Irish walked down to the sheriff’s office, where he found “Shorty”
Long, the deputy, enjoying a siesta. Irish and Shorty had always been
good friends, and Shorty was glad to see him.
“Doggone, yuh look good, Irish! Hyah, Kid, long time no see.”
“That’s right, Shorty. I didn’t know how I stood with the law, so I
thought I’d beard the lion in his den.”
“Jim Corwin is out.” Shorty grinned. “I reckon yuh stand all right with
the law, far as I know. At least, the law of Dancin’ Flats, Irish. Set
down and rest yore hind feet, boy. Everybody is talkin’ about you. The
preacher says yuh’re a crusader for the right, whatever that is.”
“Preachers have never paid much attention to me, Shorty.”
“Me neither. But John Calvin is a little different. You’ll like him.”
“I didn’t come here to go to church, Shorty.”
“I know yuh didn’t, Irish. Everybody is talkin’ about why yuh came
here, and they’re even makin’ bets that yuh don’t last a week. I hear
that Slim Duarte is takin’ bets on yuh.”
Irish grinned slowly. “Slim Duarte is, eh? He’s bettin’ that I don’t
last, eh?”
“I don’t reckon Slim has forgotten what happened the day you left here,
Irish. Neither has Jim Corwin, but he ain’t bettin’.”
“What’s yore bet, Shorty?”
“Me? I don’t bet; I just hope yuh win.”
“Yuh do, eh? Shorty, you’ve been here with Corwin for a long time, and
you’ve got two good ears, so what about these Night Hawks? Are people
scared of ’em?”
“Yeah, I reckon they’re a little scary of talkin’. Nobody knows who they
are, nor how many there are. They make the sheriff’s office look awful
bad, Irish. They leave notes, yuh know, sayin’ that the law works too
slow, and all that. Jim don’t like ’em.”
Irish smiled. “Shorty, if the odds get long enough, maybe I’ll risk a
few dollars myself.”
“Yuh mean yuh’re so confident on winnin’ that you’d take a chance on
yore own money, Irish?”
“Look at it this way, Shorty. If I come out on top, I can use the money,
but if I’m loser--well, I can’t take it with me.”
“Yea-a-a-ah!” breathed Shorty. “That’s right. Shucks, you can afford to
bet every cent you’ve got.”
Irish smiled. “I reckon I’ll go out to the ranch and wait for the odds
to get bigger. See yuh later, Shorty.”
People on the street looked curiously at Irish as he rode his sorrel
down the main street of Dancing Flats. Some of them shook their heads.
One man said to another:
“I knowed Irish Delaney when he lived here, and he was a nice boy until
he lost his temper, but he’s become a rash fool, talkin’ like he has.”
“Packs his gun low,” observed the other man pointedly.
“Yeah, and he can sling it, too. Hank Farley learned him that. When
he was twelve years old he could pull a gun and hit tin cans throwed
in the air. But his shootin’ ability won’t save him. He’s buttin’ his
sorrel head ag’in a stone wall.”
Irish Delaney realized it, too. One man against an unseen and unknown
organization, an organization that would not stop at murder, made his
chances very slim indeed. Irish believed that they had murdered Hank
Farley, and that the only way to unmask them was to force their hand.
All they would have to do would be to shoot him from ambush, pin a
note on his shirt-front--and the Night Hawks would be more powerful
than ever.
* * * * *
He had a long talk with Johnny and Tucson that evening, hoping that
they might remember somebody who hated Hank Farley enough to murder
him, but to no avail. Neither of them had ever heard of Hank Farley
having a deadly enemy. The time element meant nothing. There was no
record of the Night Hawks, until they found the body of Hank Farley.
It was their first job. Every sheriff in that part of the state had
tried to find the Ghost Rider.
Tucson insisted that the Ghost Rider had an accomplice.
“He had to have, I tell yuh,” insisted the old man. “Evidence proved
it.”
“But he pulled every other job alone,” said Johnny McCune.
“Mebbe. Yuh can’t tell--mebbe the other man hung back ready to step in
if things got tough. Everybody looks for one man, and all the time there
was two.”
“What about descriptions?” asked Irish. “Men must have seen the Ghost
Rider and knew what size he was.”
“Well, I dunno about that, Irish,” replied Johnny. “When a man’s got a
gun centered on yuh--size don’t mean much.”
“Uncle Hank didn’t have no close friend--nobody he’d pull a job like
that with, did he?”
“Uncle Hank never done it!” declared Tucson.
“Yo’re just hard-headed and soft-hearted, Tucson,” said Johnny.
The talk shifted to other things, and Irish mentioned seeing Nell in
town.
“She’s aged, don’t yuh think, Irish? Who wouldn’t--livin’ with Briggs.
He’s been drinkin’ a lot, and he’s awful jealous of her. Briggs don’t
get along with Ed Shearer. Briggs spends most of his evenin’s at the
Turquoise, drinkin’ up the profits, and I reckon she sets at home,
waitin’ for him to come home and cuss at her. Yuh know, Irish, he hates
the preacher.” Johnny grinned widely. “He’s jealous of the preacher.
Won’t let Nell go to church.”
“You’re jokin’, ain’t yuh, Johnny?”
“Ask anybody. The preacher knows it.”
“Well, I dunno,” sighed Irish. “Nobody can be as foolish as people.”
It was nearly midnight when they went to bed that night, and none of
them had gone to sleep, when fast-traveling hoofs beat up to the
front of the house. Johnny McCune slept on a cot in the main room. He
lighted a lamp, picked up his gun and went to the door, for someone
was knocking.
“This is Jim Corwin, Johnny!” called a voice, and Johnny opened the
door.
It was the sheriff and Shorty Long. Tucson came in from one doorway and
Irish Delaney from another. Irish had a gun in his hand. The sheriff
looked them over, but spoke to Irish.
“How long ago did you come here, Irish?” he asked sharply.
“Before supper,” replied Irish, and the other two men nodded.
“He’s been here all evenin’, talkin’ with us, Jim,” said McCune.
“Has, eh? Well, that’s lucky for him.”
“What’s all this hocus-pocus about, Corwin?” asked Irish.
“No hocus-pocus,” replied the sheriff. “Somebody shot Al Briggs tonight,
and somebody stuck up Slim Duarte, and cleaned out his safe.”
None of the three men had any comment to make. Irish placed his gun on
the table, picked up a cigarette-paper and tobacco and began rolling a
cigarette.
“And you thought I done it, eh?” he said coldly. “Thanks.”
“You had trouble with Al Briggs today,” accused the sheriff.
* * * * *
Deliberately Irish lighted his cigarette over the chimney of the lamp,
and squinted away from the smoke. “Trouble? I didn’t have trouble with
Briggs. He’d been drinkin’--and I walked out on him. What was the
evidence against me in the Slim Duarte job?”
“Well, it was a masked man about yore size, Irish,” replied the sheriff.
“I see. Sorry to disappoint yuh, Corwin, but I was here.”
“Is Al Briggs dead?” asked Johnny.
“Dead’s a doorknob,” said Shorty Long. “Slim don’t know how much money
he’s lost--somethin’ over four thousand dollars.”
“Was the masked man dressed in gray?” asked Tucson.
“No, he wasn’t,” replied the sheriff testily.
“Looks like another crime wave was startin’,” remarked the deputy. “I
figure the killer was also the robber. Everybody was so upset over Al
Briggs that the man pried open the window of Slim’s little office,
slipped in and waited for Slim to come. Then he made Slim open the
safe.”
“Where did he kill Briggs?” asked Johnny.
“Right in front of my office!” snapped the sheriff. “I was at the
Turquoise.”
“Made it easy for yuh to find the body, Jim,” said Tucson, dryly.
“In front of yore office,” said Irish. “That’s kind of funny.”
“What’s the difference where he was shot?” asked the sheriff.
“None, I reckon. Was Al Briggs armed?”
“He had a gun in his pocket, if that’s what yuh mean.”
“I could have meant that, I reckon.”
“Well,” said the sheriff, “we might as well go back, Shorty.”
“Have yuh tried any of the other ranches?” asked Tucson. “Yuh never can
tell what yore luck might be, Jim.”
Jim Corwin told Tucson where he could go, and they walked out. Tucson
chuckled quietly. “I like to rub Jim the wrong way,” he said.
“You were pretty lucky, Irish,” remarked Johnny. Irish smiled.
“Corwin wants to count coup on my scalp, I reckon, Johnny.”
“I can’t figure Al Briggs gettin’ killed,” said Tucson.
“Irish,” said Johnny. “What was yore idea in askin’ if Briggs had a
gun?”
“I don’t know, Johnny. I just wondered.”
“You didn’t have no trouble with Briggs, did yuh, Irish?”
“No. I was talkin’ with Nell, when Al came in. He sent her away, and
tried to start an argument with me about talkin’ to her, but I told
him he was drunk and walked out.”
Tucson yawned. “Well, we might as well go back to bed.”
Jim Corwin and Shorty Long went back to Dancing Flats. There was still a
crowd in the Turquoise. They found Slim Duarte and told him that Irish
Delaney had an iron-clad alibi.
“McCune and Thomas would lie for him,” said Duarte.
“All right, Slim, think what yuh like but when two men swear he was
there with them all evenin’, yuh’re stuck. How much did he get away
with?”
“About six thousand dollars,” replied Duarte grimly. “I was a fool to
keep that much in my safe but it’s too late now.”
V
When Irish and Johnny arrived at Dancing Flats next morning, the general
store was closed. Ed Shearer was in town, talking with the sheriff and
the minister, when Irish and Johnny rode in. Both Ed Shearer and the
sheriff looked rather bleakly at Irish, but the minister shook hands
with him. Johnny said:
“We thought we’d ride in and get more information.”
Irish looked around on the wooden sidewalk. Jim Corwin said:
“Right here’s where the body was found, Irish.”
“Kinda funny--no blood-stains,” remarked Irish.
No one said anything, but all five men looked at the weathered planking.
Then the sheriff said:
“That’s right--I didn’t notice. It is kinda--funny, ain’t it?”
“He must have bled,” said Johnny McCune. “Usually do.”
“His shirt was all bloody,” said the sheriff.
“Mrs. Briggs is standing it well,” said the minister. “She is very
brave.”
“Al was drinkin’ hard all day,” said Shearer.
“That wasn’t anythin’ new,” remarked Johnny McCune. “He’s been drunk for
a year. Anythin’ new on the robbery, Jim?”
The big sheriff shook his head. “Nothin’ new, Johnny. Duarte says the
man got six thousand dollars.”
“I think I’ll go down to the house,” said Shearer. “Better go with me,
Parson.”
“I shall be very glad to be of any assistance,” replied the minister.
They walked away together. Johnny said:
“Jim, do yuh think the killer was the same one who robbed the saloon?”
“What’s the difference? We don’t know who either one was. It’s kind of
funny that Briggs was killed here in front of my office.”
“I don’t believe he was,” said Irish. The sheriff looked quickly at the
cowboy.
“Why do yuh say that?” he asked sharply.
“No blood, Corwin. I believe he was shot some place else and placed
here.”
“Nonsense! We heard the shot.”
“You heard _a_ shot, Corwin. There was nothin’ to stop a killer from
shootin’ in the air, was there?”
“No, I don’t reckon there was. Hm-m-m-m. Could be. But why not let us
find him where he was shot?”
“And incriminate the killer?”
“Yeah, I see what yuh mean, Irish. But that don’t do us any good. No
matter where he was killed, it’s still murder.”
“Could he have been shot some’ers else and walked here?” asked Johnny.
The sheriff shook his head quickly.
“He was shot plumb through the heart, Johnny.”
“Then he didn’t do much walkin’. Well, Irish, I think I’ll walk up to
the post office and get the mail.”
“I’ll go with yuh, Johnny. See yuh later, Corwin.”
There was the usual crowd around the little post office, arguing about
the murder and robbery. Irish knew many of them, and they knew that
Irish had been an immediate suspect. Johnny McCune got the mail, and
they walked outside. As they walked over to their horses Johnny said
quietly:
“There’s a letter for you, Irish, and the handwritin’ is the same as on
the letter I got.”
“Keep it until we get out of the town, Johnny. That gang is watchin’ us
now.”
* * * * *
Outside of Dancing Flats, Johnny gave the letter to Irish. It was poorly
addressed in pencil to Irish Delaney, care of the Flying M. Inside was a
sheet of paper on which was penciled:
DELANEY, YOU ARE A FOOL AND A BRAGGART. THE LAW CAN’T TOUCH
YOU, BUT WE CAN. GET OUT--AND STAY OUT. WE ONLY WARN ONCE.