Bransford of Rainbow Range Part 20

"Well, now, who'd 'a' thought that?" demanded Long, still only half convinced. "He didn't strike me like that kind of a man. Well, you never can tell! How come you fellows to be chasin' him?"

"You see," said Steele, "every one was sure he had gone up to Rainbow.

The sheriff and posse is up there now, looking for him; but we four--Stone and Harlow, the chaps at the other end, were with us, you know--we were up in the foothills on a deerhunt. We were out early--sun-up is the best time for deer, they tell me--and we had a spygla.s.s. Well, we just happened to see a man ride out from between two hills, quite a way off. Stone noticed right away that he was riding a sorrel horse. It was a sorrel horse that Bransford stole, you know. We didn't suspect, though, who it was till a bit later. Then Rex tried to pick him up again and saw that he was going out of his way to avoid the ridges--keeping cover, you know. Then we caught on and took after him pell-mell. He had a big start; but he was riding slowly so as not to make a dust--that is, till he saw our dust. Then he lit out."

"You're not deputies, then?" said Long.

"Oh, no, not at all!" said Steele, secretly flattered. "So Harlow and Stone galloped off to town. The program was that they'd wire down to Escondido to have horses ready for them, come down on Number Six and head him off. They were not to tell any one in Arcadia. There's five thousand dollars' reward out for him--but it isn't that exactly. It was a cowardly, beastly murder, don't you know; and we thought it would be rather a big thing if we could take him alone."

"You got him penned all right," said Tobe. "He can't get out, so far as I know, unless he runs over us or the men at the other end. By George, we must get away from this fire, too!" He set the example, dragging the bedding with him to the shelter of a big rock. "He could pick us off too slick here in the light. How're you going to get him? There's a heap of country in that Basin, all rough and broken, full o' boulders--mighty good cover."

"Starve him out!" said Griffith. This was base deceit. Deep in his heart he believed that the quarry sat beside him, well fed and contented. Yet the unthinkable insolence of it--if this were indeed Bransford--dulled his belief.

Long laughed as he spread down the bed. "He'll shoot a deer. Maybe, if he had it all planned out, he may have grub cached in there somewhere.

There's watertanks in the rocks. Say, what are your pardners at the other side going to do for grub?"

"Oh, they brought out cheese and crackers and stuff," said Gurd.

"I'll tell you what, boys, you've bit off more than you can chaw," said Jeff--Tobe, that is. "He can't get out without a fight--but, then, you can't go in there to hunt for him without weakening your guard; and he'd be under shelter and have all the best of it. He'd shoot you so dead you'd never know what happened. I don't want none of it! I'd as lief put on boxing gloves and crawl into a hole after a bear! Look here, now, this is your show; but I'm a heap older'n you boys. Want to know what I think?"

"Certainly," said Rex.

"Goin' to talk turkey to me?" An avaricious light came into Long's eyes.

"Of course; you're in on the reward," said Rex diffidently and rather stiffly. "We are not in this for the money."

"I can use the money--whatever share you want to give me," said Long dryly; "but if you take my advice my share won't be but a little. I think you ought to keep under shelter at the mouth of this canon--one of you--and let the other one go to Escondido and send for help, quick, and a lot of it."

"What's the matter with you going?" asked Griffith disingenuously. He wanted Long to show his hand. It would never do to abandon the siege of Double Mountain to arrest this _soi-disant_ Long on mere suspicion. On the other hand, Mr. Rex Griffith had no idea of letting Long escape his clutches until his ident.i.ty was established, one way or the other, beyond all question.

That was why Long declined the offer. His honest gaze s.h.i.+fted. "I ain't much of a rider," he said evasively. Young Griffith read correctly the thought which the excuse concealed. Evidently Long considered himself an elder soldier, if not a better, than either of his two young guests, but wished to spare their feelings by not letting them find it out. Griffith found this plain solution inconsistent with his homicidal theory: a murderer, fleeing for his life, would have jumped at the chance.

There are two sides to every question. Let us, this once, prove both sides. Wholly oblivious to Griffith's lynx-eyed watchfulness and his leading questions, Mr. Long yet recognized the futility of an attempt to ride away on Mr. Griffith's horse with Mr. Griffith's benison. There we have the other point of view.

"We'll have to send for grub anyway," pursued the sagacious Mr. Long.

"I've only got a little left; and that old liar, Gwin, won't be out for four days--if he comes then. And--er--look here now--if I was you boys I'd let the sheriff and his posse smoke your badger out. They get paid to tend to that--and it looks to me like some one was going to get hurt.

You've done enough."

All this advice was so palpably sound that the doubter was, for the second, staggered--for a second only. This was the man he had seen in the prisoner's dock. He was morally sure of it. For all the difference of appearance, this was the man. Yet those blasts--the far-seen fire--the hearty welcome--this delivery of himself into their hands?...

Griffith scarcely knew what he did think. He blamed himself for his unworthy suspicions; he blamed Gurdy more for having no suspicions at all.

"Anything else?" he said. "That sounds good."

Tobe studied for some time.

"Well," he said at last, "there may be some way he can get out. I don't think he can--but he might find a way. He knows he's trapped; but likely he has no idea yet how many of us there are. So we know he'll try, and he won't be just climbing for fun. He'll take a chance."

Steele broke in:

"He didn't leave any rope on his saddle."

Tobe nodded.

"So he means to try it. Now here's five of us here. It seems to me that some one ought to ride round the mountain the first thing in the morning, and every day afterward--only here's hoping there won't be many of 'em--to look for tracks. There isn't one chance in a hundred he can climb out; but if he goes out of here afoot we've got him sure. The man on guard wants to keep in shelter. It's light to-night--there's no chance for him to slip out without being seen. You say the old watchman ain't dead yet, Mr. Griffith?"

"No. The latest bulletin was that he was almost holding his own."

"Hope he gets well," said Long. "Good old geezer! Now, cap, I've worked hard and you've ridden hard. Better set your guards and let the other two take a little snooze."

Griffith was not proof against the insidious flattery of this unhesitant preference. He flushed with embarra.s.sment and pleasure.

"Well, if I'm to be captain, Gurd will take the first guard--till eleven. Then you come on till two, Mr. Long. I'll stand from then on till daylight."

In five minutes Mr. Long was enjoying the calm and restful sleep of fatigued innocence; but his poor captain was doomed to have a bad night of it, with two Bransfords on his hands--one in the Basin and one in the bed beside him. His head was dizzy with the vicious circle. Like the gentlewoman of the nursery rhyme, he was tempted to cry: "Lawk 'a' mercy on me, this is none of I!"

If he haled his bedmate to justice and the real Bransford got away--that would be a nice predicament for an ambitious young man! He was sensitive to ridicule, and he saw here such an opportunity to earn it as knocks but once at any man's door.

If, on the other hand, while he held Bransford cooped tightly in the Basin, this thrice-accursed Long should escape him and there should be no Bransford in the Basin----What nonsense! What utter twaddle!

Bransford was in the Basin. He had found his horse and saddle, his tracks; no tracks had come out of the Basin. Immediately on the discovery of the outlaw's horse, Gurd had ridden back posthaste and held the pa.s.s while he, the captain, had gone to the mouth of the southern canon and posted his friends. He had watched for tracks of a footman every step of the way, going and coming; there had been no tracks.

Bransford was in the Basin. He watched the face of the sleeping man.

But, by Heaven, this was Bransford!

Was ever a poor captain in such a predicament? A moment before he had fully and definitely decided once for all that this man was not Bransford, could not be Bransford; that it was not possible! His reason unwaveringly told him one thing, his eyesight the other!... Yet Bransford, or an unfortunate twin of his, lay now beside him--and, for further mockery, slept peacefully, serene, untroubled.... He looked upon the elusive Mr. Long with a species of horror! The face was drawn and lined. Yet, but forty-eight hours of tension would have left Bransford's face not otherwise. He had noticed Bransford's hands in the courtroom--noticed their well-kept whiteness, due, as he had decided, to the perennial cowboy glove. This man's hands, as he had seen by the campfire, were blistered and calloused! Callouses were not made in a day. He took another look at Long. Oh, thunder!

He crept from bed. He whispered a word to sentry Steele; not to outline the distressing state of his own mind, but merely to request Steele not to shoot him, as he was going up to the mine.

He climbed up the trail, chewing the unpalatable thought that Gurdon had seen nothing amiss--yet Gurd had been at the trial! The captain began to wish he had never gone on that deerhunt.

He went into the tent, struck a match, lit a candle and examined everything closely. There was no gun in the camp and no cartridges. He found the spill of twisted paper under the table, smothered his qualms and read it. He noted the open book for future examination in English.

And now Tobe's labors had their late reward, for Rex missed nothing.

Every effort brought fresh disappointment and every disappointment spurred him to fresh effort. He went into the tunnel; he scrutinized everything, even to the drills in the tub. The food supply tallied with Long's account. No detail escaped him and every detail confirmed the growing belief that he, Captain Griffith, was a doddering imbecile.

He returned to the outpost, convinced at last. Nevertheless, merely to quiet the ravings of his insubordinate instincts, now in open revolt, he restaked the horses nearer to camp and cautiously carried both saddles to the head of the bed. Concession merely encouraged the rebels to further and successful outrages--the government was overthrown.

He drew sentry Steele aside and imparted his doubts. That faithful follower heaped scorn, mockery, laughter and abuse upon his shrinking superior: recounted all the points, from the first blasts of dynamite to the present moment, which favored the charitable belief above mentioned as newly entertained by Captain Griffith concerning himself. This belief of Captain Griffith was amply indorsed by his subordinate in terms of point and versatility.

"Of course they look alike. I noticed that the minute I saw him--the same amount of legs and arms, features all in the fore part of his head, hair on top, one body--wonderful! Why, you pitiful a.s.s, that Bransford person was a mighty keen-looking man in any company. This fellow's a yokel--an old, rusty, cap-and-ball, single-shot muzzle-loader. The Bransford was an automatic, steel-frame, high velocity----"

"The better head he has the more apt he is to do the unexpected----"

"Aw, shut up! You've got incipient paresis! Stuff your ears in your mouth and go to sleep!"

The captain sought his couch convinced, but holding his first opinion, savagely minded to arrest Mr. Long rather than let him have a gun to stand guard with. He was spared the decision. Mr. Long declined Gurdon's proffered gun, saying that he would be right there and he was a poor shot anyway.

Gurdon slept; Long took his place--and Captain Rex, from the bed, watched the watcher. Never was there a more faithful sentinel than Mr.

Long. Without relaxing his vigilance even to smoke, he strained every faculty lest the wily Bransford should creep out through the shadows.

The captain saw him, a stooped figure, sitting motionless by his rock, always alert, peering this way and that, turning his head to listen.

Once Tobe saw something. He crept noiselessly to the bed and shook his chief. Griffith came, with his gun. Something was stirring in the bushes. After a little it moved out of the shadows. It was a prowling coyote. The captain went back to bed once more convinced of Long's fidelity, but resolved to keep a relentless eye on him just the same.

And all unawares, as he revolved the day's events in his mind, the captain dropped off to troubled sleep.