Casey studied that until he had the fresh pipeful of tobacco going
well. Then he looked up and grinned understandingly.
"So it's White Mule you're trailin'." He kicked a stub of greasewood
branch back into the flames and laughed. "Well, the tracks is deep an'
plenty, and if that's the trail you're takin', I'm with yuh. You ain't
a cop--leastways you don't spread your arms every time you turn around.
Gosh, I hate them wing-floppin' kind! They's one thing an' one only
that I hate worse--an' that's bootleggers an' moonshiners. If you got
a scheme to give them cusses their needin's, you can ask anybody if
Casey Ryan ain't the feller you can bank on."
"Yes. That's what I've been thinking. Now, I wish you'd tell me
exactly what you've been up against. Don't leave out anything, however
trivial it might seem to you."
Wherefore, Casey sat with the firelight flickering across his seamed,
Irish face and told the story of his wrongs. Trivial details Nolan had
asked for--and he got them with the full Casey Ryan flavor. Even the
old woman who rocked, Casey pictured--from his particular angle. Mack
Nolan sat up and listened, his eyes steady and his mouth, that had
curved to laughter many times during the recital, once more firm and
somewhat pitiless when Casey finished.
"This Smiling Lou; you'd know him again, of course?"
"Know him! Say, I'd know him after he'd fried a week in hell!" Casey's
tone left no doubt of his meaning.
"And I suppose you could tell this man Kenner a mile off and around a
corner. Now, I'll tell you what I want you to do, Casey. This may jar
you a little--until I explain. I want you--" Mack Nolan paused, his
lips twitching in a faint smile--"to do a little bootlegging yourself."
"Yuh--WHAT?" In the firelight Casey's eyes were seen to bulge.
"I want you to bootleg this whisky you've got in the car." Nolan's eyes
twinkled. "I want you to go back and peddle this booze, and I want you
to do it so that Smiling Lou or one of his bunch will hold you up and
highjack you. Do you see what I mean? You don't--so I'll tell you.
We'll put it in marked bottles. I have the bottles and the seals and
labels for every brand of liquor to be had in the country to-day. With
marked money and marked bottles, we ought to be able to get the goods
on that gang."
Casey thought of something quite suddenly and held out an imperative,
pointing finger.
"There's something else that feller told me was in the car!" he cried
agitatedly. "He said he had forty pints of French champagne cached in
a false bottom under the front seat. And he said the front cushion had
a blind pocket around the edges that was full uh dope. Hop, he called
it."
Mack Nolan whistled under his breath.
"And he turned the whole outfit over to you for sixteen hundred dollars
or so?" He stared thoughtfully into the fire. Abruptly he looked at
Casey.
"What the deuce had you done to him, Ryan?" he asked, with a quizzical
intentness. "He must have been scared stiff, to let go of all that
stuff for sixteen hundred. Why, man, the 'junk'--that's dope--alone
must be worth more than that. And the champagne--forty pints, you say?
He ought to get twenty dollars a pint for that. Figure it yourself. I
hope," he added seriously, "the fellow wasn't too scared to show up
again."
"Well," Casey said grimly, "I dunno how scart he is--but he knows darn'
well I'll kill 'im. I told im I would."
Again Mack Nolan laughed. "Catching's much better than killing, Ryan.
It hurts a man worse, and it lasts a heap longer. What do you say to
turning in? To-morrow we'll have a full day at my private bottling
works."
They moved their cooking outfit down near the Ford for safety's sake.
While it was wholly improbable that the car would be robbed in the
night, Mack Nolan was a man who took as few chances as possible. It
happened that the excavation Casey had so hopefully made that morning
formed a convenient level for their bed; wherefore they spread it
there, talking in low tones of their plans until they went to sleep.