Claim Number One Part 39

Slavens followed the horse's trail, wondering how the animal had been able to scramble up those slopes, hobbled as it was. Presently he found the beast and started with it back to camp. Rounding the base of a great stone which stood perched on the hillside as if meditating a tumble, Slavens paused a moment to look over the troubled slope of land which had been his two days before.

There was Boyle's tent, with a fire before it, but no one in sight; and there, on the land which adjoined his former claim on the south, was another tent, so placed among the rocks that it could not be seen from his own.

"It wasn't there when I left," Slavens reflected. "I wonder what he's after?"

CHAPTER XIX

CROOK MEETS CROOK

Slavens was saddling his horse before his tent, his mind still running on the newcomer who had pitched to the south of him, evidently while he was away. He was certain that he would have seen the tent if it had been there before he left, for it was within plain view of the road.

Well, thought the doctor, whoever the stranger was, whatever he hoped or expected of that place, he was welcome to, for all that Slavens envied him. As for Slavens himself, he had run his race and won it by a nose; and now that he was putting down the proceeds to appease what he held as blackmail, he had no very keen regrets for what he was losing. He had pa.s.sed through that. There would be the compensation----

But of that no matter; that must come in its time and place, and if never, no matter. He would have the ease of conscience in knowing that he had served her, and served her well.

His horse was restive and frisky in the cool of the morning, making a stir among the stones with its feet. Slavens spoke sharply to the animal, bending to draw up the girth, the stirrup thrown across the saddle.

"Now, you old scamp, I'll take this friskiness out of you in a minute,"

said he, giving the horse a slap under the belly as he reached to pull the stirrup down.

He drew back with a start as his eyes lifted above the saddle, and his hand dropped to the b.u.t.t of the revolver which he carried so clumsily in his belt. Hun Shanklin was standing there facing him, not above a dozen feet away, grinning dubiously, but with what he doubtless meant for an expression of friendliness.

The old gambler threw out his hands with a sidewise motion eloquent of emptiness, lifting his shoulders in a quick little jerk, as if to say, "Oh, what's the use?"

"Kind of surprised you; didn't I, Doc?" he asked, coming nearer.

"What do you want here?" demanded Slavens harshly.

"Well, not trouble," replied Shanklin lightly. "If I'd come over for that, I guess I could 'a' started it before now."

"Yes, I suppose you could," admitted Slavens, watching him distrustfully and feeling thankful, somehow, that the horse was between them.

"I saw you up on the hill after your horse, so I thought I'd come over and let you know I was around," said Shanklin. "Thought I'd tell you that I ain't holdin' any grudges if you ain't."

"I don't see where you've got any call to. I never took a crack at you with a blackjack in the dark!"

"No, you didn't, friend," Shanklin agreed in his old easy, persuasive way. "And I never done it to you. You owe the honorable Mr. Jerry Boyle for the red mark you've got on your forrid there. I'll own up that I helped him nail you up and dump you in the river; but I done it because I thought you was finished, and I didn't want the muss around."

"Well, it will all come out on the day of reckoning, I suppose," said Slavens, not believing a word the old scamp said.

He knew that minute, as he had known all the time, that no other hand than Shanklin's had laid him low that night. Of this he was as certain in his own mind as if he had seen the gambler lift hand for the blow.

Boyle had no motive for it up to that time, although he had been quick to turn the circ.u.mstance to his advantage.

"I thought Boyle'd d.i.c.kered you out of this claim before now," said Shanklin, looking around warily.

"He's down the road here a little piece," replied Slavens testily, "in company of another friend of yours. You could have seen his tent as you came over if you'd looked."

"I just put up my tent last night," Shanklin explained.

Slavens took hold of his saddle-horn as if to mount, indicating by his action that the visit should come to an end. Shanklin, who was not in the least sensitive on the matter of social rebuffs, did not appear to be inclined to accept the hint. He s.h.i.+fted his legs, thrusting one of them forward in a lounging att.i.tude, and dug in his trousers pockets with his long, skinny hands.

"Well, spit it out and have it over with!" snapped Slavens, feeling that there was something behind the man's actions to which he had not given words.

"That was a purty good coat I left with you that night," suggested Shanklin, looking up without the slightest stirring of humor in his dry face.

"You're welcome to it, if that's all," said Slavens.

"That's all. I was kind of attached to that coat."

Slavens left him standing there and entered the tent, feeling that Shanklin was as irresponsible morally as a savage. Evidently the inconsequential matter of an attempt at murder should not be allowed to stand between friends, according to the flat-game man's way of viewing life. It appeared that morning as if Shanklin had no trace of malice in him on account of the past, and no desire to pursue further his underhanded revenge. Conscience was so little trouble to him that he could sit at meat with a man one hour and stick a knife in his back the next.

The coat was under a sack of oats, somewhat the worse for wrinkles and dust. Slavens gave it a shake, smoothed the heaviest of the creases with his hand, and went out to deliver it to its owner.

Shanklin was facing the other way, in the direction of his own camp. His att.i.tude was in sharp contrast with the easy, lounging posture of a few moments before. He was tense and alert, straining forward a little, his lean body poised as if he balanced for a jump. There was a clattering on the small stones which strewed the ground thickly there, as of somebody approaching, but the bulk of the horse was between Slavens and the view, as the doctor stopped momentarily in the door of the low tent.

Clearing the tent and standing upright, Slavens saw Boyle and Ten-Gallon coming on hurriedly. They had been to Shanklin's camp evidently, looking for him. From the appearance of both parties, there was something in the wind.

Boyle was approaching rapidly, Ten-Gallon trailing a bit, on account of his shorter legs perhaps, or maybe because his valor was even briefer than his wind. Boyle seemed to be grinning, although there was no mirth in his face. His teeth showed between his parted lips; he carried his right arm in front, crooked at the elbow, his fingers curved.

Slavens saw that all thought of the coat had gone but of Shanklin's mind. The old gambler did not so much as turn his head. Slavens threw the coat across his saddle as Boyle came up.

"Well, what have you got to say to it, you dirty old thief?" demanded Boyle, plunging into the matter as if preliminaries were not needed between him and Shanklin.

"You seem to be doin' the talkin'," returned Shanklin with a show of cold indifference, although Slavens saw that he watched every movement Boyle made, and more than once in those few seconds the doctor marked Hun's sinewy right arm twitch as if on the point of making some swift stroke.

Boyle stopped while there was yet a rod between them, so hot with anger that his hands were trembling.

"That don't answer me!" he growled, his voice thick in his constricted throat. "What have you got to say to the way you double-crossed me, you old one-eyed h.e.l.lion?"

"Talk don't hurt, Jerry, unless a man talks too much," Shanklin answered mildly. "Now, if I wanted to talk, I could mighty near talk a rope around your little white neck. I know when to talk and when to keep still."

"And I know how to jar you loose!" threatened Boyle.

Shanklin leaned toward the Governor's son never so little, his left hand lifted to point his utterance, and opened upon Boyle the most withering stream of blasphemous profanity that Slavens had ever heard. If there ever was a man who cursed by note, as they used to say, Hun Shanklin was that one. He laid it to Boyle in a blue streak.

"What do I owe you?" he began.

Then he swung off into the most derogatory comparisons, applications, insulting flagellations, that man ever stood up and listened to. His evident motive was to provoke Boyle to some hostile act, so that twitching right arm might have the excuse for dealing out the death which lay at its finger-ends. Every little while the torrent of abuse broke upon the demand, "What do I owe you?" like a rock in the channel, and then rushed on again without laying hold of the same epithet twice.

If a man were looking for a master in that branch of frontier learning, a great opportunity was at hand.

Boyle leaned against the torrent of abuse and swallowed it, his face losing its fiery hue, blanching and fading as if every word fell on his senses like the blow of a whip to the back. The Governor's son watched every muscle of Shanklin's face as if to read the gambler's intention in his eye, while his hand, stiff-set and clawlike, hovered within three inches of his pistol-b.u.t.t.

Presently Shanklin stopped, panting like a lizard. Both men stooped a little lower, leaning forward in their eager watchfulness. Neither of them seemed to be conscious that the world held any other object than his enemy, crouching, waiting, drawing breath in nostril-dilating gasps.