The Long Chance Part 37

"How d'ye know there ain't?" the gambler demanded.

"Er--er--well, the fact is, Harley, Mrs. Pennycook--"

"She went an' looked, eh?"

"Well, she was concerned about the girl's reputation--"

"Huh-huh. I see. Dan, do _you_ believe this scandal?"

"Not a d.a.m.ned word of it" said honest Dan firmly. "There's some mistake.

The girl's good. I've seen her grow up in this town since she was a baby, an' girls like Donna Corblay don't go wrong."

Mr. Hennage extended his freckled, hairy hand. "Dan" he said, "I thank you for that. But your missus ain't playin' fair."

Pennycook threw up his hands deprecatingly. "I know it" he said, "an' I can't help it."

Harley P. laid his hand on the yardmaster's shoulder. "Dan" he said, "me an' you've been good friends, man to man, an' there's just a chance that after to-day we ain't a-goin' to meet no more. You take my compliments to Mrs. Pennycook, Dan, an' tell her that I've kept my word, even if she didn't keep hers. That worthless convict brother-in-law o' yours is dead, Dan. You can quit worryin'. He'll never blackmail you again. He's as dead as a mackerel an' I seen him buried. Dan, old friend, _adios._"

He shook hands warmly with the yardmaster and walked over to the Silver Dollar saloon, where, in order to smother his distress, he played game after game of solitaire. Here, shortly after his arrival, he had learned of Borax O'Rourke's latest move, and when the latter entered the saloon an hour later, Harley P. had delivered his ultimatum.

For an hour after O'Rourke had left the Silver Dollar for the ostensible purpose of purchasing a gun, the gambler continued to play solitaire.

At three o'clock he arose, kicked back his chair, sighed, and glanced at the crowd which had been hanging around, watching him.

"Twenty games to-day an' never beat it once" he complained. "No use talkin', boys, my luck's changed." He walked to the bar, laid a handful of gold thereon and gave his order.

"Wine."

He turned to the crowd. "It happens that there ain't no officer o' the law in San Pasqual to-day to interfere in the forthcoming festivities between me an' O'Rourke. I do hope that none o' you boys'll feel called on to interfere. I take it for granted you won't, out o' compliment to me, an' as a further compliment I'd be obliged if you-all'd honor me to the extent o' havin' a little nip."

The crowd shuffled to the bar, and a lanky prospector in from the dry diggings at Coolgardie spoke up.

"I'm a stranger here, but I'll help pull a rope tight around that mule-skinner's neck. It looks to me like a community job, an' if you say the word, friend, I'll head a movement to relieve you o' the resk o'

cancelin' that entry."

"Thank you, old-timer" replied Mr. Hennage kindly, "but this is a personal matter, an' it's been the custom in this town to let every man kill his own skunks. All set, boys. Smoke up!"

Each of his guests half turned, facing the gambler. As one man they spoke.

"How."

"How" replied Harley P., and tossed off his wine with evident relish.

He pocketed his change and left the saloon; five minutes later he was bending over a show-case in the hardware department of the general store, and when his purchase was completed he sat down on a keg of nails, laid his watch on the counter before him, lit a cigar and smoked until four o 'clock; then he arose.

He handed his watch to the proprietor.

"I'd be obliged if you was to give that watch to Dan Pennycook" he said, and walked out.

On the threshold he paused. A train, brown with the dust of the hundreds of miles of desert across which it had traveled, was just pulling in to the depot, and while Mr. Hennage realized that any delay in his programme would be a distinct strain on the idlers who had gathered in the porch of the Silver Dollar and adjacent deadfalls to watch the worst man in San Pasqual finally make good on his reputation, still he was not one of the presuming kind, and he declined to make a spectacle of himself for the edification of the travelers peering curiously from the windows of the train.

So he waited until the train pulled out before stepping briskly into the middle of the street, gun in hand. He crossed diagonally toward the eating-house, watching for O'Rourke.

Suddenly a man appeared around the corner of the eating-house, a long-barreled Colt's in his hand. Mr. Hennage raised his gun, but lowered it again instantly, for the man was Sam Singer. The Indian ran to Mr. Hennage's side.

"_Vamose, amigo mio_" he said in mingled Spanish and English, "me fixum plenty good."

"Sam" said Mr. Hennage, "get out. You're interferin'. This is the white man's burden." With a sudden sweep of his arm he tore the gun from the Indian's hand, and waved him imperiously away, just as the crowd on the porch of the Silver Dollar parted and Borax O'Rourke leaped into the street.

"Git--you Injun" yelled Mr. Hennage. "If he beefs me first you take a hack at him."

Sam Singer, weaponless, sprang around the corner of the eating-house, just as O'Rourke, having gained the center of the street, turned, drew his gun down on Harley P. and fired. A suppressed "A-a-h-h" went up from the crowd as the worst man in San Pasqual sprawled forward on his hands and knees.

O'Rourke brought his gun up, swiftly, dropped it again. Mr. Hennage's left arm buckled under him suddenly and he slid forward on his face, while two more bullets from the mule-skinner's gun threw the sand in his eyes, blinding him, before ricochetting against the eating-house wall.

Sam Singer, peering around the corner of the eating-house, saw the gambler pick himself up slowly. There was a surprised look on his face.

He was staggering in circles and as yet he had not fired a shot.

"No luck" he muttered thickly, "no luck," and reeled toward the eating-house. A fifth bullet scored his shoulder and crashed through the wall; the sixth--and last--was a clean miss, and in the middle of San Pasqual's single street Borax O'Rourke stood wonderingly, an empty smoking gun in his hand, staring at the man reeling blindly along the eating-house wall.

Mr. Hennage paused with his broad back against the wall. "The sand" he muttered, blinking, and brushed his eyes with the back of his good right hand, as Sam Singer made a quick scuttering rush around the corner and retrieved the loaded gun which the gambler had taken from him and which Harley P. had dropped when O'Rourke's second bullet had shattered his left arm.

Mr. Hennage saw the Indian stooping, and flapped his broken arm in feeble protest. Then he raised his gun.

"Borax" he said aloud, "I've got a full house," and pulled away, O'Rourke pitched forward, and Harley P. advanced uncertainly toward him, firing as he came, and when the gun was empty and Borax O'Rourke as dead as Cheops, the gambler stood over his man and hurled the gun at the still twitching body.

"Well, I've canceled that entry" he said. He stood there, swaying a little, and a strong arm came around his fat waist. He half turned and gazed into the sun-scorched, red-bearded face of a tall young man clad in a ruin of weather-beaten rags.

It was Bob McGraw. He had come back. Sam Singer, reaching Mr. Hennage's side at that moment, recognized the stranger, and realizing that Mr.

Hennage was in safe hands, the Indian dropped his gun (the one he had taken from O'Rourke at the Hat Ranch) and fled to Donna with the news.

Mr. Hennage fixed his fading glance upon the wanderer. He wanted to say something severe, but for the life of him--even the little he had left--he could not; there was a puzzled look in his sand-clogged eyes as he whispered.

"Bob, they've got the goods--on you. There's a warrant--out; you--know--that stage hold-up--at Garlock--"

He lurched forward into Bob McGraw's arms.

"Oh, Harley, Harley, old man" said Bob McGraw in a choking voice.

"Vamose" panted Mr. Hennage. "I'm dyin', son. You can't do no good here."

"My friend, my friend" whispered the wanderer, "don't die believing I'm an outlaw. I didn't do it. On my word of honor, I didn't."

"I'm dyin', Bob. Give me the straight of it."

"I can't. I don't know what you're driving at, Harley. It's a mistake--"

"Everything's a mistake--I'm a mistake" muttered the gambler. "Son, take me--to my--room--in the hotel. I'm a dog with a bad--name, but I--don't want to--die in--the street."

Dan Pennycook, at his work among the strings of empty box-cars across the track, had heard the shooting; had seen the crowd leave the porch of the Silver Dollar saloon and surge out into the street. He came running now, and upon hearing the details of the duel he pressed through the circle of curious men who had gathered to see Harley P. Hennage die.