
"Never mind, Morrison! It is all over now,--so here's to better
days."
Morrison was not very responsive, and the Mayor excused himself on the
plea of his ankle, his want of sleep and the further pressure of
mayoral business.
"Darn it!" exclaimed Morrison to Jim and Phil, as he left them at the
end of the avenue, "I used to like Brenchfield, but I don't know
what's come over me lately with him. When he laid his hand on me a few
minutes ago, I felt as if a wet toad was squatting on the back of my
neck."
When they reached home, Jim did not go to his own room immediately. He
followed into Phil's and sat down on the edge of the bed as Phil
commenced to get out of his clothes preparatory to having a bath.
"Well!--what did you think of it, Phil?" he asked, glad, evidently, to
be alone with his comrade where he could at last express his thoughts
and pent-up feelings freely.
"Pretty work!"
"What?"
"I said I thought it was pretty work. We did a clean job;--got all we
went out for."
"Like the devil we did!" shot out Jim.
"Why!--what did we forget, grouchy?"
"Everything! They're too blamed wise for us, that bunch, and they're
too many."
Phil stopped pulling off a sock and looked over at Jim.
"Aw, come off!" cried the other. "Let in the daylight, man! What did
we get anyway?"
"We got the thieves, didn't we?"
"Not by a jugfull! Half a dozen half-breed teamsters,--that's all!"
"Armed and driving stolen goods!"
"Yes! I grant that, but what good is that going to do?"
"Well, Jim,--you've discovered the plan they have been operating for
doing away with the stuff. That is something."
"Sure!--that too, and it will end the wholesale thieving for a bit,
till they find another way. It will give poor old Morrison a chance to
recoup."
"Then I guess you always expect too much, Jim. You're never
contented."
"Why should I be;--with Brenchfield's foreman and head-boss rotter Red
McGregor, and that sneaky little devil Stitchy Summers not among the
casualties."
"But Palmer will get them, won't he?"
"Not on your life!"
"Why not? We stopped each of them making for the gang to warn them
off."
"How are we to prove that? They might have been going anywhere. Why
man!--that pair could pretty nearly nail us for unprovoked assault."
Phil laughed.
"And they were the men who were conducting the entire steal when I
fell in among them in the cellar;--but I can't prove it."
"You're sure they were, Jim?"
"Of course I'm sure. Red hit me on the head with the butt-end of his
quirt. I'll get him one for it too, before I'm done."
"And they engineered the whole affair, set the teamsters on their
journey, then beat it ahead for Redmans?"
"'Oh noble judge! O excellent young man,'" Jim quoted sarcastically.
Phil felt the thrust. He went over to the bed, tilted up Jim's chin
with his forefinger and looked straight into his mischievous eyes.
"Seeing you know so much, Jim Langford,--tell me more. What side is
Brenchfield on in this affair?"
Jim grew serious all of a sudden.
"Now you're talking!" he exclaimed, his eyes snapping angrily and his
voice throwing fire. "I've had no darned use for that son-of-a-gun for
some considerable time. He has his nose in everything. He pretty
nearly bosses the whole Valley. He's political boss, Mayor, rancher,
and God knows what else. If he isn't crooked, why does he have his
biggest ranch right in the thick of that Indian settlement? He has the
whole of the breeds on the reservation under his thumb. He's a party
heeler, a grafter from away back, and everybody falls for him. And
yet,--good Land!--if you did so much as open your mouth against him,
you'd get run out of town."
"Go on! Go on!" applauded Phil. "I like to hear you."
"Yes!--and _you've_ got the biggest grudge against him of any for
something or other, or I'm not Wayward Langford. But you're so darned
tight about it."
Phil's applause ended abruptly.
"Thought that would stop you!" grinned Jim. "But that man, and the
blindness of the so-called wise men of this wee burg make me
positively sick in the stomach.
"Who's at the back of the whole feed steal?--Brenchfield! Half-breeds
didn't make that tunnel. It is a white man's job all through. It
was all nicely done. Oh, ay! A tunnel to the three warehouses,
Brenchfield's included! Thieving right and left and Brenchfield
always losing a bit--to himself--every time; just to keep up
appearances; and getting richer and richer every theft until he
owns about as much land and gear as Royce Pederstone does!"
"Well then, Jim;--why can't that fertile brain of yours devise
something to land him on this?"
"Weel ye may ask!" answered Jim, breaking into the Doric, "and I canna
answer ye.
"We can't prove a thing on him. He would plead absolute ignorance of
the entire affair; that he had been away for weeks and only got in
yesterday with Royce Pederstone, and was at the dance when it
happened. Everybody would believe him and sympathise with him too
because of an apparent endeavour to blacken the character of a public
man, a prominent citizen and a local benefactor--one who himself had
lost so much by the thefts--for, mark you, Brenchfield has made much
of it in his conversations."
"Can't Chief Palmer make the half-breeds talk? They will surely be
pretty sore over the raw deal that has been handed out to them."
"Palmer be jiggered! He is another of Brenchfield's cronies, and is
feathering his nest like the rest of them. I'll be very much surprised
if the innocent Howden isn't fired by this time for his share in this
morning's work. I'm half sorry I dragged him into it."
"Couldn't a good lawyer wriggle something out of the Indians at the
trial?"
"He might,--but the Indians will be darned well paid to keep their
mouths shut. Believe me!--it'll fizzle out. You watch and see!"
Jim sat quiet for a bit, then he began again.
"And that kind of animal has the nerve to want to marry little Eilie
Pederstone. Oh, hell!--I'd better stop or I'll burst a blood-vessel or
something.
"Say!"
"Speak on!"
"Are you going to work after breakfast?"
"Of course!" answered Phil. "Aren't you?"
"No!"
"Are you going to bed?"
"Not yet! This is Saturday morning, man. My usual monthly 'Penny
Horrible' is only half finished and it has to be ready before mail
time."
Phil laughed.
"What is the name of it this month, Jim?"
"'Two Fingered Pete's Come-back, a Backwoods Mystery.'"
"Sounds exciting!" remarked Phil. "I think I would like to read that
one. Save a copy for me, Jim, when it comes along."
"De'il the fear! It'll never be said that Jim Langford, alias Captain
Mayne Plunkett, alias Aunt Christina, ever put anything your way that
would fire you, in your rashness, to disgrace me and make a fool of
yourself."
Jim changed the subject again.
"Phil, why don't you cut that bluffer, Brenchfield, out?"
"Me? What harm have I done, Jim?"
"That'll do, laddie. You can't brazen it out that way. Man, I'd give
my wee pinkie to see it happen."
"Oh, don't talk rot!" returned Phil, serious as an owl, nevertheless
pale at the lips. "What chance has an impecunious day-labourer like me
with Miss Pederstone?
"Why don't you try yourself? You're mighty good at arranging things
for your friends."
Jim laughed.
Phil turned his head and glared at him; and Jim laughed more
uproariously.
"What are you yelling your Tom-fool head off for? I don't see anything
funny about the proposition."
"What? You can't see anything funny in it? Gee, Phil!--but you're
dull. Eileen Pederstone hitched to Wayward Langford, booze fighter,
ne'er-do-weel, good-for-nothing, never-worked-and-never-will;
a-penny-a-liner; Aunt Christina and Captain Mayne Plunkett!"
He became sober again.
"Man, Phil!--I'm ashamed of you even suggesting it. I once fell in
love. Don't get anxious; it was a long time ago when I had ambitions
of becoming Lord Chief Justice, or at least a High Court Judge."
"Yes!"
"The lady and I fell out over her father. He asked me one night how
much money I had in the bank. I was eighteen.
"I told him I had twenty pounds.
"'Tuts, tuts!' said the old fellow, who was one of those human
fireworks--all fizzle and flare,--'that isn't enough to keep a cat.'
"'We know it,' I answered, speaking for both of us, 'but we thought we
might manage to run along for a while without the cat.'"
Phil laughed.
"The old chapie got angry, and the girl sacked me because I was
rude to papa and flippant about the most serious thing in the
world--marriage. She couldn't see the joke. Imagine, Phil, being
married to a woman that couldn't see a joke!
"That was the very nearest I ever got. And believe me----!
"Now you, for instance; you're different, you're just made for married
life; you're young, big, handsome, mannerly, sober, sometimes
diligent, ambitious. You don't smoke much, you don't swear--not all
the time--and you can chop wood and brush your own boots. You----"
But Jim got no further. A cushion, well aimed, stopped his flow of
talk.
"All right, all right! We'll say no more. Go and have your bath! You
need it. Give your soul a touch o' soap and water when you are at
it."