“And how are we now, my young friend?”—Page [39].

GOOD MEN AND
TRUE
AND
HIT THE LINE HARD

BY
EUGENE MANLOVE RHODES

AUTHOR OF
BRANSFORD OF RAINBOW RANGE,
THE DESIRE OF THE MOTH,
WEST IS WEST, Etc.

ILLUSTRATIONS BY
H. T. DUNN

NEW YORK
GROSSET & DUNLAP
PUBLISHERS

Made in the United States of America

Copyright, 1910, by
HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY

Copyright, 1920, by
THE H. K. FLY COMPANY

ILLUSTRATIONS

GOOD MEN AND TRUE

Chapter I

“I always thought they were fabulous monsters.

Is it alive?”

—The Unicorn.

SUN and wind of thirty-six out-of-door years had tanned Mr. Jeff Bransford’s cheek to a rosy-brown, contrasting sharply with the whiteness of the upper part of his forehead, when exposed—as now—by the pushing up of his sombrero. These same suns and winds had drawn at the corners of his eyes a network of fine lines: but the brown eyes were undimmed, and his face had a light, sure look of unquenchable boyishness; sure mark of the unattached, and therefore carefree and irresponsible man, who, as the saying goes, “is at home wherever his hat is hung.”

The hat in question was a soft gray one, the crown deeply creased down the middle, the wide brim of it joyously atilt, merging insensibly from one wavy curve into another and on to yet a third, like Hogarth’s line of beauty.

Mr. Bransford’s step was alert and springy: perhaps it had even a slight, unconscious approach to a swagger, as of one not unsatisfied with himself. He turned at the corner of Temple Street, skipped lightsome up a stairway and opened an office door, bearing on its glass front the inscription:

SIMON HIBLER
ATTORNEY-AT-LAW

“Is Mr. Hibler in?”

The only occupant of the room—a smooth-faced and frank-eyed young man—rose from his desk and came forward.

“Mr. Hibler is not in town.”

“Dee-lightful! And when will he be back?” The rising inflection on the last word conveyed a resolute vivacity proof against small annoyances.

“To tell you the truth, I do not know. He is over in Arizona, near San Simon—for change and rest.”

“H’m!” The tip of the visitor’s nose twitched slightly, the brown eyes widened reflectively; the capable mouth under the brown mustache puckered as if to emit a gentle whistle. “He’ll bring back the change. I’ll take all bets on that. San Simon! H’m!” He shrugged his shoulders, one corner of his mouth pulled down in whimsical fashion, while the opposite eyebrow arched, so giving his face an appearance indescribably odd: the drooping side expressive of profound melancholy, while the rest of his face retained its habitual look of invincible cheerfulness. “San Simon! Dear, oh dear! And I may just nicely contemplate my two thumbs till he gets back with the change—and maybeso the rest!” He elevated the thumbs and cast vigilant glances at each in turn: half-chanting, dreamily:

“‘O, she left her Tombstone home

For to dwell in San Simon,

And she run off with a prairie-navigator.’

—Ran off, I should say.” His nose tweaked again.

The clerk was a newcomer in El Paso, hardly yet wonted to the freakish humor and high spirits that there flourish unrebuked—and indeed, unnoticed. But he entered into the spirit of the occasion. “Is there anything I can do?” he inquired. “I am Mr. Hibler’s chief—and only—clerk.”

“No-o,” said the visitor doubtfully, letting his eyes wander from his thumbs to the view of white-walled Juarez beyond the river. “No-o—That is, not unless you can sell me his Rainbow ranch and brand for less than they’re worth. Such is my errand—on behalf of Pringle, Beebe, Ballinger and Bransford. I’m Bransford—me.”

“Jeff Bransford? Mr. Hibler’s foreman?” asked the young man eagerly.

“Mr. Jeff Bransford—foreman for Hibler—not of,” amended Bransford gently. His thumbs were still upreared. Becoming suddenly aware of this, he fixed them with a startled gaze.

“Say! Take supper with me!” The young man blurted out the words. “Mr. Hibler’s always talking about you and I want to get acquainted with you. Aughinbaugh’s my name.”

Bransford sat down heavily, thumbs still erect, elbows well out from his side, and transferred his gaze, with marked respect, to the clerk’s boyish face, now very rosy indeed.

Jeff’s eyes grew big and round; his lips were slightly parted; the thumbs drooped, the fingers spread wide apart in mutual dismay. Holding Aughinbaugh’s eyes with his own, he pressed one outspread hand over his heart. Slowly, cautiously, the other hand fumbled in a vest pocket, produced notebook and pencil, spread the book stealthily on his knee and began to write. “‘A good name,’” he murmured, “‘is rather to be chosen than great riches.’”

But the owner of the good name was a lad of spirit, and had no mind to submit tamely to such hazing. “See here! What does a cowboy know about the Bible, anyway?” he demanded, glaring indignantly. “I believe you’re a sheep in wolves’ clothing! You don’t talk like a cowboy—or look like a cowboy.”

Jeff glanced down at his writing, and back to his questioner. Then he made an alteration, closed the book and looked up again. He had a merry eye.

“Exactly how does a cowboy look? And how does it talk?” he asked mildly. He glanced with much interest over as much of his own person as he could see; turning and twisting to aid the process. “I don’t see anything wrong. Is my hair on straight?”

“Wrong!” echoed Aughinbaugh severely, shaking an accusing finger. “Why, you’re all wrong. What the public expects——”

Mr. Bransford’s interruption may be omitted. It was profane. Also, it was plagiarized from Commodore Vanderbilt.

“You a cowboy! Yah!” said Aughinbaugh in vigorous scorn. “With a silk necktie! Everybody knows that the typical cowboy wears a red cotton handkerchief.”

“How long since you left New York?”

“Me? I’m from Kansas City.”

“Same thing,” said Bransford coldly. “I mean, how long since you came to El Paso? And have you been out of town since?”

“About eight months. And I confess that my duties—at first in the bank and afterwards here, have kept me pretty close, except for a trip or two to Juarez. But why?”

“Why enough!” returned Jeff. “Young man, young man! I see the finger of fate in this. It is no blind chance that brought me here while Hibler was away. It was predestined from the foundations of earth that I was to come here at this very now to explain to you about cowboys. I have the concentrated venom of about twenty-one years stored away to work off on somebody, and I feel it in my bones that you are the man. Come with me and I will do you good—as it says in mournful Numbers. You’ve been led astray. You shouldn’t believe all you read and only half what you see.

“In the first place, take the typical cowboy. There positively ain’t no sich person! Maybe so half of ’em’s from Texas and the other half from anywhere and everywhere else. But they’re all alike in just one thing—and that is that every last one of them is entirely different from all the others. Each one talks as he pleases, acts as he pleases and—when not at work—dresses as he pleases. On the range though, they all dress pretty much alike.—Because, the things they wear there have been tried out and they’ve kept only the best of each kind—the best for that particular kind of work.”

“They ‘proved all things and held fast that which was good,’” suggested Aughinbaugh.

“Exactly. For instance, that handkerchief business. That isn’t meant as a substitute for a necktie. Ever see a drought? If you did, you probably remember that it was some dusty. Well—there’s been a steady drought out here for two hundred and eight million years come August. And when you drive two, three thousand head of cattle, with four feet apiece, to the round-up ground and chouse ’em ’round half a day, cutting out steers, the dust is so thick a horse can’t fall down when he stumbles. Then mister cowboy folds his little hankie, like them other triangles that the ladies, God bless ’em, with their usual perversity, call ‘squares,’ ties the ends, puts the knot at the back of his neck, pulls the wide part over his mouth and up over the bridge of his nose, and breathes through it! Got that? By heavens, it’s a filter to keep the dust out of your lungs, and not an ornament! It’s usually silk—not because silk is booful but because it’s better to breathe through.”

“Really, I never dreamed——” began Aughinbaugh. But Jeff waved him down.

“Don’t speak to the man at the wheel, my son. And everything a cowboy uses, at work, from hat to boots, from saddle to bed, has just as good a reason for being exactly what it is as that handkerchief. Take the high-heeled boots, now——”

“Dad,” said Aughinbaugh firmly. “I am faint. Break it to me easy. I was once an interior decorator of some promise, though not a professional. Let me lead you to a restaurant and show you a sample of my skill. Then come round to my rooms and tell me your troubles at leisure. Maybe you’ll feel better. But before you explain your wardrobe I want to know why you don’t say ‘You all’ and ‘that-a-way,’ ‘plumb’ and ‘done gone,’ and the rest of it.”

“I do, my dear, when I want to,” said Bransford affectionately. “Them’s all useful words, easy and comfortable, like old clothes and old shoes. I like ’em. But they go with the old clothes. And now, as you see, I am—to use the metropolitan idiom—in my ‘glad rags’ and my speech naturally rises in dignity to meet the occasion. Besides, associating with Beebe—he’s one of them siss—boom—ah! boys—has mitigated me a heap. Then I read the signs, and the brands on the freight cars. And I’ll tell you one more thing, my son. A large proportion—I mean, of course, a right smart chance—of the cowboys are illiterate, and some of them are grand rascals, but they ain’t none of ’em plumb imbeciles. They couldn’t stay on the job. If their brains don’t naturally work pretty spry, things happen to ’em—the chuck-wagon bunts ’em or something. And they all have a chance at ‘the education of a gentleman’—‘to ride, to shoot and to speak the truth.’ They have to ride and shoot—and speakin’ the truth comes easier for them than for some folks, ’cause if speaking the aforesaid truth displeases any one they mostly don’t give a damn.”

“Stop! Spare me!” cried Aughinbaugh. He collapsed in his chair, sliding together in an attitude of extreme dejection. “My spirits are very low, but——” He rose, tottered feebly to his desk and took therefrom a small bottle, which, with a glass, he handed to Bransford.

“Thanks. But you—you’re a tee-totaler?” said Jeff.

“A—well—not exactly,” stammered Aughinbaugh. “But I have to be very careful. I—I only take one drink at a time!” He fumbled out another glass.

“I stumble, I stumble!” said Bransford gravely. He poured out a small drink and passed the bottle. “‘I fill this cup to one made up!’”—He held the glass up to the light.

“Well?” said Aughinbaugh, expectantly. “Go on!”

“That description can’t be bettered,” said Bransford.

“Never will I drink such a toast as that,” cried Aughinbaugh, laughing. “Let me substitute, Here’s to our better acquaintance!”

Chapter II

“Life is just one damn thing after another.”

—A Nameless Philosopher.

AUGHINBAUGH closed the door behind him and paused, vastly diverted. His entrance had passed unnoted, muffled by the jerky click-click of the typewriter on which Jeff Bransford toiled with painful absorption. On Jeff’s forehead little beads of sweat stood out, glistening in the lamp-light. He scanned the last line, scowled ferociously, and snapped the platen back. His uncertain fingers twitched solicitously above the keys. Aughinbaugh chuckled offensively.

“‘Yond Cassius has a lean and hungry look;

He thinks too much: such men are dangerous.’”

he declaimed.

Jeff whirled around. “Hello, here you are! Any news from our employer?” He rose with a sigh of relief and mopped his brow. “Gee! I’ve got to work the Jim-fidgets out of my fingers.”

Ignoring the query, Aughinbaugh took a step forward, drew up his slender frame, inflated his chest, spread one hand upon it, and threw up his other hand with a flourish of limber fingers. “‘Now is the time,’” he spouted forth at Bransford, mouthing the well-known words, “‘for all good men and true to come to the aid of the party!’”

Jeff grinned sheepishly. “I’ll dream that cussed thing to-night. How long did it take you to learn to play a tune on this fool contraption, anyhow?”

“It took me three months—to play on it anyhow. But then I already knew how to spell. I’ve been at it two years since and am still improving. I should estimate that you would need about eight years. Better give it up. Try a maul or a piledriver. More suited to your capabilities. Why, Jeff, a really good stenographer can do first-class work in the dark.”

“Eight years? George, you’re an optimist. I’ve worked two solid hours on this one ‘simple little sentence,’ as you call it, and I’ve never got it right once. Sometimes I’ve come within one letter of it. Once I made a mighty effort and got all the letters right, but I forgot to space and ran the words together. And say—that simple little sentence hasn’t got near all the letters in it. B, j, k, q, v, x and z are left out.”

“Here, then—here’s one that contains every letter: ‘A quick move by the enemy will jeopardize six fine gunboats.’”

Jeff pulled pad and pencil to him. “Give me that again and I’ll take it down.” Repeating the alphabet slowly, he canceled each letter as he went. “Right you are! Say, the fellow that got that up was on the job, wasn’t he? Why didn’t you give me this one in the first place? Wonder if it’s possible to get ’em all in another sentence as short?”

“I think not,” said Aughinbaugh. “It’s been tried. But I don’t share your admiration for the last one. Besides reeking of militarism abhorrent to my peaceful disposition, it is stiff, labored, artificial and insincere. Compare it with the spontaneity, the beauty, the stately cadences, the sonorous fire, the sweep and swing of the simple, natural appeal: ‘Now is the time for all good men and true to come to the aid of the party!’”

If it has ever been your privilege to observe a wise old she-bear watching her cubs at play and to note the expression of her face—half patience, tolerance, resignation; the remainder pride and approval—you will know exactly how Jeff looked. As for Aughinbaugh, he bore himself grandly, chin up. His voice was vibrant, resonant, purposeful; his eyes glowed with serious and lofty enthusiasm: no muscle quivered to a smile.

“Why, there is philosophy in it! The one unvarying factor of the human mind,” he went on, “is the firm, unbiased conviction that I am right, and all opposition necessarily, consciously and wilfully wrong. This belief is the base and foundation of all human institutions, of sectionalism, caste, creeds, parties, states, of patriotism itself. It is the premise on which all wars are based. Mark, now, how human nature speaks from its elemental depths in the calm, complacent, but entirely sincere assumption that all good men and true will be unconditionally with the party!”

He warmed to his subject; he strode back and forth; he smote open palm with clenched fist in vehement gesture. Jeff snickered. George rebuked him with a stern and withering glance.

“I grant you that b, j, k, q, v, x and z are omitted. But what are b, j, k, q, v, x and z in comparison to the chaste perfection of this immortal line? Let them fitly typify the bad men and false who do not come to the aid of the party. Injustice is only what they deserve!”

Consigning b, j, k, q, v, x and z to outer darkness with scornful, snapping fingers, he poured a glass of water, sipped it slowly, with resolute suppression of his Adam’s apple, fixed Jeff with another severe glance, paused impressively, rose to his tiptoes with both hands outspread, and continued:

“Why, sir, this is the grandest line in literature! It should hang on every wall, a text worked on a sampler by tender, loving hands! It is a ready-made watchword, a rallying cry for any great cause! It might be sung by marching thousands. When, in a great crisis, the mighty statesman, the intellectual giant between whose puny legs we petty men do creep and peer about, has proclaimed the Fla-ag in Danger; has led us to stand at the parting of the ways; has shown that the nation must make irrevocable choice of good or evil; when our hearts are thrilled with the consciousness of our own virtue——” he sprang to a chair and flaunted his handkerchief in rhythmical waves—“this, then, is his crashing peroration: ‘Now is the time for all good men and true to come to the aid of the party!’”

Bowing gracefully, he carefully parted imaginary coat-tails and seated himself, beaming.

Jeff lolled contentedly back in his chair, puffing out clouds of smoke. “That’s a fine line of talk you get out. You sure did a wise thing when you quit the bank and took to studying law. You have all the qualifications for a successful lawyer—or a barker for a sideshow.” He tapped out his pipe and yawned lazily. “I infer from your slurring remarks about solemn, silly twaddle that you are not permanently tagged, classified, labeled and catalogued, politically?”

“I am a consistent and humble follower,” replied George, “of the wise Democritus, who, as I will explain for the benefit of your benighted ignorance, is known as the Laughing Philosopher. I laugh. Therefore I can truthfully say, to paraphrase the words of a famous leader, ‘I am a Democrit!’”

Jeff showed his teeth. “I guess I am, too—but I didn’t know what it was till you told me. Now I have a party, at last—and now is the time for all good men and true—and that reminds me, my young and exuberant friend, that you have not yet told me when our esteemed and respected employer intends to return.”

“I do not quite like the tone you adopt in speaking of Mr. Simon Hibler,” said George icily. “It smacks of irreverence and presumption. Still less do I relish your persistent reference to him as ‘our’ employer. It amounts to an assumption of a certain equality in our respective positions that I cannot for an instant tolerate.” He strutted to the hearthrug and turned his back to the fire; he fiddled with his watch-chain; tone and manner were heavily pompous. “In a way, of course, Mr. Hibler might be said to employ us both. But I would have you realize that a vast gulf separates the social status of a lowly cow-servant, stolid and stunned, a brother to the ox, from that of an embryo Blackstone—like myself. I accept a position and receive a salary. You take a job and draw wages. Moreover, a lawyer’s clerk marries the youngest daughter and is taken into the firm. By the way, Hibler has no daughter. I must remind him of this. ‘Hibler & Aughinbaugh, Counselors at Law.’ That’ll look good in silver letters on a sanded, dark-blue background, eh, Jefferson? But soft! methinks my natural indignation has diverted me from your question. No, my good fellow, I do not know when Mr. Hibler is returning to El Paso. Are you already tired of urban delights, Mr. Bransford?”

“I was tired of urban delights,” remarked Mr. Bransford, “before you were out of short dresses. However, I’ve waited this long and I’ll stay right here in El Paso till he comes. I bore myself some, daytimes, but we have bully good times of nights. You’re as good as a show—better. Tune up your Julius Cæsar!”

“Your attitude—if you will overlook the involuntary rhyme,” said George, “is one of base ingratitude. I endeavor to instruct and uplift you. You might be absorbing sweetness and light at every pore, acquiring a love for the true, the good and the beautiful—and you are merely amused! It is disheartening. As for this golden volume, this masterpiece of William Shakspere’s genius—‘which, pardon me, I do not mean to read’——”

“Oh, go on! Of course you’re going to read it. We’ve got almost through it. You left off just beyond ‘the-will-give-us-the-will, we-will-have-the-will.’”

“Why, you lazy pup, why didn’t you read it yourself? You have nothing to do. I have to work.”

“I did read it through to-day. And began at the first again. But,” said Jeff admiringly, “I like to hear you read it. You have such a lovely voice, Mr. Crow.”

Aughinbaugh bowed. “Thank you, Mr. Bransford, thank you! But I am proof against even such subtle and insidious flattery as yours. Hereafter, sir, I shall read no book through to you. I shall select works suited to your parts and your station in life and read barely enough to stimulate your sluggish mind. Then you can shell corn or be buried alive. To-night, for instance, I shall read some salient extracts from Carlyle’s ‘French Revolution.’ You will not in the least understand it, but your interest and curiosity will be aroused. You will then finish it, with such collateral reading as I shall direct.”

“Sure you got all those ‘shalls’ and ‘wills’ just right?” suggested Jeff. “It’s mighty easy to get ’em tangled up.”

“That is the only proper way to study history,” George went on, wisely ignoring the interruption. “Read history lightly, about some period, then read the best works of poetry or fiction dealing with the same events. Then come back to history again. The characters will be real people to you and not mere names. You will eagerly extend your researches to details about these familiar acquaintances and friends, and learn particulars that you would else have shirked as dull and laborious.” He took a book from the shelf. “I will now read to you—after you replenish the fire—a few chapters here and there, especially there, dealing with the taking of the Bastille.”

Without, a wild March wind shrilled and moaned at the trembling casements; within, firelight’s cozy cheer, Aughinbaugh’s slim youth lit by the glowing circle of the shaded lamp, the dusky corners beyond. The flexible voice sank with pity or swelled with hot indignation. And Bransford, as he listened to that stupendous, chaotic drama of incoherent clangorous World Bedlam, saw, in the glowing coals, tumultuous, dim-confused figures come and go, passionate, terrible and grim; the young, the gay, the beautiful, the brave, the brave in vain; fire-hearted, vehement, proud, swallowed up by delirium. Newer shapes, wild, portentous, spluttering, flashing, whirling, leaping in wild dervish dance. In the black shadows, in the eddying thick smoke, lurked crowding shapes more terrible still, abominable, malignant, demoniacal, imbecile—Proteus shapes that changed, dwindled, leaped and roared to an indistinguishable sulphurous whirlpool, sport of all the winds. Brief flashes of clearer light there were, as the smoke billowed aside; faces gleamed a moment distinct, resolute, indomitable, bright-sparkling; blazed high—and fell, trampled down by fresh legion-changing apparitions. Sad visions, some monstrous, some heroic, all pitiful; thronging innumerable, consuming and consumed.

“Likewise ashlar stones of the Bastille continue thundering through the dusk; its paper archives shall fly white. Old secrets come to view; and long buried despair finds voice. Read this portion of an old letter: ‘If for my consolation monseigneur would grant me, for the sake of God and the most blessed Trinity, that I should have news of my dear wife; were it only her name on a card to show that she is alive! It were the greatest consolation I could receive; and I should forever bless the greatness of monseigneur.’ Poor prisoner, who signest thyself Quéret-Démery, and hast no other history, she is dead, that dear wife of thine, and thou art dead! ’Tis fifty years since thy breaking heart put this question; to be heard now first, and long heard, in the hearts of men.”

A long silence. The fire was low. One dim, blurred form was there—an old man, writing, in a stone cell.

Aughinbaugh closed the book. His eyes were moist. “One of the greatest novels ever written, ‘The Tale of Two Cities,’ is based entirely upon and turns upon this last paragraph. Read that to-morrow and then come back to the ‘French Revolution.’ You’ll be around to-morrow night?”

Jeff rose, laughing. “You remind me of my roommate at school.”

“Your—what? Where?” said George in astonishment.

“Oh, yes, I’ve been to school, but not very long. When the boys used to stay too late he’d yawn and say to me: ‘Jeff, perhaps we’d better go to bed. These people may want to go home!’”

“Oh, well, it’s nearly twelve o’clock,” said George, unabashed. “And I have to work if you don’t. Bless you, my children, bless you! Be happy and you will be good! Buenas noches!”

“Buenas noches!”

A trolley car whirred by, with scintillation of blue-crackling sparks. Jeff elected to walk, companied by his storied ghosts—their footsteps sounded through the rustling leaves. The wind was dead; the night was overcast, dark and chill. Aughinbaugh’s lodgings were in the outskirts of the residence section; the streets at this hour were deserted. Jeff had walked briskly for ten minutes when, as he neared a corner in a quiet neighborhood, he saw a tall man in gray come from the farther side of the intersecting street just ahead. The gray man paused under the electric light to let a recklessly-driven cab overtake and pass him, and then turned diagonally over toward Jeff, whistling as he came. He was half-way across, and Jeff was within a yard of the corner, when another man, short and squat, hurried from the street to the left, brushing by so close that Jeff might have touched him. So unexpected was his appearance—for his footsteps had been drowned by the clattering cab—that Jeff was startled. He paused, midstep, for the merest fraction of a second. The town clock boomed midnight.

Thereafter, events moved with all the breathless unreality of dream. The second man turned across to meet the first. A revolver leaped up, shining in the light; he fired point-blank. The gray man staggered back. Yet, taken all unaware, so deadly swift he was that both men fired now together.

Nor was Jeff imprudently idle. He was in the line of fire, directly behind the short man. To the left, across the sidewalk, the hole of a tree was just visible beyond the house corner. Jeff leaped for this friendly shelter—and butted headlong into human ribs.

A one-hundred-and-sixty-pound projectile deals no light blow, and Jeff’s initial velocity was the highest he could command at such slight notice. The owner of the ribs reeled out into the street, beyond the shadows. A huge man, breathless, gasping, with a revolver drawn; his thumb was on the hammer. So much Jeff knew and closed on him, his left hand clutched the gun, the hammer was through his finger. They wrenched and tore at the gun; and had the bigger man grappled now he might have crushed Jeff at once, broken him by main strength. But he was a man of one idea—and he had a second gun. A violent jerk threw Jeff to his knee, but he kept his desperate grip. The second gun flashed in the giant’s left hand, rising and falling with the frontier firing motion; but Jeff’s own gun was out, he struck up the falling death, the bullet sang above him. He was on his feet, in trampling, unreal struggle; again he struck the gun aside as it belched fire. Turning, whirling, straining, Jeff was dizzily conscious that the men beneath the light were down, both still shooting; the cab had stopped, men were running toward him shouting. The giant’s dreadful strength was undirected, heaving and thrusting purposeless; time for order and response would be time for crashing death to find him; his one frantic thought was to shoot first, to shoot fast. Shaken, tossed and thrown, Jeff kept his feet, kept his head, kept close in; as the great man’s gun rose and fell he parried with his own. Three shots, four—the others fired no longer; five—one more—Six! It was warded, Jeff drew back, fired his first shot from his hip; the giant dragged at him, heaved forward, and struck out mightily, hammerwise. Jeff saw the blow gleaming down as he fired again. Glint of myriad lights streamed sparkwise across an infinite blackness; he knew no more.

The clock was still striking.

Chapter III

“Please go ’way and let me sleep,

I would rather sleep than eat!”

—The Sluggard.

“HE’S coming round. That man’s suhtenly got a cast-iron skull. Such a blow with a .45 would ’a’ killed most fellers. What you goin’ to do with him, Judge?”

“I don’t know. It strikes me that he would be a valuable man for us. That was the nerviest performance I ever saw. Had I been told that any one could mix it that way with Oily Broderick and two guns, and get off with it scot-free except for this little love tap, I should never have believed it.” The voice was rich, clear, slow, well-modulated. “Perhaps he may be induced to join us. If not——”

The words reached Jeff from immeasurable distances. He was floating on a particularly soft and billowy cloud at the time: a cloud with a buoyant and undulant motion, very soothing. Jeff noted it with approval. Underneath and a little ahead, a high and exceedingly steep mountain rose abruptly from the sea. It was built entirely of piled, roundish boulders. The contour seemed familiar. Madagascar, of course! How clever of him to remember! Jeff turned the cloud. It sank in slow and graceful spirals to the peak. Doubtless the voices came from there. The words seemed to have an unexplained connection with some circumstance that he could not quite recall. He felt the elusive memory slipping away. However, it made no difference. He drifted into a delicious vagueness.

Something hard was forced between his teeth; a fiery liquid trickled down his throat. He gasped and struggled; his eyes fluttered open. To his intense disappointment the cloud was gone. An arm was propping him up. Mysterious blankets appeared before him from somewhere or other. On them lay an arm and a bandaged hand. The hand was hurting some one very much. Jeff wondered whose it was. He looked at the hand fixedly for a long time and, on further examination, found it to be his own. Here was a pretty state of affairs!

A pillow was thrust behind him and the supporting arm withdrawn. At once he felt a throbbing pain in his head. He put his hand up and lo! his head was also heavily bandaged! He regretted Madagascar more than ever. He settled back for reflection. Looking up, after a little, he saw a chair with the back turned toward him; astride the chair, a middle-aged man, large, clean-shaven, rosy, well-dressed, and, as it seemed to Jeff, unnecessarily cheerful. His eyes twinkled; his hands, which were white and plump and well kept, played a little ditty on the chair-back. There was a ruby on one finger. Beyond him sat a gross, fat man with a stubbly beard, a coarse, flat nose and little, piggish, red eyes. His legs were crossed and he smoked a villainous pipe. There were other men behind these two. Jeff was just turning to look at them when his attention was recalled by a voice from the man astride the chair.

“And how are we now, my young friend? A trifle dazed, I fancy? Something of a headache?” He showed his white teeth in a friendly smile; his voice was soft and playful. “Are we well enough to eat something? What with our recent disagreeable shock and our long abstinence from food, we must find ourself rather feeble.”

Jeff stared at the man while he digested this communication. “A little coffee,” he said at last. “I can’t eat anything now. I am dizzy and most everlasting sick at my stomach. Put out that damned pipe!”

The soft-voiced man chuckled delightedly, as if he found this peremptory command exquisitely humorous. “You hear, Borrowman? Evidently Mr. Bransford is of those who want what they want when they want it. Bring a little soup, too. He’ll feel better after he drinks his coffee.”

The man addressed as Borrowman disappeared with a shuffling gait. Jeff lay back and considered. His half-shut eyes wandered around. Whitewashed stone walls, a heavily-ironed door, no window—that was queer, too!—floor and ceiling of rough boards, a small fireplace, two chairs, a pine table, a lighted lamp. That was all. His gaze came back to the man in the chair, to find that gentleman’s large blue eyes watching him with a quizzical and humorous look—a look highly suggestive of a cat enjoying a little casual entertainment with a mouse. In his weakened condition Jeff found this feline regard disconcerting.

The coffee came, and the soup. After Jeff’s refreshment the man in the chair rose. “We will leave you to the care of our good Borrowman,” he said, baring his white, even teeth. “I will be back this evening and, if you are stronger, we will then discuss some rather momentous affairs. Go to sleep now.”

The caressing advice seemed good. Jeff was just dropping off when a disturbing thought intruded itself.

This evening? Then it must be day now. Why did they burn a lamp in daytime? The problem was too much for Jeff. Still pondering it, he dozed off.

When he woke the lamp was yet burning; the objectionable fat man sat by the fire. When he turned his head, presently, Jeff was startled to observe that this man had got hold of an entirely new set of features. Here was an extraordinary thing! Hard features, and unprepossessing still, but clean at least. How very curious!

After a while a simple solution presented itself. It was not the same man at all! Jeff wondered why he had not hit upon that at first. It seemed that he had now become a body entirely surrounded by fat men—no—that wasn’t right. “Let me—let me name the Supreme Court of a nation and I care not who makes the laws.” No, that was John Wesley Pringle’s gag. Good old Wes’! Wonder where he is? He wasn’t fat. How did that go? Oh, yes! “Let me have men about me that are fat!”—Something snapped—and Jeff remembered.

Not all at once. He lay silent, with closed eyes, and pieced together scraps of recollection, here and there, bit by bit. It was like a picture puzzle; so much so that Jeff quite identified each random memory with some definite shape, eagerly fitting them together in a frame; and, when he had adjusted them satisfactorily to a perfect square, fell peacefully asleep.

Chapter IV

“Good fellow, thy shooting is good,

An’ if thy heart be as good as thy hand,

Thou art better than Robin Hood.”

—Guy of Gisborne.

WHEN he woke the soft-voiced, white-handed man again sat beside the bed, again in the same equestrian attitude, clasping the back of the chair, beaming with good humor.

“And how is our young friend now? Much better, I trust. We have had a long and refreshing sleep. Is our brain quite clear?”

Here the fat man—the less ill-favored one—rose silently from beside the fire and left them.

“Our young friend is extremely hungry,” said Jeff. “Our young friend’s brain is clear, but our young friend’s head is rather sore. Where am I? In jail?” He sat up and pushed back the bandage for clearer vision.

The jovial gentleman laughed—a merry and mellow peal. “What a spirited fellow you are! And what an extremely durable headpiece you have! A jail? Well, not exactly, my dear fellow, not exactly. Let us say, in a cache, in a retreat, sometimes used by gentlemen wishing temporary retirement from society. You are also, though I grieve to say it, in a jackpot—to use a phrase the precise meaning and origin of which I do not comprehend, but which seems to be, in the vernacular, a synonym for the more common word predicament.” He shook his head sorrowfully. “A very sad predicament, indeed! Quite unintentionally, and in obedience to a chivalrous impulse—which does you great credit, I assure you—you have had the misfortune to mar a very-well-laid plan of mine. Had I not been a quick thinker, marvelously fertile in expedients, your officiousness would have placed me in an awkward quandary. However, in the very brief time at my disposal I was able to hit upon a device equally satisfactory—I may say even more satisfactory than the original.”

“Hold on!” said Jeff. “I don’t quite keep up. You planned a midnight assassination which did not go off smoothly. I’ve got that. You were one of the men in the cab. There was a fight——”

“There was, indeed!” interrupted the genial gentleman. His eyes lit up with enthusiasm; his shapely fingers tapped the chair-back. “Such a fight! It was magnificent! Believe me, my dear Bransford, it inspired me with an almost affectionate admiration for you! And your opponent was a most redoubtable person, with a sensitive trigger finger——”

“Excuse the interruption,” said Jeff. “But you seem to have the advantage of me in the matter of names.”

“So I have, so I have! As you will infer, I looked through your pockets. Thorpe is my name—S. S. Thorpe. Stay—here is my card. You will see that I am entitled to the prefix ‘Hon.,’ having been sometime State Senator. Call me Judge. I have never occupied that exalted position, but all the boys call me Judge. To go back—we were speaking of your opponent. Perhaps you knew him? No? Mr. Broderick, Mr. Oily Broderick, once of San Antonio, a man of some renown. We shall miss him, Mr. Bransford, we shall miss him! A very useful fellow! But your eyes ask the question—Dead? Dear me, yes! Dead and buried these many hours. He never knew what ailed him. Both of your bullets found a vital spot. A sad loss! But I interrupt. I am much interested to see how nearly accurate your analysis of the situation will be.”

“The short man—was he killed, too?” asked Jeff.

“The worthy Krouse was killed as well,” said Judge Thorpe, sighing with comfortable resignation. “But Krouse was a negligible quantity. Amiable, but a bungler. Go on!”

“Your intended victim seems to have escaped——”

“Survived,” corrected Judge Thorpe gently, with complacent inspection of his shapely hands. “Survived is the better word, believe me. Captain Charles Tillotson, Captain of the Rangers. An estimable gentleman, with whom, I grieve to say, I was not on the best of terms. To our political enmity, of long standing—and you perhaps know that Southwestern politics are extremely bitter—has been added of late a certain social rivalry. But I digress. You were saying——”

“But you are prompting me,” said Jeff testily. “It is hardly necessary. Your enemy not being killed outright, you choose to assassinate his good name, juggling appearances to make it seem that he was the murderer—and to that end you have spirited me away.”

“Exactly! You are a man after my own heart—a man of acumen and discernment,” said Judge Thorpe, beaming, “although I did, as you suggest, prompt you at some points—knowing that you were not familiar with all the premises. Really, Mr. Bransford, though I would not unduly exalt myself, I cannot help but think my little device showed more than mere talent. It was, considering the agitating circumstances, considering that both conception and execution had to be instantaneous, little less than Napoleonic! I feel sure that when I tell you the details you will share my enthusiasm.”

Jeff was doing some quick thinking. He recalled what he had heard of Thorpe. He was best known as a powerful and wealthy politician of El Paso, who in his younger days had been a dangerous gunfighter. Of late years, however, he had become respected and reputable, his youthful foibles forgotten.

The appalling frankness of this avowal could bode no good to Jeff. Evidently he was helplessly in this man’s power, and his life had been spared for some sinister and shameful purpose.

“Before you favor me with any more details, Judge,” said Jeff, “can’t you give me an old boot to chew on?”

“What wonderful spirits, what splendid nerves! I compliment you!” said the Judge. “Our good Mac went, when you first awoke, to prepare steak, eggs and coffee for you. You will pardon us if we do not have your meals brought in from a restaurant. It would not do. We are quiet here, we do not court observation. For the same reason we have been forced to abstain from medical attendance for you, otherwise so desirable. I, myself, have filled that office to the best of my ability. Now as to the replenishing of the inner man. Mac is an excellent cook.”

“Cleaner than Borrowman,” said Jeff.

“And is, as you observe, much cleaner than Borrowman. He will prepare whatever the market affords. You have only to ask. And, while we are waiting, I will return to my story.”

“I was, as you so readily surmised, in the cab, together with my good friend, colleague and lieutenant, Mr. Sam Patterson. We had telephoned ahead to Krouse and Broderick that Tillotson was on his way. We were to be witnesses that Krouse acted purely in self-defense, you know—as, indeed, were also the cab driver and Broderick. Broderick was to hold himself in reserve and not to assist, except in case of mishap. We supposed that Krouse would kill Tillotson without difficulty. Krouse bungled. He inflicted three wounds, painful but not dangerous; including one which creased the scalp and produced unconsciousness.”

The man took such shameless delight in parading his wickedness that Jeff began to wonder if, after all, it would not have saved himself much difficulty if Broderick had killed him. But he set his mind like a flint to thwart this smiling monster at any cost.

The Judge went on: “Such was the distressing situation when I came up. Some men would have finished Tillotson on the spot. But I kept my presence of mind; I exercised admirable self-restraint. It would be but an instant before the aroused neighborhood would be on the street. We bundled you and your gun into the cab and the driver hurried you away to a certain rendezvous of ours. To have done with the driver, I will say at this time that he came in and gave his testimony the next day very effectively, fully confirming ours; accounting for his conduct by the very natural excuse that he was scared and so ran away lest he should be shot.

“The gun in Broderick’s right hand, you may remember, had not been fired. His stiffening fingers still held it. I picked up his other gun, unbuckled his belt, buckled it around Tillotson, and dropped Broderick’s empty gun by him. No more was needed. The populace found me caring for Captain Tillotson like a brother, pouring whisky down him—and thereby heaping coals of fire on his head.

“Now, as to our evidence. As you may readily guess, we were driving by when the trouble began. We saw Captain Tillotson when he fired the first shot, killing Broderick with it. He continued to shoot after Broderick dropped; Krouse, defending his friend, was killed also, wounding Tillotson, who kept on shooting blindly after he fell. The circumstantial evidence, too, was damning, and bore us out in every respect. Broderick, a man of deadly quickness, had been killed before he could shoot. Tillotson had emptied one gun and fired four shots from the other; his carrying two guns pointed toward deliberate, fore-planned murder. The marks on the houses, made by a number of his wild bullets, were in a line directly beyond Broderick’s body from where Tillotson lay. Broderick was between you and the others, you know,” explained the Judge parenthetically. “But as nothing is known of you, the marks of Broderick’s bullets are supposed to be made by Tillotson’s—incontrovertible evidence that he began the fighting.”

Nothing could have been more hateful, more revolting, than this bland, smiling complacency: Jeff’s fingers itched to be at his throat. It became clear to him that either this man would be his death, or, which was highly improbable, the other way about. His resolution hardened; he began to have visions of this smiling face above a noose.

“When Tillotson regained consciousness he told a most amazing story, obviously conflicting with the facts. He had carried but one gun; Krouse had made a wanton attack upon him, without warning; he had returned the fire. Simultaneously Broderick had been killed by some fourth man, a stranger, whom Tillotson did not know, and who had mysteriously disappeared when the people of the neighborhood arrived. It looks very black for Captain Tillotson,” purred the Judge, shaking his hands and head sorrowfully. “Even those who uphold him do not credit this wildly-improbable tale. It is universally thought that his wealth and position will not save him from the noose. El Paso is reforming; El Paso is weary of two-gun men.

“And now, my dear Bransford, comes the crucial point, a matter so delicate that I hesitate to touch upon it. All of my ingenious little impromptu was built and founded on the natural hypothesis of your demise, which, in my haste, I did not stop to verify. It did not occur to me as among the possibilities that any man—even myself—could weather six shots, at hand-grips, from Oily Broderick. Imagine, then, my surprise and chagrin when I learned that you were not even seriously hurt! It was a shock, I assure you! But here comes Mac with the tray. I will bathe your hands, Mr. Bransford. Then I beg that you will fall to at once. We will discourse while you break your fast.”

“Oh, I can get up,” said Jeff. “I’m not hurt. Put it on the table.”

Chapter V

“Quoth Robin, ‘I dwell by dale and down

By thee I set right naught.’”

—Guy of Gisborne.

“I  PERCEIVE,” said the Judge, surveying the tempting viands, “that Mac has thoughtfully cut your meat for you. You are provided with many spoons, but neither knife nor fork. A wise and wholesome precaution, I may remark. After your recent exploit we stand quite in awe of you. Pray be seated. I will take a cup of coffee with you—if you will allow me?

“It will not have escaped a man of your penetration that an obvious course was open to me. But your gallantry had quite won my heart, and I refrained from that obvious course, though strongly urged to it. Mac, tell Mr. Bransford what your advice was.”

“I said: ‘Dead men tell no tales!’” replied Mac sturdily. “And I say it again. Yon is a fearsome man.”

“You are a dangerous man yourself, Mac. Yet I trust you. And why? Because,” said the Judge cooingly, “I am more dangerous still—leader by right of the strongest. I admire you, Mr. Bransford; I needed such a man as you seem to be. Moreover, singular as it may seem, I boggled at cutting you off in cold blood. I have as good a heart as can be made out of brains. You had not intentionally harmed me; I bore you no grudge; it seemed a pity. I decided to give you a chance. I refused this advice. If you but knew it, Mr. Bransford, you owe me a heavy debt of gratitude. So we brought you across quite unostentatiously. That brings us up to date.

“You see the logic of the situation, my dear fellow? Your silence must be insured. Either you must throw in your lot with us, commit yourself entirely and irrevocably to us, or suffer the consequences of—shall we say, your indiscretion?”

The Judge sipped his coffee daintily. “It is distressing even to mention the alternative; it is needless to lay undue emphasis upon it; circumstances have already done that. You see for yourself that it must be thus, and not otherwise.”

Jeff took a toothpick, pushed his chair back and crossed his legs comfortably. “I must have time to consider the matter and look at it from all sides,” he said meditatively. “But I can tell you now how it strikes me at first blush. Do you believe in presentiments, Judge?”

The Judge shook his head. “I am singularly free from all superstition.”

“Now, I do,” said Jeff steadily, his face wearing as engaging an expression as its damaged condition would permit. “And I have a very strong presentiment that I shall see you hung, or perhaps I should say, hanged.”

The Judge went off in another peal of laughter. Even the saturnine Mac relaxed to a grim smile. The Judge pounded on the table. “But what a droll dog it is!” he cried. “Positively, I like you better every moment. Such high spirits! Such hardihood! Really, we need you, we must have you. I cannot imagine any one better fitted to fill the place of the departed brother whom you—as the instrument of an inscrutable and all-wise Providence—have removed from our midst.”

At this disloyalty to the dead, Jeff’s gorge rose at the man; treacherous, heartless, revolting. But he kept a tranquil, untroubled face. The Judge went on: “Your resolution may change. You will suffer from ennui. I may mention that, should you join us, the pecuniary reward will be great. I am wealthy and powerful, and our little organization—informal, but very select—shares my fortunes. They push me up from below and I pull them up from above. I will add that we seldom find it necessary to resort to such extreme measures as we did in the Tillotson case. He was a very troublesome man; he has been a thorn in my side for years.

“On the contrary, we conduct many open and perfectly-legitimate enterprises, political, legal, financial. We are interested in mining propositions; we have cattle ranches in Texas and Old Mexico; we handle real estate. As side lines, we do a miscellaneous business—smuggle a vast amount of opium and a few Chinamen, keep sanctuary for unhappy fugitives, jump good mines and sell poor ones, furnish or remove witnesses—Oh, many things! But, perhaps, our greatest activity is simply to exert moral pressure in aid of our strictly-legitimate enterprises.

“Tut, tut! I have been so charmed that I have overstayed my time. Think this matter over carefully, my dear fellow. There is much to gain or to lose. You shall have ample time for consideration. Mac and Borrowman will get you anything you want, within the bounds of reason—clothes, books, tobacco, such knickknacks. And, by the way, here are yesterday’s papers. You may care to read the Tillotson case. The editorials, both those that condemn him and those that defend, are particularly amusing.”

“Mac and Borrowman are to be my jailers?” said Jeff.

The Judge raised his hands in expostulation. “Jailers?” he repeated. “What a harsh term! Let us say, companions. You might break out of jail,” said the Judge, tapping Jeff’s breast with his strong fingers, “but you will not get away from me. They will tell you their instructions. I will attend to your hurts, now, and then I must go.”

“I would like clean clothes,” said Jeff, while the Judge dressed his wounds skilfully. “A safety razor—they can keep it when I’m not using it—the daily papers, cigars, tobacco—let me see, what else? Oh, yes—I was trying to learn the typewriter. I’d like to try it again when my finger gets better. For books, send in Shakspere’s works and Carlyle’s ‘French Revolution,’ for the present.”

“You’re quite sure that’s all?” said the Judge, entertained and delighted. “You must intend to take your time about making up your mind.”

“My mind is entirely made up now. I would insure you against a watery death,” said Jeff with utmost calmness, “for a dime!”

“We shall see, we shall see!” said the Judge skeptically. “Time works many wonders. You will be ennuied! I prophesy it. Besides, I count upon your gratitude. Good-night!”

“Good-night!”

So you “brought me unostentatiously across,” did you? You made a slip that time. You talk well, Judge, but you talk too much. Across? Across the Rio Grande. I am in Juarez. I had already guessed it, for I hear the sounds of many whistling engines from far off, and but few from near at hand. My prison is underground, since those whistles are the only sounds that reach me, and they muffled and indistinct; coming by the fireplace. That chimney goes through a house above, since they keep up a fire. What to do?

Through the long hours he lay on his bed, sleepless. When he opened his eyes, at intervals, it was always to find the guard’s face toward him, watching him intently. They were taking no chances.

His vigorous brain was busy with the possibilities; contriving, hopeless as the situation might seem, more than one scheme, feasible only to desperation, and with terrible odds against success. These he put by to be used only as a last recourse, and fell to his Sisyphean task again with such concentration of all his powers upon the work in hand as few men have ever dreadful need to attain—such focused concentration that, had his mind been an actual searchlight, capable, in its turning, to throw a shining circle upon actual, living, moving men, in all places, far or near, in time past, present or to come—where it paused, the places, men and events could not have been more real, more clear, more brightly illumined. When this inner light wearied and grew faint he turned it back till it pierced the thick walls to another prison, dwelt on another prisoner there: a tall, gray figure, whose face was turned away; ringed round with hate, with ignominy, shame despair and death; not friendless. And the light rose again, strong and unwavering, ranging the earth for what help was there; so fell at last upon a plan, not after to be altered. A rough plan only—the details to be worked out—to-morrow and to-morrow. So thinking, utter exhaustion came upon him and he fell asleep.

Chapter VI

“The bosun’s mate was very sedate, but fond of amusement too,

So he played hop-scotch with the larboard watch, while the Captain tickled the crew.”

—Ballad of The Walloping Window Blind.

“AND what are these famous instructions of yours, Mae?”

“They are verra precise, Mr. Bransford. One of us will be always in the room. That one will keep close and constant watch upon you, even when you are asleep. Your wound will be dressed only when we are both here. Coal and water, your meals, the things you send for, will be brought in only when we are both here. And on any slightest eendication of an attempted rescue or escape we are to kill you without hesitation!”

It was plain that Mac was following the manner as well as the matter of his instructions. He gave this information slowly, with dour satisfaction, checking each item by forcibly doubling down, with his right hand, the fingers of his left. Having now doubled them all down, he undoubled them and began again.

“If you attempt to give any alarm, if you attempt to make any attack, if on any pretext you try to get near enough for a possible attack, we will kill you without hesitation.” He rolled the phrase under his tongue with great relish.

“Your precautions are most flattering, I’m sure,” said Jeff idly. “I must be very careful. The room is large, but I might inadvertently break your last rule at any time. If I understand you correctly, should I so much as drop my pencil and, picking it up, forgetfully come too close——”

“I will shoot you,” repeated this uncompromising person, “without any hesitation. I have a verra high opeenion of your powers, Mr. Bransford, and have no mind to come to grips wi’ you. You will keep your distance, and we will agree fine.”

“All this is like to be very tiresome to you.” Jeff’s tones were level and cheerful; he leaned back in his chair, yawning; his hands were clasped behind his head. “Such constant vigilance will be a strain upon you; your nerves will be affected. I will have by far the best of it. I can sleep, read, think. But if you turn your head, if you close your eyes, if you so much as falter in your attention,” said Jeff dispassionately, “my fingers will be at your throat to tear your life out for the dog that you are!”

“Why, now we understand each other perfectly,” returned Mac, in nowise discomposed. “But I would have ye to observe that your last remark was highly discourteous. My instructions are not yet ended. Look now!” He held up his hand, with three fingers still tightly closed to indicate three several unhesitancies. “Our last instruction was to treat you with ceeveelity and consideration, to give you any indulgence which would not endanger your safe keeping, to subject you to no indignity or abuse.” He folded down the fourth finger and extended his closed hand, thrusting out his thumb reproachfully. “To no abuse!” he repeated.

“I am properly rebuked,” said Jeff. “I withdraw the ‘dog.’ Let me amend the offending remark to read thus: ‘to tear out your life without any hesitation.’ But even the remarkable foresight of Judge Thorpe seems to have overlooked one important thing. I refer to the possible corruption of my jailers. Do I likewise forfeit my life if I tamper with your integrity?”

His grim guardian chose to consider this query as extremely facetious. His leathern face wrinkled to cavernous gashes, indicative of mirth of a rather appalling sort; he emitted a low rumble that might be construed, in a liberal translation, as laughter; his words took on a more Scottish twist. “You might try it on Borrowman,” he said. “Man, you’ve a taking way with you! ’Tis fair against my advice and sober judgment that ye are here at all—but I am begeening to feel your fasceenations! Now that ye’re here I e’en have the hope that ye will be weel advisit. I own it, I would be but loath to feed so gay and so plain-dealing a man to the feeshes!”

These two had many such skirmishes as the days went by: slow, dragging days, perpetually lamp-lit, their passage measured only by the irregularly-changing guards and the regular bringing in of the daily papers.

Jeff timed his sleeping hours to come on Borrowman’s trick; finding that jailer dull, ferocious and unendurable. His plan was long since perfected, and now he awaited but the opportunity of putting it into execution.

The Judge had called—as a medical adviser, he said—pronounced Jeff’s progress all that could be desired, and touched upon their affair with argument, cajolery and airy badinage. Jeff had asked permission to write to his wife, to send some message, which the Judge might dictate; any sort of a story, he implored, to keep her from alarm and anxiety; which petition the Judge put merrily by, smiling at the absurdity of such request.

In his waking hours Jeff read the papers. Tillotson was mending, his trial would be soon. He read his books, sometimes aloud; he chaffed his jailer; he practised on the typewriter, but never, in his practice, wrote off any appeal for aid to good men and true, or even the faintest suggestion that a quick move by the enemy would jeopardize any possible number of gunboats. Instead, Jeff undertook to produce another “speed sentence.” He called Mac to his assistance, explaining his wants; and between them, with great glee, they concocted the following gem:

He kept vexing me with frantic journeys hidden by quiet zeal.

They showed this effusion to the Judge with much pride, defying him to better it. Jeff pounded it off by the hour; he mingled fragments of it with his remarks in season and out.

There were long visits from the Judge. In his own despite Jeff grew to enjoy them and to look forward to them—so strange a thing is man! The Judge was witty, cynical, informed, polished, keen, satirical. At times Jeff almost forgot what thing he was besides. Their talk ranged on many things, always in the end coming back to the same smiling query, the same unfaltering reply. Once, Patterson came with him—a younger man, with a brutal and bloated face—and urged the closing of the incident in clear and unmistakable terms.

And, as day followed day, Jeff let it appear—as a vital part of his plan—in his speech, his manner, his haggard looks, that danger, suspense and confinement were telling upon him, that he was worried and harassed, that he was losing his nerve. These things appeared slowly, lest he should seem to weaken too soon and too easily.

Chapter VII

“And when ’e downs ’is ’ead and ’umps ’is back, ye cawn’t remain, y’ know!”

—Beresford on the Bronco.

“MY iron-headed friend,” said the Judge—“and I use the word in more senses than one—you have now had ample time for deliberation. I have given you the opportunity to choose—life——”

No menace, no violence, could have left an impression so strong, so dreadful in its finality, as this brief ellipsis, the casual, light-hearted manner.

“——at no slight risk to myself. Because, the admiration, the liking which I have professed to you is real and sincere enough, though, perhaps, none of the deepest. I will be quite frank with you, Mr. Bransford; that liking, that admiration has grown with our acquaintance. A weakness; I admit it; it would be with a real regret that I should speak the word to cut that acquaintance short. I will be so much further frank with you as to say that I fancy I can sufficiently steel myself to speak that word should you again refuse good counsel. This may be the last of our pleasant meetings. For the last time, in the words of your favorite writer: ‘Under which king, Bezonian? Speak, or die!’”

Jeff’s hands gripped visibly at his chair-arms, so that the Judge observed it—as was intended—and smiled. But Jeff gave his answer quietly: “I can’t do it. If you had killed Tillotson outright I might, to save my life, keep silence and let you go unpunished. But I can’t do this.”

“You mean you won’t,” said the Judge acidly.

“I mean that I can’t,” said Jeff. “I would if I could, but I can’t.”

“By Heavens, I believe you will stick to it!” said the Judge, greatly disappointed. “Had you couched your refusal in some swelling phrase—and I can think of a dozen sonorous platitudes to fit the case—I might yet have hopes of you. I believe, sir, that you are a stubborn fellow. The man is nothing to you!”

“The man is much to me,” returned Jeff. “He is innocent.”

“So, I believe, are you. How will it help him for you to die? And so obscurely, too! I think,” said the Judge gently, flicking at his cuff, “that you mentioned a wife? Yes? And children? Two, I think. Two boys?”

His elbows were upon the table, his white hands were extended upon the table, he held his head a little to one side and contemplated his fingers as they played a little tune there, quite as if it were a piano.

Jeff’s face worked; he rose and paced the floor. Mac, by the door, regarded him with something very like compassion in his hard face. The Judge watched him with feline amusement.

When he came back he passed by his chair; he stood beside the table, resting his fingers lightly on the typewriter frame. “Life is dear to me,” he said, with a slight break in his voice. “I will make this one concession. More I will not do. Tillotson’s trial is half over; the verdict is certain; there are powerful influences at work to insure the denial of an appeal and to hasten his execution. If you can keep me here until after his execution I will then—to save my life, for my wife’s sake, for my children’s sake—keep silence. And may God forgive me for a compromiser and a coward!” he added with a groan. “But if, before that, I can make my escape; if, before that, I can in any way communicate with the outside world, I will denounce you, at any cost to myself.”

The Judge would have spoken, but Jeff held up his hand. “Wait! I have listened to you—listen now to me. You have forgotten that there are two sides to every bargain. You sit directly between me and Mac, your hands are upon the table, your feet are beneath the table, the typewriter is at my hand. Do not move! If Mac stirs but an inch, if you dare raise a finger, until you have agreed to my proposition, by the God that made me, I will crush your skull like an egg!”

“Had ye wrung his neck off-hand, as I urgit upon ye frae the first——” The words came bitterly from Mac, sitting rigid in his corner—“this wadna have chancit.” His tones conveyed a singular mixture of melancholy and triumph; the thickening of his Scotch burr betrayed his agitation. “Be guidit by me noo at the last, Judge, and tak the daft body’s terms. In my opeenion the project of smashin’ your head wi’ the machine is enteerly pract’ecable, and I think Mr. Bransford will e’en do it. Why should he no? A dead man has naught to fear. My gude word is, mak treaty wi’ him and save your——”

“Neck. For this time,” hinted Jeff delicately.

The Judge did not shrink, he did not pale; but neither did he move. “And your presentiment that you would see me hanged? You have abandoned that, it seems?”

“Not at all, not at all,” said Jeff, cheerily. “You are going to do just what I propose. You’d rather take the chance of having your neck broken legally than the certainty that I’ll break it now.”

“With that thing? Humph! You couldn’t hurt me much with that. I think I could get up and away before you could hit me with it. And Mac would certainly shoot you before you could hit me a second time.”

“Once will be a-plenty.” Bransford laughed. “You go first, I beseech you, my dear Alphonse! O no, Judge—you don’t think anything of the kind. If you did you’d try it. Your legs—limbs, I mean of course—are too far under the table. And I’ve been practising for speed with this machine every day. What Mac does to me afterward won’t help you any. You’ll be done dead, damned and delivered. If he could shoot me now without shooting through you, it would be a different proposition. Your mistake was in ever letting me line you up. ‘Tit, tat, toe—Three in a row!’ Well, what are you going to do about it?”

“Oh, man, ye chargit me streectly to keep this wild cat-a-mountain at his distance,” interrupted Mac in mournful reproach, “and then pop ye down cheek by jowl wi’ the deil’s buckie your ainsel’. I’d as lief seat me to sup wi’ the black devil and his muckle pitchfork!”

As often happens in such cases, the man who was in no immediate danger was more agitated than the one imperiled; who, after a moment’s reflection, looked up at Bransford with a smile in his eyes.

“And how am I to know you will not denounce me if I let you go after this unfortunate Tillotson is hanged?” he demanded. “Or, for that matter, how are you to know that I will not kill you as soon as I am beyond the reach of your extremely novel weapon—which, I grant you, might be effective at such close quarters and in such capable hands—or that I will not have you killed at any time hereafter? This,” said the Judge, picking his words leisurely and contemplating his fine fingers with unreserved approval, “is the crux of the very interesting situation. Rigid moralists, scrutinizing the varied actions of my life, might find passages not altogether blameless. But I have always held and maintained that a man should keep faith where it is expressly pledged. This is the bedrock upon which is based all relations of man with man, and to no class is it so needful as to those who are at variance with society. If a man will not hold by his plighted word, even to his hurt, he has lost all contact with reality and is become henceforth no actuality, but a vain and empty simulacrum, not to be dealt with, useless either for good or evil. Here, for instance, are we, two intelligent men, confronting mutual instant annihilation; which might be avoided could each be perfectly sure the other would keep his word! It is quite amusing!”

“I will take your word if you will take mine,” said Jeff. “You should know who runs the greater risk. But I have a stipulation to make.”

The Judge arched his brows. “A stipulation? Another? My volatile and resourceful friend, do not ask too much. It is by no means certain that your extraordinary missile—or was it to be a war-club?—might not fail of the desired effect. You have already stipulated for your life, and I think,” said the Judge dryly, “that if you have any other demand to make, it had best be a modest one.”

“I do not choose,” said Jeff steadily, “that my wife shall suffer needless anxiety—unneeded if you set me free at last. Still less do I choose, if I meet with foul play at your hands, or if I should be killed attempting an escape, to have her haunted by any doubt of me. I shall write to her that I am in Old Mexico, in some part known to be dangerous, tempted by high pay. You will send it to be mailed down there. Then, if I do not come back, she will think of me as honorably dead, and be at peace.”

It came into the Judge’s active mind that such a letter—dated and signed from some far-off Mexican town—might, in some contingencies, be useful to him; his bold, blue eyes, which had faced an imminent death firmly enough, dropped now to hide the treacherous thought. And upon this thought, and its influence upon sending the letter, Jeff had counted from the first.

“There are other reasons,” said Jeff. “You have been pleased to speak well of me. You have boasted, both for yourself and for me, enough and more than enough. Let me now boast for myself. Has it never occurred to you that such a man as I am would have friends—formidable friends? That they are wondering what has become of me? If you agree to my arrangement, I have a chance of saving both my life and some shreds of decency. I do not now want my friends to come in search of me and get me killed in trying to rescue me—for you will, of course, redouble your precautions after this. This letter will put my friends at ease. I will have to trust you to mail it. That is the weakness of my position. But I will think that there is a chance that you will mail it—and that chance will help me to keep a quiet mind. That much, at least, will be a clear gain. Do this, and I will yield a point to you. If you would rather I didn’t, I will not go to see you hanged!”

The amazing effrontery of this last coaxing touch so appealed to Judge Thorpe’s sense of humor that he quite recovered his good nature. “My dear boy,” he said, “if I should ever be hanged, I wouldn’t miss having you there for worlds. It would add a zest to the occasion that I should grieve to lose. I will agree unconditionally to your proposed modus vivendi. As I understand it, if I can hang Tillotson you are to keep silence and go free. But if you can contrive to get me hanged you are to attend the festivity in person? It is a wager. Write your letter and I’ll mail it. Of course, I’ll have to read it and edit it if needed. And say—Bransford! I’ll mail it, too! You can be at rest on that point. In the meantime, I presume, I may move without bringing the typewriter about my ears?”

“You may,” said Jeff. “It’s a bet. I wish you’d wait and I’ll write the letter now. She’ll be anxious about me. It’ll take some time. I always write her long letters. Let me have your fountain-pen, will you?”

“Why don’t you use your typewriter?” said the Judge. “And, by the way, I fear we shall have to deprive you of your typewriter in the future.”

“A typewritten letter wouldn’t be consistent at all,” said Jeff. “I am supposed to be writing from darkest Old Mexico. No typewriters there. Besides, I can’t write with the damn thing to do any good. Say, don’t take it away from me, Judge; there’s a good fellow. I want to master it. I do hate to be beaten.”

“The elasticity with which you adjust yourself to changing conditions is beyond all praise,” said the Judge, smiling. “Like the other Judge, in the Bible, I yield to importunity. I can deny you nothing. Keep your typewriter, then, with the express understanding that its use as a deadly weapon is barred. Here’s the pen.”

Chapter VIII

“Alice’s Right Foot, Esq.,

Hearthrug,

Near the Fender,

(With Alice’s love).”

“O, there be many systems

But only one that wins—

When leading from your strongest suit,

Just kick your partner’s shins.”

—Hoyle.

JEFF pulled the paper over and began to scribble madly; pausing from time to time to glance around for inspiration: at the Judge, at Mac, at the papers, the books, the typewriter. “I’ll slip in a note for the kids,” said Jeff. His lips moved, his eyes kindled in his eager absorption; his face took on a softer and tenderer look. The Judge, watching him, beamed with almost paternal indulgence.

On the whole Jeff wrote with amazing swiftness for a man who professed to be unaccustomed to lying. For this communication, apparently so spontaneous, dashed off by a man hardly yet clear of the shadow of death, was learned by rote, no syllable unpremeditated, the very blots of it designed.

This is what he handed the Judge at last:

San Miguel, Chihuahua, March 24.

My dear Wife:

Since I last wrote you I have been on a long trip into the Yaqui country as guide, interpreter and friend to a timid tenderfoot—and all-round sharp from the Smithsonian. His main lay is Cliff-Dweller-ology, but he does other stunts—rocks and bugs and Indian languages, and early Spanish relics.

I get big pay. I enclose you $100——

“A hundred dollars! Why, this is blackmail!” remonstrated the Judge, grinning nevertheless.

“But,” said Jeff, “I’ve got to send it. She knows I wouldn’t stay away except for good big pay, and she knows I’ll send the big pay to her. I didn’t think you were a piker. Why, I had thirty dollars in my pocket. You won’t be out but seventy. And if you don’t send it she’ll know the letter is a fake. Besides, she needs the money.”

“I surrender! I’ll send it,” said the Judge, and resumed his reading:

——and will send you more when I get back from next trip. Going way down in the Sierra Madre this time. Don’t know when we will hit civilization again, so you needn’t write till you hear from me.

The Cliff-Dweller-ologist had the El Paso papers sent on here to him and I am reading them all through while he writes letters and reports and things. I am reading some of his books, too.

Mary, I always hated it because I didn’t have a better education. I used to wonder if you wasn’t sometimes ashamed of me when we was first married. But I’ve learned a heap from you and I’ve picked up considerable, reading, these last few years—and I begin to see that there are compensations in all things. I see a good deal in things I read now that I would have missed if I’d just skimmed over the surface when I was younger. For instance, I’ve just made the acquaintance of Julius Cæsar—introduced by my chief.

Say, that’s a great book! And I just know I’m getting more out of it than if I’d been familiar with it ever since I was a boy, with stone-bruises on my hoofs. I’ve read it over two or three times now, and find things every time that I didn’t quite get before.

It ought to be called Yond Caius Cassius, though. Shakspere makes Julius out to be a superstitious old wretch. But Julius had some pretty good hunches at that.

Of course Mark Antony’s wonderful speech at the funeral was fine business. Gee! how he skinned the “Honorable men!” Some of the things he said after that will stand reading, too.

But Yond Cassius, he was the man for my money. He was a regular go-getter. If Brutus had only hearkened to Cassius once in a while they’d have made a different play of it. I didn’t like Brutus near so well. He was a four-flusher. Said he wouldn’t kill himself and sure enough he did. He was set up and heady and touchy. I shouldn’t wonder if he was better than Cassius, just morally. I guess maybe that’s why Cassius knuckled down to him and humored him so. But intellectually, and as a man of action, he wasn’t ace-high to Cassius.

Still there’s no denying that Brutus had a fine line of talk. There was his farewell to Cassius—you remember that—and his parting with his other friends.

I’ve been reading Carlyle’s “French Revolution” too. It’s a little too deep for me, so I take it in small doses. It looks to me like a great writer could take a page of it and build a book on it.

Well, that’s all I know. Oh, yes! I tried to learn typewriting when I was in El Paso—I musn’t forget that. I made up a sentence with all the letters in it—he kept vexing me by frantic journeys hidden with quiet zeal—I got so I could rattle that off pretty well, but when I tried new stuff I got balled up.

Will write you when I can. George will know what to do with the work. Have the boys help him.

Your loving husband,
Jeff.

Dear Kids:

I wish you could see some of the places I saw in the mountains. We took the train to Casas Grandes and went with a pack outfit to Durasno and Tarachi, just over the line into Sonora. That’s one fine country. Had a good time going and coming, but when we got there and my chief was snooping around in those musty old underground cave houses I was bored a-plenty. One day I remember I lay in camp with nothing to do and read every line of an old El Paso paper, ads and all.

Leo, you’re getting to be a big boy now. I want you to get into something better than punching cows. When you get time you ought to go down to your Uncle Sim’s and make a start on learning to use a typewriter. I’ve been trying it myself, but it’s hard for an old dog to learn new tricks.

You and Wesley must both help your mother, and help George. Do what George tells you—he knows more about things than you do. Be good kids. I’ll be home just as soon as I can.

Dad.

“There,” said Jeff, “if there’s anything you want to blue-pencil I’ll write it over. Anything you want to say suits me so long as it goes.”

“Why, this seems all right,” said the Judge, after reading it. “I have an envelope in my billbook. Address it, but don’t seal it. You might attempt to put in some inclosure by sleight-of-hand. If you try any such trick I shall consider myself absolved from any promise. If you don’t, I’ll mail it. I always prefer not to lie when I have nothing to gain by lying. Bless my soul, how you have blotted it!”

“Yes. I’m getting nervous,” said Jeff.

The envelope bore the address:

MRS. JEFF BRANSFORD,
Rainbow South,
Escondido, N. M.
c/o William Beebe.

“Of course you will do as you like,” remonstrated Patterson, later. “But I shouldn’t send that letter, and I should, without any further delay, erase Mr. Bransford’s name from the list of living men.”