Lost Farm Camp Part 13

His face as white as the snow at his feet, hat gone, hair clotted with blood, and hands smeared with a sickening red, David Ross stood tottering in the doorway. His eyes were heavy with pain. He raised an arm and motioned weakly up the trail. Then he caught sight of Harrigan's face over Cameron's shoulder. The soul of a hundred Highland ancestors flamed in his eyes.

"Your man," he said, pointing to Harrigan, "is a d.a.m.ned poor shot." He raised his hand to his coat-collar and fumbled at the b.u.t.ton,-"And he's dead-up there-"

Cameron caught him as he wilted across the threshold, and, with Barney Axel, helped carry him to the bedroom.

Harrigan had gone pale and was walking about the room.

Barney stood in the bedroom doorway, watching him silently. "So that's the deer Fisty sent the Indian back fur. Always knowed Fisty'd jest as leave kill with his dukes, but settin' a boozy Indian to drop a man from behind-h.e.l.l! that's worse than murder."

Cameron came from the bedside where his wife was bathing David's head with cold water and administering small doses of whiskey.

"What did he mean, sayin' your man was a dam' poor shot?" Curious Jim fixed Harrigan with a suspicious glare.

Fisty tugged into his coat. "You got me. Injun Pete slipped into the bresh lookin' for a deer he seen,"-Harrigan glanced apprehensively at Barney,-"and it looks like as if he made a mistake and took-"

"From what Ross said afore he keflummixed, I guess he did make a mistake," said Jim dryly, "but I'll hitch up and go and have a look anyway. Then I'll go fur the Doc. Comin' along?"

Cameron drove and the two lumbermen walked silently behind. Just beyond the first turn in the trail they found the body and beside it many animal tracks in the snow. A new Winchester lay at the side of the trail.

"My G.o.d!" cried Harrigan, as he jumped back from the dead man, "his throat's cut!"

Curious Jim was in his element. Here was something to solve. He threw the reins to Barney Axel and examined the tracks leading into the bushes. He followed them for a short distance while his companions waited. "Nothin' up there," he said, as he returned. Then he walked along the trail toward Lost Farm. Finally he turned and came back briskly.

He was unusually quiet as they drove toward his camp. At the Knoll he brought out a blanket from the stable and covered the thing in the wagon.

"I'm goin' to Tramworth with this," he said, jerking his head toward the body, "and git Doc Wilson. Missus says Ross is some easier-only tetched by the bullet-lifted a piece of scalp; but I guess you better keep the missus comp'ny, Barney, for sometimes they get crazy-like and bust things. I've knowed 'em to."

"You was goin' to Tramworth anyhow, warn't you?" asked Cameron, as he faced Harrigan.

"Sure thing, Jim," replied Harrigan, a trifle over-eagerly. "There's some stuff at the station fur the camp, that we're needin' bad."

"Denny," said Cameron solemnly, as the wide-tired wagon shrilled over the frosted road, "'t warn't no knife that cut Injun Pete's throat. That big dog of Ross's done the job, and then skinned back to Lost Farm to tell Hoss Avery that they was somethin' wrong." He paused, looking quickly sideways at his companion. Then, fixing his gaze on the horses'

ears, he continued, "And they was, for Injun Pete warn't three feet from young Ross when the dog got him."

"h.e.l.l, but you're gettin' mighty smart-fur a teamster."

Harrigan's self-control was tottering. The three words, "for a teamster," were three fates that he unleashed to destroy himself, and the moment he uttered them he knew it. Better to have cursed Cameron from the Knoll to Tramworth than to have stung his very soul with that last speech. But, strangely enough, Curious Jim smiled serenely.

Harrigan saw, and understood.

They drove slowly down the trail in the cold, dreary afternoon, jolting the m.u.f.fled shape beneath the blanket as they lumbered over the corduroy crossing the swamp. Pete the Indian meant little enough to Cameron, but-

He pulled up his horses and stared at Harrigan's feet. The Irishman glanced at him, then down. A lean, scarred brown hand lay across his foot. "Christ!" he shrieked, as he jumped to the ground. The horses bounded forward, but Cameron pulled them up, talking to them gently.

"I was goin' to ask you to get down and pull it back a piece," he called to Harrigan, who came up, cursing at his loss of nerve. "The dum'

thing's been pokin' at my legs for a half an hour, but I guess you didn't notice it. The old wagon shakes things up when she ain't loaded down good."

Again Harrigan felt that Jim Cameron was playing with him. He, Fisty Harrigan, the bulldog of the Great Western, chafed at his inability to use his hands. He set his heavy jaw, determined to hold himself together. What had he done? Why, nothing. Let them prove to the contrary if they could.

They found the sheriff at the hotel. In the privacy of his upstairs room he questioned them with easy familiarity. As yet no one knew nor suspected what brought them there, save the thick-set, ruddy, gray-eyed man, who listened quietly and smiled.

"Got his rifle?" he said suddenly, still smiling.

"It's in the wagon. I brung it along," replied Cameron.

"Denny, will you step down and get it?" The sheriff's tone was bland, persuasive.

Harrigan mistrusted Cameron, yet he dared not refuse. As the door closed behind him the sheriff swung toward Cameron.

"Now, out with it!" The tone was like the snapping of pine in the flames.

"How in-" began Cameron, but the sheriff's quick gesture silenced him.

"Here they be," said Jim. "Three sh.e.l.ls I picked up 'bout two rods from the trail. Injun Pete might 'a' took young Ross for a deer _onct_, but three times-"

Harrigan's hand was on the door-k.n.o.b. The sheriff swept the sh.e.l.ls into his pocket.

"Thanks, Denny," he said, as he emptied the magazine and laid the rifle on the table. "A 30-30 is a good deer gun, but it's liable to over-shoot an inch or two at short range."

CHAPTER X-BARNEY AXEL'S EXODUS

Indian Pete's death was the talk of Tramworth for a month. The "Sentinel" printed a vivid account of the tragedy, commenting on the Indian as having been a crack shot and emphasizing the possibility of even experienced hunters making grave mistakes. Much to the sheriff's disgust the article concluded with, "In again reviewing this tragedy, one important fact should not be overlooked. The Indian fired three shots at the supposed deer. This information we have from a trustworthy source." In a later issue the sheriff read, "Mr. Ross visited Tramworth last week, accompanied by the brave animal that so n.o.bly avenged the alleged 'mistake,' as described in a recent issue of this paper. Both seem to be in excellent health."

This issue of the "Sentinel" eventually reached the lumber-camps cl.u.s.tered about the spot where towns.h.i.+p lines Nine and Fifteen intersected. It was read with the eager interest that such an article would create in an isolated community that had known and liked or disliked "Injun Pete." Some of the lumbermen expressed approval of the dog, appreciating the unerring instinct of animals in such cases. Others expressed a sentimental sympathy for the Indian, and Smoke's history would have been a brief one had their sanguinary threats been executed.

Most of the men seemed to consider David Ross as a victim of circ.u.mstance rather than an active partic.i.p.ant in the affair. Yet in one shadowy corner of the main camp it was recalled by not a few that Ross had made Harrigan "take the count," had in fact whipped him in fair fight. There were head-shakings and expressive silences over this; silences because Harrigan had friends in the camp, and he was czar.

One evening, much to the surprise of every one, Barney Axel, who had been gloomily uncommunicative heretofore, gave them something to think about, especially as he was regarded as Harrigan's closest friend, and a man p.r.o.ne to keep his own counsel.

It happened that Joe Smeaton, an axe-man at the main camp, and universally unpopular owing to his habit of tale-bearing, was rehearsing the "Sentinel's" account of Indian Pete's death to an interested but silent audience.

"Denny's. .h.i.t kind of hard," he ventured at random.

Several nodded.

"He kind of liked Pete."

More nods and a muttering of "That's so-he sure did."

Then, out of the smoke-heavy silence following, came Barney Axel's voice, tense with the acc.u.mulated scorn of his secret knowledge.

"He'll be hit harder yet!"

There was a covert threat in the tone. Pipes stopped wheezing. The men stared anywhere but at each other. This was high treason.

"Fisty's drinkin' too much," he added, covering his former statement with this counter-suggestion, which seemed to satisfy every one but Smeaton. He took occasion to repeat the conversation to Harrigan that night in the seclusion of the w.a.n.gan office.