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To Hale’s surprise, a burst of laughter from the party followed this speech. He tried to join in, but this ridiculous summary of the result of his enthusiastic sense of duty left him—the only earnest believer mortified and embarrassed. Nor was he the less concerned as he found the girl’s dark eyes had rested once or twice upon him curiously. Zenobia laughed too, and, lazily turning the chair around, dropped into it. “And by this time George Lee’s loungin’ back in his chyar and smokin’ his cigyar somewhar in Sacramento,” she added, stretching her feet out to the fire, and suiting the action to the word with an imaginary cigar between the long fingers of a thin and not over-clean hand.
“We cave, Zeenie!” said Rawlins, when their hilarity had subsided to a more subdued and scarcely less flattering admiration of the unconcerned goddess before them. “That’s about the size of it. You kin rake down the pile. I forgot you’re an old friend of George’s.”
“He’s a white man!” said the girl decidedly.
“Ye used to know him?” continued Rawlins.
“Once. Paw ain’t in that line now,” she said simply.
There was such a sublime unconsciousness of any moral degradation involved in this allusion that even Hale accepted it without a shock. She rose presently, and, going to the little sideboard, brought out a number of glasses; these she handed to each of the party, and then, producing a demijohn of whiskey, slung it dexterously and gracefully over her arm, so that it rested on her elbow like a cradle, and, going to each one in succession, filled their glasses. It obliged each one to rise to accept the libation, and as Hale did so in his turn he met the dark eyes of the girl full on his own. There was a pleased curiosity in her glance that made this married man of thirty-five color as awkwardly as a boy.
The tender of refreshment being understood as a tacit recognition of their claims to a larger hospitality, all further restraint was removed. Zenobia resumed her seat, and placing her elbow on the arm of her chair, and her small round chin in her hand, looked thoughtfully in the fire. “When I say George Lee’s a white man, it ain’t because I know him. It’s his general gait. Wot’s he ever done that’s underhanded or mean? Nothin’! You kant show the poor man he’s ever took a picayune from. When he’s helped himself to a pile it’s been outer them banks or them express companies, that think it mighty fine to bust up themselves, and swindle the poor folks o’ their last cent, and nobody talks o’ huntin’ THEM! And does he keep their money? No; he passes it round among the boys that help him, and they put it in circulation. HE don’t keep it for himself; he ain’t got fine houses in Frisco; he don’t keep fast horses for show. Like ez not the critter he did that job with—ef it was him—none of you boys would have rid! And he takes all the risks himself; you ken bet your life that every man with him was safe and away afore he turned his back on you-uns.”
“He certainly drops a little of his money at draw poker, Zeenie,” said Clinch, laughing. “He lost five thousand dollars to Sheriff Kelly last week.”
“Well, I don’t hear of the sheriff huntin’ him to give it back, nor do I reckon Kelly handed it over to the Express it was taken from. I heard YOU won suthin’ from him a spell ago. I reckon you’ve been huntin’ him to find out whar you should return it.” The laugh was clearly against Clinch. He was about to make some rallying rejoinder when the young girl suddenly interrupted him. “Ef you’re wantin’ to hunt somebody, why don’t you take higher game? Thar’s that Jim Harkins: go for him, and I’ll join you.”
“Harkins!” exclaimed Clinch and Hale simultaneously.
“Yes, Jim Harkins; do you know him?” she said, glancing from one to the other.
“One of my friends do,” said Clinch laughing; “but don’t let that stop you.”
“And YOU—over there,” continued Zenobia, bending her head and eyes towards Hale.
“The fact is—I believe he was my banker,” said Hale, with a smile. “I don’t know him personally.”
“Then you’d better hunt him before he does you.”
“What’s HE done, Zeenie?” asked Rawlins, keenly enjoying the discomfiture of the others.
“What?” She stopped, threw her long black braids over her shoulder, clasped her knee with her hands, and rocking backwards and forwards, sublimely unconscious of the apparition of a slim ankle and half-dropped-off slipper from under her shortened gown, continued, “It mightn’t please HIM,” she said slyly, nodding towards Hale.
“Pray don’t mind me,” said Hale, with unnecessary eagerness.
“Well,” said Zenobia, “I reckon you all know Ned Falkner and the Excelsior Ditch?”
“Yes, Falkner’s the superintendent of it,” said Rawlins. “And a square man too. Thar ain’t anything mean about him.”
“Shake,” said Zenobia, extending her hand. Rawlins shook the proffered hand with eager spontaneousness, and the girl resumed: “He’s about ez good ez they make ‘em—you bet. Well, you know Ned has put all his money, and all his strength, and all his sabe, and—”
“His good looks,” added Clinch mischievously.
“Into that Ditch,” continued Zenobia, ignoring the interruption. “It’s his mother, it’s his sweetheart, it’s his everything! When other chaps of his age was cavortin’ round Frisco, and havin’ high jinks, Ned was in his Ditch. ‘Wait till the Ditch is done,’ he used to say. ‘Wait till she begins to boom, and then you just stand round.’ Mor’n that, he got all the boys to put in their last cent—for they loved Ned, and love him now, like ez ef he wos a woman.”
“That’s so,” said Clinch and Rawlins simultaneously, “and he’s worth it.”
“Well,” continued Zenobia, “the Ditch didn’t boom ez soon ez they kalkilated. And then the boys kept gettin’ poorer and poorer, and Ned he kept gettin’ poorer and poorer in everything but his hopefulness and grit. Then he looks around for more capital. And about this time, that coyote Harkins smelt suthin’ nice up there, and he gits Ned to give him control of it, and he’ll lend him his name and fix up a company. Soon ez he gets control, the first thing he does is to say that it wants half a million o’ money to make it pay, and levies an assessment of two hundred dollars a share. That’s nothin’ for them rich fellows to pay, or pretend to pay, but for boys on grub wages it meant only ruin. They couldn’t pay, and had to forfeit their shares for next to nothing. And Ned made one more desperate attempt to save them and himself by borrowing money on his shares; when that hound Harkins got wind of it, and let it be buzzed around that the Ditch is a failure, and that he was goin’ out of it; that brought the shares down to nothing. As Ned couldn’t raise a dollar, the new company swooped down on his shares for the debts THEY had put up, and left him and the boys to help themselves. Ned couldn’t bear to face the boys that he’d helped to ruin, and put out, and ain’t been heard from since. After Harkins had got rid of Ned and the boys he manages to pay off that wonderful debt, and sells out for a hundred thousand dollars. That money—Ned’s money—he sends to Sacramento, for he don’t dare to travel with it himself, and is kalkilatin’ to leave the kentry, for some of the boys allow to kill him on sight. So ef you’re wantin’ to hunt suthin’, thar’s yer chance, and you needn’t go inter the snow to do it.”
“But surely the law can recover this money?” said Hale indignantly. “It is as infamous a robbery as—” He stopped as he caught Zenobia’s eye.
“Ez last night’s, you were goin’ to say. I’ll call it MORE. Them road agents don’t pretend to be your friend—but take yer money and run their risks. For ez to the law—that can’t help yer.”
“It’s a skin game, and you might ez well expect to recover a gambling debt from a short-card sharp,” explained Clinch; “Falkner oughter shot him on sight.”
“Or the boys lynched him,” suggested Rawlins.
“I think,” said Hale, more reflectively, “that in the absence of legal remedy a man of that kind should have been forced under strong physical menace to give up his ill-gotten gains. The money was the primary object, and if that could be got without bloodshed—which seems to me a useless crime—it would be quite as effective. Of course, if there was resistance or retaliation, it might be necessary to kill him.”
He had unconsciously fallen into his old didactic and dogmatic habit of speech, and perhaps, under the spur of Zenobia’s eyes, he had given it some natural emphasis. A dead silence followed, in which the others regarded him with amused and gratified surprise, and it was broken only by Zenobia rising and holding out her hand. “Shake!”
Hale raised it gallantly, and pressed his lips on the one spotless finger.
“That’s gospel truth. And you ain’t the first white man to say it.”
“Indeed,” laughed Hale. “Who was the other?”
“George Lee!”
CHAPTER VI
The laughter that followed was interrupted by a sudden barking of the dogs in the outer clearing. Zenobia rose lazily and strode to the window. It relieved Hale of certain embarrassing reflections suggested by her comment.
“Ef it ain’t that God-forsaken fool Dick bringing up passengers from the snow-bound up stage in the road! I reckon I’VE got suthin’ to say to that!” But the later appearance of the apologetic Dick, with the assurance that the party carried a permission from her father, granted at the lower station in view of such an emergency, checked her active opposition. “That’s like Paw,” she soliloquized aggrievedly; “shuttin’ us up and settin’ dogs on everybody for a week, and then lettin’ the whole stage service pass through one door and out at another. Well, it’s HIS house and HIS whiskey, and they kin take it, but they don’t get me to help ‘em.”
They certainly were not a prepossessing or good-natured acquisition to the party. Apart from the natural antagonism which, on such occasions, those in possession always feel towards the new-comer, they were strongly inclined to resist the dissatisfied querulousness and aggressive attitude of these fresh applicants for hospitality. The most offensive one was a person who appeared to exercise some authority over the others. He was loud, assuming, and dressed with vulgar pretension. He quickly disposed himself in the chair vacated by Zenobia, and called for some liquor.
“I reckon you’ll hev to help yourself,” said Rawlins dryly, as the summons met with no response. “There are only two women in the house, and I reckon their hands are full already.”
“I call it d—d uncivil treatment,” said the man, raising his voice; “and Hennicker had better sing smaller if he don’t want his old den pulled down some day. He ain’t any better than men that hev been picked up afore now.”
“You oughter told him that, and mebbe he’d hev come over with yer,” returned Rawlins. “He’s a mild, soft, easy-going man, is Hennicker! Ain’t he, Colonel Clinch?”
The casual mention of Clinch’s name produced the effect which the speaker probably intended. The stranger stared at Clinch, who, apparently oblivious of the conversation, was blinking his cold gray eyes at the fire. Dropping his aggressive tone to mere querulousness, the man sought the whiskey demijohn, and helped himself and his companions. Fortified by liquor he returned to the fire.
“I reckon you’ve heard about this yer robbery, Colonel,” he said, addressing Clinch, with an attempt at easy familiarity.
Without raising his eyes from the fire, Clinch briefly assented, “I reckon.”
“I’m up yer, examining into it, for the Express.”
“Lost much?” asked Rawlins.
“Not so much ez they might hev. That fool Harkins had a hundred thousand dollars in greenbacks sealed up like an ordinary package of a thousand dollars, and gave it to a friend, Bill Guthrie, in the bank to pick out some unlikely chap among the passengers to take charge of it to Reno. He wouldn’t trust the Express. Ha! ha!”
The dead, oppressive silence that followed his empty laughter made it seem almost artificial. Rawlins held his breath and looked at Clinch. Hale, with the instincts of a refined, sensitive man, turned hot with the embarrassment Clinch should have shown. For that gentleman, without lifting his eyes from the fire, and with no apparent change in his demeanor, lazily asked—
“Ye didn’t ketch the name o’ that passenger?”
“Naturally, no! For when Guthrie heard what was said agin him he wouldn’t give his name until he heard from him.”
“And WHAT was said agin him?” asked Clinch musingly.
“What would be said agin a man that give up that sum o’ money, like a chaw of tobacco, for the asking? Why, there were but three men, as far ez we kin hear, that did the job. And there were four passengers inside, armed, and the driver and express messenger on the box. Six were robbed by THREE!—they were a sweet-scented lot! Reckon they must hev felt mighty small, for I hear they got up and skedaddled from the station under the pretext of lookin’ for the robbers.” He laughed again, and the laugh was noisily repeated by his five companions at the other end of the room.
Hale, who had forgotten that the stranger was only echoing a part of his own criticism of eight hours before, was on the point of rising with burning cheeks and angry indignation, when the lazily uplifted eye of Clinch caught his, and absolutely held him down with its paralyzing and deadly significance. Murder itself seemed to look from those cruelly quiet and remorseless gray pupils. For a moment he forgot his own rage in this glimpse of Clinch’s implacable resentment; for a moment he felt a thrill of pity for the wretch who had provoked it. He remained motionless and fascinated in his chair as the lazy lids closed like a sheath over Clinch’s eyes again. Rawlins, who had probably received the same glance of warning, remained equally still.
“They haven’t heard the last of it yet, you bet,” continued the infatuated stranger. “I’ve got a little statement here for the newspaper,” he added, drawing some papers from his pocket; “suthin’ I just run off in the coach as I came along. I reckon it’ll show things up in a new light. It’s time there should be some change. All the cussin’ that’s been usually done hez been by the passengers agin the express and stage companies. I propose that the Company should do a little cussin’ themselves. See? P’r’aps you don’t mind my readin’ it to ye? It’s just spicy enough to suit them newspaper chaps.”
“Go on,” said Colonel Clinch quietly.
The man cleared his throat, with the preliminary pose of authorship, and his five friends, to whom the composition was evidently not unfamiliar, assumed anticipatory smiles.
“I call it ‘Prize Pusillanimous Passengers.’ Sort of runs easy off the tongue, you know.
“‘It now appears that the success of the late stagecoach robbery near the Summit was largely due to the pusillanimity—not to use a more serious word’”—He stopped, and looked explanatorily towards Clinch: “Ye’ll see in a minit what I’m gettin’ at by that pusillanimity of the passengers themselves. ‘It now transpires that there were only three robbers who attacked the coach, and that although passengers, driver, and express messenger were fully armed, and were double the number of their assailants, not a shot was fired. We mean no reflections upon the well-known courage of Yuba Bill, nor the experience and coolness of Bracy Tibbetts, the courteous express messenger, both of whom have since confessed to have been more than astonished at the Christian and lamb-like submission of the insiders. Amusing stories of some laughable yet sickening incidents of the occasion—such as grown men kneeling in the road, and offering to strip themselves completely, if their lives were only spared; of one of the passengers hiding under the seat, and only being dislodged by pulling his coat-tails; of incredible sums promised, and even offers of menial service, for the preservation of their wretched carcases—are received with the greatest gusto; but we are in possession of facts which may lead to more serious accusations. Although one of the passengers is said to have lost a large sum of money intrusted to him, while attempting with barefaced effrontery to establish a rival “carrying” business in one of the Express Company’s own coaches—‘I call that a good point.” He interrupted himself to allow the unrestrained applause of his own party. “Don’t you?”
“It’s just h-ll,” said Clinch musingly.
“‘Yet the affair,” resumed the stranger from his manuscript, “‘is locked up in great and suspicious mystery. The presence of Jackson N. Stanner, Esq.’ (that’s me), ‘special detective agent to the Company, and his staff in town, is a guaranty that the mystery will be thoroughly probed.’ Hed to put that in to please the Company,” he again deprecatingly explained. “‘We are indebted to this gentleman for the facts.’”
“The pint you want to make in that article,” said Clinch, rising, but still directing his face and his conversation to the fire, “ez far ez I ken see ez that no three men kin back down six unless they be cowards, or are willing to be backed down.”
“That’s the point what I start from,” rejoined Stanner, “and work up. I leave it to you ef it ain’t so.”
“I can’t say ez I agree with you,” said the Colonel dryly. He turned, and still without lifting his eyes walked towards the door of the room which Zenobia had entered. The key was on the inside, but Clinch gently opened the door, removed the key, and closing the door again locked it from his side. Hale and Rawlins felt their hearts beat quickly; the others followed Clinch’s slow movements and downcast mien with amused curiosity. After locking the other outlet from the room, and putting the keys in his pocket, Clinch returned to the fire. For the first time he lifted his eyes; the man nearest him shrank back in terror.
“I am the man,” he said slowly, taking deliberate breath between his sentences, “who gave up those greenbacks to the robbers. I am one of the three passengers you have lampooned in that paper, and these gentlemen beside me are the other two.” He stopped and looked around him. “You don’t believe that three men can back down six! Well, I’ll show you how it can be done. More than that, I’ll show you how ONE man can do it; for, by the living G-d, if you don’t hand over that paper I’ll kill you where you sit! I’ll give you until I count ten; if one of you moves he and you are dead men—but YOU first!”
Before he had finished speaking Hale and Rawlins had both risen, as if in concert, with their weapons drawn. Hale could not tell how or why he had done so, but he was equally conscious, without knowing why, of fixing his eye on one of the other party, and that he should, in the event of an affray, try to kill him. He did not attempt to reason; he only knew that he should do his best to kill that man and perhaps others.
“One,” said Clinch, lifting his derringer, “two—three—”
“Look here, Colonel—I swear I didn’t know it was you. Come—d—m it! I say—see here,” stammered Stanner, with white cheeks, not daring to glance for aid to his stupefied party.
“Four—five—six—”
“Wait! Here!” He produced the paper and threw it on the floor.
“Pick it up and hand it to me. Seven—eight—”
Stanner hastily scrambled to his feet, picked up the paper, and handed it to the Colonel. “I was only joking, Colonel,” he said, with a forced laugh.
“I’m glad to hear it. But as this joke is in black and white, you wouldn’t mind saying so in the same fashion. Take that pen and ink and write as I dictate. ‘I certify that I am satisfied that the above statement is a base calumny against the characters of Ringwood Clinch, Robert Rawlins, and John Hale, passengers, and that I do hereby apologize to the same.’ Sign it. That’ll do. Now let the rest of your party sign as witnesses.”
They complied without hesitation; some, seizing the opportunity of treating the affair as a joke, suggested a drink.
“Excuse me,” said Clinch quietly, “but ez this house ain’t big enough for me and that man, and ez I’ve got business at Wild Cat Station with this paper, I think I’ll go without drinkin’.” He took the keys from his pocket, unlocked the doors, and taking up his overcoat and rifle turned as if to go.
Rawlins rose to follow him; Hale alone hesitated. The rapid occurrences of the last half hour gave him no time for reflection. But he was by no means satisfied of the legality of the last act he had aided and abetted, although he admitted its rude justice, and felt he would have done so again. A fear of this, and an instinct that he might be led into further complications if he continued to identify himself with Clinch and Rawlins; the fact that they had professedly abandoned their quest, and that it was really supplanted by the presence of an authorized party whom they had already come in conflict with—all this urged him to remain behind. On the other hand, the apparent desertion of his comrades at the last moment was opposed both to his sense of honor and the liking he had taken to them. But he reflected that he had already shown his active partisanship, that he could be of little service to them at Wild Cat Station, and would be only increasing the distance from his home; and above all, an impatient longing for independent action finally decided him. “I think I’ll stay here,” he said to Clinch, “unless you want me.”
Clinch cast a swift and meaning glance at the enemy, but looked approval. “Keep your eyes skinned, and you’re good for a dozen of ‘em,” he said sotto voce, and then turned to Stanner. “I’m going to take this paper to Wild Cat. If you want to communicate with me hereafter you know where I am to be found, unless”—he smiled grimly—“you’d like to see me outside for a few minutes before I go?”
“It is a matter that concerns the Stage Company, not me,” said Stanner, with an attempt to appear at his ease.
Hale accompanied Clinch and Rawlins through the kitchen to the stables. The ostler, Dick, had already returned to the rescue of the snow-bound coach.
“I shouldn’t like to leave many men alone with that crowd,” said Clinch, pressing Hale’s hand; “and I wouldn’t have allowed your staying behind ef I didn’t know I could bet my pile on you. Your offerin’ to stay just puts a clean finish on it. Look yer, Hale, I didn’t cotton much to you at first; but ef you ever want a friend, call on Ringwood Clinch.”
“The same here, old man,” said Rawlins, extending his hand as he appeared from a hurried conference with the old woman at the woodshed, “and trust to Zeenie to give you a hint ef there’s anythin’ underhanded goin’ on. So long.”
Half inclined to resent this implied suggestion of protection, yet half pleased at the idea of a confidence with the handsome girl he had seen, Hale returned to the room. A whispered discussion among the party ceased on his entering, and an awkward silence followed, which Hale did not attempt to break as he quietly took his seat again by the fire. He was presently confronted by Stanner, who with an affectation of easy familiarity crossed over to the hearth.
“The old Kernel’s d—d peppery and high toned when he’s got a little more than his reg’lar three fingers o’ corn juice, eh?”
“I must beg you to understand distinctly, Mr. Stanner,” said Hale, with a return of his habitual precision of statement, “that I regard any slighting allusion to the gentleman who has just left not only as in exceedingly bad taste coming from YOU, but very offensive to myself. If you mean to imply that he was under the influence of liquor, it is my duty to undeceive you; he was so perfectly in possession of his faculties as to express not only his own but MY opinion of your conduct. You must also admit that he was discriminating enough to show his objection to your company by leaving it. I regret that circumstances do not make it convenient for me to exercise that privilege; but if I am obliged to put up with your presence in this room, I strongly insist that it is not made unendurable with the addition of your conversation.”
The effect of this deliberate and passionless declaration was more discomposing to the party than Clinch’s fury. Utterly unaccustomed to the ideas and language suddenly confronting them, they were unable to determine whether it was the real expression of the speaker, or whether it was a vague badinage or affectation to which any reply would involve them in ridicule. In a country terrorized by practical joking, they did not doubt but that this was a new form of hoaxing calculated to provoke some response that would constitute them as victims. The immediate effect upon them was that complete silence in regard to himself that Hale desired. They drew together again and conversed in whispers, while Hale, with his eyes fixed on the fire, gave himself up to somewhat late and useless reflection.