'Firebrand' Trevison Part 27

He tried the front door of the courthouse, to find it locked. The rear door was also locked. He tried the windows--all were fastened securely.

Thinking the Judge still sleeping he went back to his office and spent an hour going over some correspondence. At the end of that time he visited the courthouse again. Angered, he went around to the side and burst the flimsy door in, standing in the opening, glowering, for the Judge's cot was empty, and the Judge nowhere to be seen.

Corrigan stalked through the building, cursing. He examined the cot, and discovered that it had been slept in. The Judge must have risen early.

Obviously, there was nothing to do but to wait. Corrigan did that, impatiently. For a long time he sat in the chair at his desk, watching Braman, studying him, scowling, rage in his heart. "If he's up to any dirty work, I'll choke him until his tongue hangs out a yard!" was a mental threat that he repeated many times. "But he's just mush-headed over the woman, I guess--he's that kind of a fool!"

At ten o'clock Corrigan jumped on his horse and rode out to the b.u.t.te where the laborers were working, clearing away the debris from the explosion. No one there had seen Judge Lindman. Corrigan rode back to town, fuming with rage. Finding some of the deputies he sent them out to search for the Judge. One by one they came in and reported their failure.

At six-thirty, after the arrival of the evening train from Dry Bottom, Corrigan was sitting at his desk, his face black with wrath, reading for the third or fourth time a letter that he had spread out on the desk before him:

"MR. JEFFERSON CORRIGAN:

"I feel it is necessary for me to take a short rest. Recent excitement in Manti has left me very nervous and unstrung. I shall be away from Manti for about two weeks, I think. During my absence any pending litigation must be postponed, of course."

The letter was signed by Judge Lindman, and postmarked "Dry Bottom."

Corrigan got up after a while and stuffed the letter into a pocket. He went out, and when he returned, Braman had gone out also--to supper, Corrigan surmised. When the banker came in an hour later, Corrigan was still seated at his desk. The banker smiled at him, and Corrigan motioned to him.

Corrigan's voice was silky. "Where were you last night, Braman?"

The banker's face whitened; his thoughts became confused, but instantly cleared when he observed from the expression of the big man's face that the question was, apparently, a casual one. But he drew his breath tremulously. One could never be sure of Corrigan.

"I spent the night here--in the back room."

"Then you didn't see the Judge last night--or hear him?"

"No."

Corrigan drew the Judge's letter from the pocket and pa.s.sed it over to Braman, watching his face steadily as he read. He saw a quick stain appear in the banker's cheeks, and his own lips tightened.

The banker coughed before he spoke. "Wasn't that a rather abrupt leave-taking?"

"Yes--rather," said Corrigan, dryly. "You didn't hear him walking about during the night?"

"No."

"You're rather a heavy sleeper, eh? There is only a thin board part.i.tion between this building and the courthouse."

"He must have left after daylight. Of course, any noise he might have made after that I wouldn't have noticed."

"No, of course not," said Corrigan, pa.s.sionlessly. "Well--he's gone." He seemed to have dismissed the matter from his mind and Braman sighed with relief. But he watched Corrigan narrowly during the remainder of the time he stayed in the office, and when he went out, Braman shook a vindictive fist at his back.

"Worry, d.a.m.n you!" he sneered. "I don't know what was in Judge Lindman's mind, but I hope he never comes back! That will help to repay you for that knockdown!"

Corrigan went over to the _Castle_ and ate supper. He was preoccupied and deliberate, for he was trying to weave a complete fabric out of the threads of Braman's visits to Hester Harvey; Hester's ride westward, and Judge Lindman's abrupt departure. He had a feeling that they were in some way connected.

At a little after seven he finished his meal, went upstairs and knocked at the door of Hester Harvey's room. He stepped inside when she opened the door, and stood, both hands in the pockets of his trousers, looking at her with a smile of repressed malignance.

"Nice night for a ride, wasn't it?" he said, his lips parting a very little to allow the words to filter through.

The woman flashed a quick, inquiring look at him, saw the pa.s.sion in his eyes, the gleam of malevolent antagonism, and she set herself against it.

For her talk with Trevison last night had convinced her of the futility of hope. She had gone out of his life as a commonplace incident slips into the oblivion of yesteryear. Worse--he had refused to recall it. It hurt her, this knowledge--his rebuff. It had aroused cold, wanton pa.s.sions in her--she had become a woman who did not care. She met Corrigan's gaze with a look of defiant mockery.

"Swell. I enjoyed every minute of it. Won't you sit down?"

He held himself back, grinning coldly, for the woman's look had goaded him to fury.

"No," he said; "I'll stand. I won't be here a minute. You saw Trevison last night, eh? You warned him that I was going to have Carson arrested."

He had hazarded this guess, for it had seemed to him that it must be the solution to the mystery, and when he caught the quick, triumphant light in the woman's eyes at his words he knew he had not erred.

"Yes," she said; "I saw him, and I told him--what Braman told me." She saw his eyes glitter and she laughed harshly. "That's what you wanted to know, isn't it, Jeff--what Braman told me? Well, you know it. I knew you couldn't play square with me. You thought you could dupe me--_again_, didn't you? Well, you didn't, for I snared Braman and pumped him dry. He's kept me posted on your movements; and his little board telephone--Ha, ha!

that makes you squirm, doesn't it? But it was all wasted effort--Trevison won't have me--he's through. And I'm through. I'm not going to try any more. I'm going back East, after I get rested. You fight it out with Trevison. But I warn you, he'll beat you--and I wish he would! As for that beast, Braman, I wish--Ah, let him go, Jeff," she advised, noting the cold fury in his eyes.

"That's all right," he said with a dry laugh. "You and Braman have done well. It hasn't done me any harm, and so we'll forget about it. What do you say to having a drink--and a talk. As in old times, eh?" He seemed suddenly to have conquered his pa.s.sion, but the queer twitching of his lips warned the woman, and when he essayed to move toward her, smiling pallidly, she darted to the far side of a stand near the center of the room, pulled out a drawer, produced a small revolver and leveled it at him, her eyes wide and glittering with menace.

"Stay where you are, Jeff!" she ordered. "There's murder in your heart, and I know it. But I don't intend to be the victim. I'll shoot if you come one step nearer!"

He smirked at her, venomously. "All right," he said. "You're wise. But get out of town on the next train."

"I'll go when I get ready--you can't scare me. Let me alone or I'll go to Rosalind Benham and let her in on the whole scheme."

"Yes you will--not," he laughed. "If I know anything about you, you won't do anything that would give Miss Benham to Trevison."

"That's right; I'd rather see her married to you--that would be the refinement of cruelty!"

He laughed sneeringly and stepped out of the door. Waiting a short time, the woman heard his step in the hall. Then she darted to the door, locked it, and leaned against it, panting.

"I've done it now," she murmured. "Braman--Well, it serves him right!"

Corrigan stopped in the barroom and got a drink. Then he walked to the front door and stood in it for an instant, finally stepping down into the street. Across the street in the banking room he saw a thin streak of light gleaming through a crevice in the doorway that led from the banking room to the rear. The light told him that Braman was in the rear room.

Selecting a moment when the street in his vicinity was deserted, Corrigan deliberately crossed, standing for a moment in the shadow of the bank building, looking around him. Then he slipped around the building and tapped cautiously on the rear door. An instant later he was standing inside the room, his back against the door. Braman, arrayed as he had been the night before, had opened the door. He had been just ready to go when he heard Corrigan's knock.

"Going out, Croft?" said Corrigan pleasantly, eyeing the other intently.

"All lit up, too! You're getting to be a gay dog, lately."

There was nothing in Corrigan's bantering words to bring on that sudden qualm of sickening fear that seized the banker. He knew it was his guilt that had done it--guilt and perhaps a dread of Corrigan's rage if he _should_ learn of his duplicity. But that word "lately"! If it had been uttered with any sort of an accent he might have been suspicious. But it had come with the bantering ring of the others, with no hint of special significance. And Braman was rea.s.sured.

"Yes, I'm going out." He turned to the mirror on the wall. "I'm getting rather stale, hanging around here so much."

"That's right, Croft. Have a good time. How much money is there in the safe?"

"Two or three thousand dollars." The banker turned from the gla.s.s. "Want some? Ha, ha!" he laughed at the other's short nod; "there are other gay dogs, I guess! How much do you want?"

"All you've got?"

"All! Jehoshaphat! You must have a big deal on tonight!"

"Yes, big," said Corrigan evenly. "Get it."