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diff --git a/old/tttwm10.txt b/old/tttwm10.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..38009eb --- /dev/null +++ b/old/tttwm10.txt @@ -0,0 +1,6446 @@ +Project Gutenberg Etext of The Trail of the White Mule, by Bower +#11 in our series by B. M. Bower + + +Copyright laws are changing all over the world, be sure to check +the copyright laws for your country before posting these files!! + +Please take a look at the important information in this header. +We encourage you to keep this file on your own disk, keeping an +electronic path open for the next readers. Do not remove this. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**Etexts Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*These Etexts Prepared By Hundreds of Volunteers and Donations* + +Information on contacting Project Gutenberg to get Etexts, and +further information is included below. We need your donations. + + +The Trail of the White Mule + +by B. M. 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Bower + + + + +CHAPTER ONE + +Casey Ryan, hunched behind the wheel of a large, dark blue +touring car with a kinked front fender and the glass gone from +the left headlight, slid out from the halted traffic, shied +sharply away from a hysterically clanging street car, crossed the +path of a huge red truck coming in from his right, missed it with +two inches to spare and was halfway down the block before the +traffic officer overtook him. + +The traffic officer was Irish too, and bigger than Casey, and +madder. For all that, Casey offered to lick the livin' tar outa +him before accepting a pale, expensive ticket which he crumbled +and put into his pocket without looking at it. + +"What I know about these here fancy city rules ain't sufficient +to give a horn-toad a headache--but it's a darn sight more'n I +care," Casey declaimed hotly. "I never was asked what I thought +of them tin signs you stick up on the end of a telegraft pole, to +tell folks when to go an' when to quit goin'. Mebby it's all +right fer these here city drivers--" + +"This'll mean thirty days for you," spluttered the officer. "I +ought to call the patrol right now--" + +"Get the undertaker on the line first!" Casey advised him +ominously. + +Traffic was piling up behind them, and horns were honking a +blatant chorus that extended two blocks up the street. The +traffic officer glanced into the troubled gray eyes of the Little +Woman beside Casey and took his foot off the running board. + +"Better go put up your bail and then forfeit it," he advised in a +milder tone. "The judge will probably remember you; I do, and my +memory ain't the best in the world. Twice you've been hooked for +speeding through traffic; and parking by fire-plugs and in front +of the No Park signs and after four, seems to be your big outdoor +sport. Forfeit your bail, old boy--or it's thirty days for you, +sure." + +Casey Ryan made bitter retort, but the traffic cop had gone to +untangle two furious Fords from a horse-drawn mail wagon, so he +did not hear. Which was good luck for Casey. + +"Why do you persist in making trouble for yourself?" the Little +Woman beside him exclaimed. "It can't be so hard to obey the +rules; other drivers do. I know that I have driven this car all +over town without any trouble whatever." + +Casey hogged the next safety-zone line to the deep disgust of a +young movie star in a cream-and-silver racer, and pulled in to +the curb just where he could not be passed. + +"All right, ma'am. You can drive, then." He slid out of the +driver's seat to the pavement, his face a deeper shade of red +than usual. + +"For pity's sake, Casey! Don't be silly," his wife cried +sharply, a bit of panic in her voice. + +"You was in a hurry to git home," Casey pointed out to her with +that mildness of manner which is not mild. "I was hurryin', +wasn't I?" + +"You aren't hurrying now--you're delaying the traffic again. Do +be reasonable! You know it costs money to argue with the +police." + +"Police be damned! I'm tryin' to please a woman, an' I'm up agin +a hard proposition. You can ask anybody if I'm the unreasonable +one. You hustled me out of the show soon as the huggin' +commenced. You wouldn't even let me stay to see the first of +Mutt and Jeff. You said you was in a hurry. I leaves the show +without seein' the best part, gits the car an' drills through the +traffic tryin' to git yuh home quick. Now you're kickin' because +I did hurry." + +"Hey! Whadda yuh mean, blockin' the traffic?" a domineering +voice behind him bellowed. "This ain't any reception hall, and +it ain't no free auto park neither." + +Another traffic officer with another pencil and another pad of +tickets such as drivers dread to see began to write down the +number of Casey's car. This man did not argue. He finished his +work briskly, presented another notice which advised Casey Ryan +to report immediately to police headquarters, waved Casey +peremptorily to proceed, and returned to his little square +platform to the chorus of blatting automobile horns. + +"The cops in this town hands out tickets like they was Free +Excursion peddlers!" snorted Casey, his eyes a pale glitter +behind his half-closed lids. "They can go around me, or they can +honk and be darned to 'em. Git behind the wheel, ma'am--Casey +Ryan's drove the last inch he'll ever drive in this darned town. +If they pinch me again, it'll have to be fer walkin'." + +The Little Woman looked at him, pressed her lips together and +moved behind the wheel. She did not say a word all the way out +to the white apartment house on Vermont which held the four rooms +they called home. She parked the car dexterously in front and +led the way to their apartment (ground floor, front) before she +looked at me. + +"It's coming to a show-down, Jack," she said then with a faint +smile. "He's on probation already for disobeying traffic rules +of one sort and other, and his fines cost more than the entire +upkeep of the car. I think he really will have to go to jail this +time. It just isn't in Casey Ryan to take orders from any one, +especially when his own personal habits of driving a car are +concerned." + +"Town life is getting on his nerves," I tried to defend Casey, +and at the same time to comfort the Little Woman. "I didn't +think it would work, his coming here to live, with nothing to do +but spend money. This is the inevitable result of too much money +and too much leisure." + +"It sounds much better, putting it that way," murmured Mrs. +Casey. "I think you're right--though he did behave back there as +if it were too much matrimony. Jack, he's been looking forward +to your visit. I'm sorry this has happened to spoil it." + +"It isn't spoiled," I grinned. "Casey Ryan is, always and ever +shall be Casey Ryan. He's running true to form, though tamer +than one would expect. When do you think he'll show up?" + +Mrs. Casey did not know. She ventured a guess or two, but there +was no conviction in her tone. With two nominal arrests in five +minutes chalked against him, and with his first rebellion against +the Little Woman to rankle in his conscience and memory, she +owned herself at a loss. + +With a cheerfulness that was only conversation deep, we waited +for Casey and finally ate supper without him. The evening was +enlivened somewhat by Babe's chatter of kindergarten doings; and +was punctuated by certain pauses while steps on the sidewalk +passed on or ended with the closing of another door than the +Ryans'. I fought the impulse to call up the police station, and +I caught the eyes of the Little Woman straying unconsciously to +the telephone in the hall while she talked of things remote from +our inner thoughts. Margaret Ryan is game, I'll say that. We +played cribbage for an hour or two, and the Little Woman beat me +until finally I threw up my hands and quit. + +"I can't stand it any longer, Mrs. Casey. Do you think he's in +jail, or just sulking at a movie somewhere?" I blurted. "Forgive +my butting in, but I wish you'd talk about it. You know you can, +to me. Casey Ryan is a friend and more than a friend: he's a pet +theory of mine-- a fad, if you prefer to call him that. + +"I consider him a perfect example of human nature in its +unhampered, unbiased state, going straight through life without +deviating a hair's breadth from the viewpoint of youth. A +fighter and a castle builder; a sort of rough-edged Peter Pan. +Till he gums soft food and hobbles with a stick because the years +have warped his back and his legs, Casey Ryan will keep that +indefinable, bubbling optimism of spiritual youth. So tell me +all about him. I want to know who has licked, so far; luxury or +Casey Ryan." + +The Little Woman laughed and picked up the cards, evening their +edges with sensitive fingers that had not been manicured so +beautifully when first I saw them. + +"Well-sir," she drawled, making one word of the two and failing +to keep a little twitching from her lips, "I think it's been +about a tie, so far. As a husband--Casey's a darned good +bachelor." Her chuckle robbed that statement of anything +approaching criticism. "Aside from his insisting on cooking +breakfast every morning and feeding me in bed, forcing me to eat +fried eggs and sour-dough hotcakes swimming in butter and +honey--when I crave grapefruit and thin toast and one French lamb +chop with a white paper frill on the handle and garnished with +fresh parsley--he's the soul of consideration. He wants four +kinds of jam on the table every meal, when fresh fruit is going +to waste. He's bullied the laundryman until the poor fellow's +reached the point where he won't stop if the car's parked in +front and Casey's liable to be home; but aside from that, Casey's +all right. + +"After serving time in the desert and rustling my own wood and +living on bacon and beans and sour-dough bread, I'm perfectly +willing to spend the rest of my life doing painless housekeeping +with all the modern built-in features ever invented; and buying +my bread and cakes and salads from the delicatessen around the +corner. I never want to see a sagebush again as long as I live, +or feel the crunch of gravel under my feet. I expect to die in +French-heeled pumps and embroidered silk stockings and the +finest, silliest silk things ever put in a show window to tempt +the soul of a woman. But it took just two weeks and three days +to drive Casey back to his sour-dough can." + +"He craved luxury more than you seemed to do," I remembered aloud. + +"He did, yes. But his idea of luxury is sitting down in the +kitchen to a real meal of beans and biscuits and all the known +varieties of jam and those horrible whitewashed store cookies and +having the noise of the phonograph drowned every five minutes by +a passing street car. Casey wants four movies a day, and he wants +them all funny. He brings home silk shirts with the stripes +fairly shrieking when he unwraps them--and he has to be thrown +and tied to get a collar on him. + +"He will get up at any hour of the night to chase after a fire +engine, and every whipstitch he gets pinched for doing something +which is perfectly lawful and right in the desert and perfectly +awful in the city. You saw him," said the Little Woman, +"to-day." And she added wistfully, "It's the first time since we +were married that he has ever talked back--to me. + +"And you know," she went on, shuffling the cards and stopping to +regard the joker attentively (though I am sure she didn't know +what card she was looking at), "just chasing around town and +doing nothing but square yourself for not playing according to +the rules costs money without getting you anywhere. Fifty-five +thousand dollars isn't so much just to play with, in this town. +Casey's highest ambition now seems to be nickel disk wheels on a +new racing car that can make the speed cops go some to catch him. +His idea of economy is to put six or seven thousand dollars into +a car that will enable him to outrun a twenty-dollar fine! + +"We have some money invested," she went on. "We own this +apartment house--and fortunately it's in my name. So long as the +housing problem continues critical, I think I can keep Casey +going without spending our last cent." + +"He did one good stroke of business," I ventured, "when he bought +this place. Apartment houses are good as gold mines these days." + +The Little Woman laughed. "Well-sir, it wasn't so much a stroke +as it was a wallop. Casey bought it just to show who was boss, +he or the landlord. The first thing he did when we moved in was +to take down the nicely framed rules that said we must not cook +cabbage nor onions nor fish, nor play music after ten o'clock at +night, nor do any loud talking in the halls. + +"Every day for a week Casey cooked cabbage, onions and fish. He +sat up nights to play the graphophone. He stayed home to talk +loudly and play bucking bronk with Babe all up and down the +stairs and in the halls. Our rent was paid for a month in +advance, and the landlord was too little and old to fight. So he +sold out cheap--and it really was a good stroke of business for +us, though not deliberate + +"Well-sir, at first we lost tenants who didn't enjoy the freedom +of their neighbors' homes. But really, Jack, you'd be surprised +to know how many people in this city just LOVE cabbage and onions +and fish, and to have children they needn't disown whenever they +go house-hunting. I had ventilator hoods put over every gas range +in the house, and turned the back yard into a playground with +plenty of sand piles and swings. I raised the price, too, and +made the place look very select, with a roof garden for the +grown-ups. We have the house filled now with really nice +families--avoiding the garlic brand--and as an investment I +wouldn't ask for anything better. + +"Casey enjoyed himself hugely while he was whipping things into +shape, but the last month he's been going stale. The tenants are +all so thankful to do as they please that they're excruciatingly +polite to him, no matter what he does or says. He's tired of the +beaches and he has begun to cuss the long, smooth roads that are +signed so that he couldn't get lost if he tried. It does seem as +if there's no interest left in anything, unless he can get a kick +out of going to jail. And, Jack, I do believe he's gone there." + +The telephone rang and the Little Woman excused herself and went +into the hall, closing the door softly behind her. + +I'm not greatly given to reminiscence, but while I sat and +watched the flames of civilization licking tamely at the +impregnable iron bark of the gas logs, the eyes of my memory +looked upon a picture: + +Desert, empty and with the mountains standing back against the +sky, the great dipper uptilted over a peak and the stars bending +close for very friendliness. The licking flames of dry +greasewood burning, with a pungent odor in my nostrils when the +wind blew the smoke my way. The far-off hooting of an owl, +perched somewhere on a juniper branch watching for mice; and +Casey Ryan sitting cross-legged in the sand, squinting humorously +at me across the fire while he talked. + +I saw him, too, bolting a hurried breakfast under a mesquite tree +in the chill before sunrise, his mind intent upon the trail; +facing the desert and its hardships as a matter of course, with +never a thought that other men would shrink from the ordeal. + +I saw him kneeling before a solid face of rock in a shallow cut +in the hillside, swinging his "single-jack" with tireless rhythm; +a tap and a turn of the steel, a tap and a turn--chewing tobacco +industriously and stopping now and then to pry off a fresh bit +from the plug in his hip pocket before he reached for the "spoon" +to muck out the hole he was drilling. + +I saw him larruping in his Ford along a sandy, winding trail it +would break a snake's back to follow, hot on the heels of his +next adventure, dreaming of the fortune that finally came. . . . + +The Little Woman came in looking as if she had been talking with +Destiny and was still dazed and unsteady from the meeting. + +"Well-sir, he's gone!" she announced, and stopped and tried to +smile. But her eyes looked hurt and sorry. "He has bought a Ford +and a tent and outfit since he left us down on Seventh and +Broadway, and he just called me up on long-distance from San +Bernardino. He's going out on a prospecting trip, he says. I'll +say he's been going some! A speed cop overhauled him just the +other side of Claremont, he told me, and he was delayed for a few +minutes while he licked the cop and kicked him and his motorcycle +into a ditch. He says he's sorry he sassed me, and if I can +drive a car in this darned town and not spend all my loose change +paying fines, I'm a better man than he is. He doesn't know when +he'll be back--and there you are." + +She sat down wearily on the arm of an over-stuffed armchair and +looked up at the gilt-and-onyx clock which I suspected Casey of +having bought. "If he isn't lynched before morning," she sighed +whimsically, "he'll probably make it to the Nevada line all +right." + +I rose, also glancing at the clock. But the Little Woman put up +a hand to forbid the plan she read in my mind. + +"Let him alone, Jack," she advised. "Let him go and be just as +wild and devilish as he wants to be. I'm only thankful he can +take it out on a Ford and a pick and shovel. There really isn't +any trouble between us two. Casey knows I can look out for +myself for awhile. He's got to have a vacation from loafing and +matrimony. I'm so thankful he isn't taking it in jail!" + +I told her somewhat bluntly that she was a brick, and that if I +could get in touch with Casey I'd try to keep an eye on him. It +would probably be a good thing, I told her, if he did stay away +long enough to let this collection of complaints against him be +forgotten at the police station. + +I went away, hoping fervently that Casey would break even his own +records that night. I really intended to find him and keep an +eye on him. But keeping an eye on Casey Ryan is a more +complicated affair than it sounds. + +Wherefore, much of this story must be built upon my knowledge of +Casey and a more or less complete report of events in which I +took no part, welded together with a bit of healthy imagination. + + + +CHAPTER TWO + +Casey Ryan knew his desert. Also, from long and not so happy +experience, he knew Fords, or thought he did. He made the +mistake, however, of buying a nearly new one and asking it to +accomplish the work of a twin six from the moment he got behind +the wheel. + +He was fortunate in buying a demonstrator's car with a hundred +miles or so to its credit. He arrived in Barstow before the +proprietor of a supply store had gone to bed--for which he was +grateful to the Ford. He loaded up there with such necessities +for desert prospecting as he had not waited to buy in Los +Angeles, turned short off the main highway where traffic officers +might be summoned by telephone to lie in wait for him, and took +the steeper and less used trail north. He was still mad and +talking bitterly to himself in an undertone while he +drove--telling the new Ford what he thought of city rules and +city ways, and driving it as no Ford was ever meant by its maker +to be driven. + +The country north of Barstow is not to be taken casually in the +middle of a dark night, even by Casey Ryan and a Ford. The +roads, once you are well away from help, are all pretty much +alike, and all bad. And although the white, diamond-shaped signs +of a beneficent automobile club are posted here and there, where +wrong turnings are most likely to prove disastrous to travelers, +Casey Ryan was in the mood to lick any man who pointed out a sign +to him. He did see one or two in spite of himself and gave a +grunt of contempt. So, where he should have turned to the east +(his intention being to reach Nevada by way of Silver Lake) he +continued traveling north and didn't know it. + +Driving across the desert on a dark night is confusing to the +most observant wayfarer. On either side, beyond the light of the +car, illusory forest stands for mile upon mile. Up hill or down +or across the level it is the same--a narrow, winding trail +through dimly seen woods. The most familiar road grows strange; +the miles are longer; you drive through mystery and silence and +the world around you is a formless void. + +Dawn and a gorgeous sunrise painted out the woods and revealed +barren hilltops which Casey did not know. Because he did not +know them, he guessed shrewdly that he was on his way to the +wilderness of mountains and sand which lies west of Death Valley. +Small chance he had of hearing the shop whistles blow in Las +Vegas at noon, as he had expected. + +He was telling himself that he didn't care where he went, when +the car, laboring more and more reluctantly up a long, sandy +hill, suddenly stopped. In Casey's heart was a thrill at the +sheer luxury of stopping in the middle of the road without having +some thick-necked cop stride toward him bawling insults. That he +was obliged to stop, and that a hill uptilted before him, and the +sand was a foot deep outside the ruts failed to impress him with +foreboding. He gloried in his freedom and thought not at all of +the Ford. + +He climbed stiffly out, squinted at the sky line, which was +jagged, and at his immediate surroundings, which were barren and +lonely and soothing to his soul that hungered for these things. +Great, gaunt "Joshua" trees stood in grotesque groups all up and +down the narrow valley, hiding the way he had come from the way +he would go. It was as if the desert had purposely dropped a +curtain before his past and would show him none of his future. +Whereat Casey Ryan grinned, took a chew of tobacco and was +himself again. + +"If they wanta come pinch me here, I'll meet 'em man to man. +Back in town no man's got a show. They pile in four deep and +gang a feller. Out here it's lick er git licked. They can all go +t' thunder. Tahell with town!" + +The odor of coffee boiling in a new pot which the sagebrush fire +was fast blackening; the salty, smoky smell of bacon frying in a +new frying pan that turned bluish with the heat; the sizzle of +bannock batter poured into hot grease--these things made the +smiling mouth of Casey Ryan water with desire. + +"Hell!" said Casey, breathing deep when, stomach full and +resentment toward the past blurred by satisfaction with his +present, he filled his pipe and fingered his vest pocket for a +match. "Gas stoves can't cook nothin' so there's any taste to +it. That there's the first real meal I've et in six months. +Light a match and turn on the gas and call that a fire! Hunh! +Good old sage er greasewood fer Casey Ryan, from here on!" + +He laid back against the sandy sidehill, tilted his hat over his +eyes and crossed his legs luxuriously. He was in no hurry to +continue his journey. Now that he and the desert were alone +together, haste and Casey Ryan held nothing in common. For +awhile he watched a Joshua palm that looked oddly like a giant +man with one arm hanging loose at its side and another pointing +fixedly at a distant, black-capped butte standing aloof from its +fellows. Casey was tired after his night on the trail. Easy +living in town had softened his muscles and slowed a little that +untiring energy which had balked at no hardship. He was drowsy, +and his brain stopped thinking logically and slipped into +half-waking fancy. + +The Joshua seemed to move, to lift its arm and point more +imperatively toward the peak. Its ungainly head seemed to turn +and nod at Casey. What did the darned thing want? Casey would go +when he, got good and ready. Perhaps he would go that way, and +perhaps he would not. Right here was good enough for Casey Ryan +at present; and you could ask anybody if he were the man to +follow another man's pointing, much less a Joshua tree. + +Battering rain woke Casey some hours later and drove him to the +shelter of the Ford. Thunder and lightning came with the rain, +and a bellowing wind that rocked the car and threatened once or +twice to overturn it. With some trouble Casey managed to button +down the curtains and sat huddled on the front seat, watching +through a streaming windshield the buffeted wilderness. He was +glad he had not unloaded his outfit; gladder still that the storm +had not struck which he was traveling. Down the trail toward him +a small river galloped, washing deep gullies where the wheels of +his car offered obstruction to its boisterousness. + +"She's a tough one," grinned Casey, in spite of the chattering of +his teeth. "Looks like all the water in the world is bein' +poured down this pass. Keeps on, I'll have to gouge out a couple +of Joshuays an' turn the old Ford into a boat--but Casey'll keep +agoin'!" + +Until inky dark it rained like the deluge. Casey remained +perched in his one-man ark and tried hard to enjoy himself and +his hard-won freedom. He stabbed open a can of condensed milk, +poured it into a cup, and drank it and ate what was left of his +breakfast bannock, which he had fortunately put away in the car +out of the reach of a hill of industrious red ants. + +He thought vaguely of cranking the car and going on, but gave up +the notion. One sidehill, he decided, was as good as another +sidehill for the present. + +That night Casey slept fitfully in the car and discovered that +even a wall bed in a despised apartment house may be more +comfortable than the front seat of a Ford. His bones ached by +morning, and he was hungry enough to eat raw bacon and relish it. +But the sun was fighting through the piled clouds and shone +cheerfully upon the draggled pass, and Casey boiled coffee and +fried bacon and bannock beside the trail, and for a little while +was happy again. + +From breakfast until noon he was busy as a beaver repairing the +washout beneath the car and on to the top of the hill. She was +going to have to get down and dig in her toes to make it, he told +the Ford, when at last he heaved pick and shovel into the +tonneau, packed in his cooking outfit and made ready to crank up. + +From then until supper time he wore a trail around the car, +looking to see what was wrong and why he could not crank. He +removed hootin'-annies and dingbats (using Casey's mechanical +terms) looked them over dissatisfiedly, and put them back without +having done them ny good whatever. Sometimes they were returned +to a different place, I imagine, since I know too well how +impartial Casey is with the mechanical parts of a Ford. + +He made camp there that night, pitching his little tent in the +trail for pure cussedness, and defying aloud a traveling world to +make him move until he got good and ready. He might have saved +his vocabulary, for the road was impassable before him and +behind; and had Casey managed to start the car, he could not have +driven a mile in either direction. + +Since he did not know that, the next day he painstakingly cleaned +the spark plugs and tried again to crank the Ford; couldn't, and +removed more hootin'-annies and dingbats than he had touched the +day before. That night he once more pitched his tent in the +trail, hoping in his heart that some one would drive along and +dispute his right to camp there; when he would lick the doggone +cuss. + +On the fourth day, after a long, fatiguing session with the +vitals of a Ford that refused to be cranked, Casey was busy +gathering brush, for his supper fire when Fate came walking up' +the trail. Fate appears in many forms. In this instance it +assumed the shape of a packed burro that poked its nose around a +group of Joshuas, stopped abruptly and backed precipitately into +another burro which swung out of the trail and went careening +awkwardly down the slope. The stampeding burro had not seen the +Ford at all, but accepted the testimony of its leader that +something was radically wrong with the trail ahead. His pack +bumped against the yuccas as he went; after him lurched a large +man, heavy to the point of fatness, yelling hoarse threats and +incoherent objurgations. + +Casey threw down his armful of dead brush and went after the lead +burro which was blazing itself a trail in an entirely different +direction. The lead burro had four large canteens strapped +outside its pack, and Casey was growing so short of water that he +had begun to debate seriously the question of draining the +radiator on the morrow. + +I don't suppose many of you would believe the innate cussedness +of a burro when it wants to be that way. Casey hazed this one to +the hills and back down the trail for half a mile before he +rushed it into a clump of greasewood and sneaked up on it when it +thought itself hidden from all mortal eyes. After that he dug +heels into the sand and hung on. Memory resurrected for his need +certain choice phrases coined in times of stress for the ears of +burros alone. Luxury and civilization and fifty-five thousand +dollars and a wife were as if they had never been. He was Casey +Ryan, the prospector, fighting a stubborn donkey all over a +desert slope. He led it conquered back to the Ford, tied it to a +wheel and lifted off the four canteens, gratified with their +weight and hoping there were more on the other burro. He had +quite forgotten that he had meant to lick the first man he saw, +and grinned when the fat man came toiling back with the other +animal. + +By the time their coffee was boiled and their bacon fried, each +one knew the other's past history and tentative plans for the +future, censored and glossed somewhat by the teller but received +without question or criticism. + +The fat man's name was Barney Oakes, and he had heard of Casey +Ryan and was glad to meet him. Though Casey had never heard of +Barney Oakes, he discovered that they both knew Bill Masters, the +garage man at Lund; and further gossip revealed the amazing fact +that Barney Oakes had once been the husband of the woman whom +Casey had very nearly married, the widow who cooked for the Lucky +Lode. + +"Boy, you're sure lucky she turned loose on yuh before yuh went +an' married her!" Barney congratulated Casey, slapping his great +thigh and laughing loudly. "She shore is handy with her +tongue--that old girl. Ever hear a sawmill workin' overtime? +That's her--rippin' through knots an' never blowin' the whistle +fer quittin' time. I never knowed a man could have as many faults +as what she used t' name over fer me." He drained his cup and +sighed with great content. "At that, I stayed with her seven +months and fourteen days," he boasted. "I admit, two of them +months I was laid up with a busted ankle an' shoulder blade. +Tunnel caved in on me." + +They talked late that night and were comrades, brothers, partners +share and share alike before they slept. Next morning Casey +tried again to start the Ford; couldn't; and yielded to Barney's +argument that burros were better than a car for prospectin' in +that rough country. They overhauled Casey's outfit, took all the +grub and as much else as the burros could carry and debated +seriously what point in the Panamints they should aim for. + +"Where's that there Joshuay tree pointin' to?" Casey asked +finally. "She's the biggest and oldest in the bunch, and ever +since I've been here she's looked like she's got somethin' on 'er +mind. Whadda yuh think, Barney?" + +Barney walked around the yucca, stood behind the extended arm, +squinted at the sharp-peaked butte with the black capping, toward +which the gaunt tree seemed to point. He spat out a stale quid +of tobacco and took a fresh one, squinted again toward the butte +and looked at Casey. + +"She's country I never prospected in, back in there. I've +follered poorer advice than a Joshuay. Le's try it a whirl." + +Thus it came to pass that Casey Ryan forsook his Ford for a +strange partner with two burros and a clouded past, and fared +forth across the barren foothills with no better guidance than +the rigid, outstretched limb of a great, gaunt Joshua tree. + + + +CHAPTER THREE + +In a still sunny gulch which shadows would presently fill to the +brim, Casey Ryan was reaching, soiled bandanna in his hand, to +pull a pot of bubbling coffee from the coals,--a pot now +blackened with the smoke of many campfires to prove how +thoroughly a part of the open land it had become. Something +nipped at his right shoulder, and at the same instant ticked the +coffeepot and overturned it into a splutter of steam and hot +ashes. The spiteful crack of a rifle shot followed close. Casey +ducked behind a nose of rock, and big Barney Oakes scuttled for +cover, spilling bacon out of the frying pan as he went. + +For a week the two had been camped in this particular gulch, +which drew in to a mere wrinkle on the southwestern slope of the +black-topped butte, toward which the Joshua tree in the pass had +directed them. Nearly a week they had spent toiling across the +hilly, waterless waste, with two harrowing days when their +canteens flopped empty on the burros and big Barney stumbled +oftener than Casey liked to see. Casey himself had gone doggedly +ahead, his body bent forward, his square shoulders sagging a bit, +but with never a thought of doing anything but go on. + +A red splotch high up on the side of this gulch promised "water +formation" as prospectors have a way of putting it. They had +found the water, else adventure would have turned to tragedy. +Near the water they had also found a promising outcropping of +silver-bearing quartz. Barney's blowpipe had this very day shown +them silver in castle-building quantities. + +Just at this moment, however, they were not thinking of mines. +They were eyeing a round hole in the coffeepot from which a brown +rivulet ran spitting into the blackening coals. + +Casey was the more venturesome. He raised himself to see if he +could discover where the bullet had come from, and very nearly +met the fate of the coffeepot. He felt the wind of a second +bullet that spatted against a boulder near Barney. Barney +burrowed deeper into his covert. + +Casey went down on all fours and crawled laboriously toward a +concealing bank covered thick with brush. A third bullet clipped +a twig of sage just about three inches above the middle of his +back, and Casey flattened on his stomach and swore. Some one on +the peak of the hill had good eyesight, he decided. Neither +spoke, other than to swear in undertones; for voices carried far +in that clear atmosphere, and nothing could be gained by +conversation. + +Darkness never had poured so slowly into that gulch since the +world was young. The campfire had died to black embers before +Casey ventured from his covert, and Barney Oakes seemed to have +holed up for the season. Unless you have lived for a long while +in a land altogether empty of any human life save your own, you +cannot realize the effect of having mysterious bullets zip past +your ears and ruin your supper for you. + +"Somebody's gunnin' fer us, looks like t' me," Barney observed +belatedly in a hoarse whisper, from his covert. + +"Found that out, did yuh? Well, it ain't the first time Casey's +been shot at and missed," Casey retorted peevishly in the lee of +the bank. "Say! I knowed the sing of bullets before I was old +enough to carry a tune." + +"So'd I," boasted Barney, "but that ain't sayin' I learned t' +like the song." + +"What I'm figurin' out now," said Casey, "is how to get up there +an' AT 'am. An' how we kin do it without him seein' us. Goin' +t' be kinda ticklish--but it ain't the first ticklish job Casey +Ryan ever tackled." + +"It can't be did," Barney stated flatly. "An' if it could be +did, I wouldn't do it. I ain't as easy t' miss as what you be. +I got bulk." + +"A hole bored through your tallow might mebbe do you good," Casey +suggested harshly. "Might let in a little sand. You can't never +tell--" + +"My vitals," said Barney with dignity, "is just as close to the +surface as what your vitals be. I ain't so fat--I'm big. An' I +got all the sand I need. I also have got sense, which some men +lacks" + +"What yuh figurin' on doin'?" Casey wanted to know. "Set here +under a bush an' let 'em pick yuh up same as they would a +cottontail, mebbe? We got a hull night to work in, an' Casey's +eyes is as good as anybody's in the dark. More'n that, Casey's +six-gun kin shoot just as hard an' fast as a rifle--let 'im git +close enough." + +Barney did not want to be left alone and said so frankly. +Neither did he want to climb the butte. He could see no possible +gain in climbing to meet an enemy or enemies who could hear the +noise of approach. It was plain suicide, he declared, and Barney +Oakes was not ready to die. + +But Casey could never listen to argument when a fight was in +prospect. He filled a canteen, emptied a box of cartridges into +his pocket, stuck his old, Colt six-shooter inside his trousers +belt, and gave Barney some parting instruction under his breath. + +Barney was to move camp down under the bank by the spring, and +dig himself in there, so that the only approach would be up the +narrow gulch. He would then wait until Casey returned. + +"Somebody's after our outfit, most likely," Casey reasoned. "It +ain't the first time I've knowed it to happen. So you put the +hull outfit outa sight down there an' stand guard over it. If +we'd 'a' run when they opened up, they'd uh cleaned us out and +left us flat. They's two of us, an' we'll git 'em from two +sides." + +He stuffed cold bannock into the pocket that did not hold the +cartridges and disappeared, climbing the side of the gulch +opposite the point which held their ambitious marksman. + +To Barney's panicky expostulations he had given little heed. "If +yore vitals is as close to your hide as what you claim," Casey +had said impatiently, "an' you don't want any punctures in 'em, +git to work an' git that hide of yourn outa sight. It'll take +some diggin'; they's a lot of yuh to cover." + +Barney, therefore, dug like a badger with a dog snuffing at its +tail. Casey, on the other hand, climbed laboriously in the +darkness a bluff he had not attempted to climb by daylight. It +was hard work and slow, for he felt the need of going quietly. +What lay over the rim-rock he did not know, though he meant to +find out. + +Daylight found him leaning against a smooth ledge which formed a +part of the black capping he had seen from the road. He had +spent the night toiling over boulders and into small gulches and +out again, trying to find some crevice through which he might +climb to the top. Now he was just about where he had been several +hours before, and even Casey Ryan could not help realizing what a +fine target he would make if he attempted to climb back down the +bluff to camp before darkness again hid his movements. + +Standing there puffing and wondering what to do next, he saw the +two burros come picking their way toward the spring for their +morning drink and a handful apiece of rolled oats which Barney +kept to bait them into camp. The lead burro was within easy +flinging distance of a rock, from camp, when the thin, +unmistakable crack of a rifle-shot came from the right, high up +on the rim somewhere beyond Casey. The lead burro pitched +forward, struggled to get up, fell again and rolled over, lodging +against a rock with its four feet sticking up at awkward angles +in the air. + +The second burro, always quick to take alarm, wheeled and went +galloping away down the draw. But he couldn't outgallop the +bullet that sent him in a complete somersault down the slope. +Barney might keep the rest of his rolled oats, for the burros +were through wanting them. + +Casey squinted along the rim of black rock that crested the peak +irregularly like a stiff, ragged frill of mourning stuff the gods +had thrown away. He could not see the man who had shot the +burros. By the intervals between shots, Casey guessed that one +man was doing the shooting, though it was probable there were +others in the gang. And now that the burros were dead, it became +more than ever necessary to locate the gang and have it out with +them. That necessity did not worry Casey in the least. The only +thing that troubled him now was getting up on the rim without +being seen. + +It was characteristic of Casey Ryan that, though he moved with +caution, he nevertheless moved toward their unseen enemy. Not +for a long, long while had Casey been cautious in his behavior, +and the necessity galled him. If the hidden marksman had missed +that last burro, Casey would probably have taken a longer chance. +But to date, every bullet had gone straight to its destination; +which was enough to make any man think twice. + +Once during the forenoon, while Casey was standing against the +rim-rock staring glumly down upon the camp, Barney's hat, perched +on a pick handle, lifted its crown above the edge of his hiding +place; an old, old trick Barney was playing to see if the rifle +were still there and working. The rifle worked very well indeed, +for Barney was presently flattened into his retreat, swearing and +poking his finger through a round hole in his hat. + +Casey seized the opportunity created by the diversion and +scurried like a lizard across a bare, gravelly slide that had +been bothering him for half an hour. By mid-afternoon he reached +a crevice that looked promising enough when he craned up it, but +which nearly broke his neck when he had climbed halfway up. +Never before had he been compelled to measure so exactly his +breadth and thickness. It was drawing matters down rather fine +when he was compelled to back down to where he had elbow room, +and remove his coat before he could squeeze his body through that +crack. But he did it, with his six-shooter inside his shirt and +the extra ammunition weighting his trousers pockets. + +In spite of his long experience with desert scenery, Casey was +somewhat astonished to find himself in a new land, fairly level +and with thick groves of pinon cedar and juniper trees scattered +here and there. Far away stood other barren hills with deep +canyons between. He knew now that the black-capped butte was +less a butte than the uptilted nose of a high plateau not half so +barren as the lower country. From the pointing Joshua tree it +had seemed a peak, but contours are never so deceptive as in the +high, broken barrens of Nevada. + +He looked down into the gulch where Barney was holed up with +their outfit. He could scarcely distinguish the place, it had +dwindled so with the distance. He had small hope of seeing +Barney. After that last leaden bee had buzzed through his hat +crown, you would have to dig faster than Barney if you wanted a +look at him. Casey grinned when he thought of it. + +When he had gotten his breath and had scraped some loose dirt out +of his shirt collar, Casey crouched down behind a juniper and +examined his surroundings carefully, his pale, straight-lidded +eyes moving slowly as the white, pointing finger of a searchlight +while he took in every small detail within view. Midway in the +arc of his vision was a ledge, ending in a flat-topped boulder. + +The ledge blocked his view, except that he could see trees and a +higher peak of rocks beyond it. He made his way cautiously +toward the ledge, his eyes fixed upon the boulder. A huge, +sloping slab of the granite outcropping it seemed, scaly with +gray-green fungus in the cracks where moisture longest remained; +granite ledge banked with low junipers warped and stunted and +tangled with sage. The longer Casey looked at the boulder, the +less he saw that seemed unnatural in a country filled with +boulders and outcroppings and stunted vegetation. + +But the longer he looked at it, the stronger grew his animal +instinct that something was wrong. He waited for a time--a long +time indeed for Casey Ryan to wait. There was no stir anywhere +save the sweep of the wind blowing steadily from the west. + +He crept forward, halting often, eyeing the boulder and its +neighboring ledge, distrust growing within him, though he saw +nothing, heard nothing but the wind sweeping through branches and +bush. Casey Ryan was never frightened in his life. But he was +Irish born--and there's something in Irish blood that will not +out; something that goes beyond reason into the world of unknown +wisdom. + +It's a tricksy world, that realm of intuitions. For this is what +befell Casey Ryan, and you may account for it as best pleases +you. + +He circled the rock as a wolf will circle a coiled rattler which +it does not see. Beyond the rock, built close against it so that +the rear wall must have been the face of the ledge, a little rock +cabin squatted secretively. One small window, with two panes of +glass was set high under the eaves on the side toward Casey. +Cleverly concealed it was, built to resemble the ledge. Visible +from one side only, and that was the side where Casey stood. At +the back the sloping boulder, untouched, impregnable; at the +north and west, a twist of the ledge that hid the cabin +completely in a niche. It was the window on the south side that +betrayed it. + +So here was what the boulder concealed,--and yet, Casey was not +satisfied with the discovery. Unconsciously he reached for his +gun. This, he told himself, must be the secret habitation of the +fiend who shot from rim-rocks with terrible precision at harmless +prospectors and their burros. + +Casey squinted up at the sun and turned his level gaze again upon +the cabin. Reason told him that the man with the rifle was still +watching for a pot shot at him and Barney, and that there was +nothing whatever to indicate the presence of only one man in the +camp below. Had he been glimpsed once during the climb, he would +have been fired upon; he would never have been given the chance +to gain the top and find this cabin. + +The place looked deserted. His practical, everyday mind told him +it was empty for the time being. But he felt queer and +uncomfortable, nevertheless. He sneaked along the ledge to the +cabin, flattened himself against the corner next the gray boulder +and waited there for a minute. He felt the flesh stiffening on +his jaws as he crept up to the window to look in. By standing on +his toes, Casey's eyes came on a level with the lowest inch of +glass,--the window was so high. + +Just at first Casey could not see much. Then, when his eyes had +adjusted themselves to the half twilight within, his mind at +first failed to grasp what he saw. Gradually a dimly sensed +dread took hold of him, and grew while he stood there peering in +at commonplace things which should have given him no feeling save +perhaps a faint surprise. + +A fairly clean, tiny room he saw, with a rough, narrow bed in one +corner and a box table at its head. From the ceiling hung a +lantern with the chimney smoked on one side and the warped, pole +rafter above it slightly blackened to show how long the lantern +had hung there lighted. A door opposite the tiny window was +closed, and there was no latch or fastening on the inner side. +An Indian blanket covered half the floor space, and in the corner +opposite the bed was a queer, drumlike thing of sheet iron with a +pipe running through the wall; some heating arrangement, Casey +guessed. + +In the center of the room, facing the window, a woman sat in a +wooden rocking chair and rocked. A pale old woman with dark +hollows under her eyes that were fixed upon the pattern of the +Indian rug. Her hair was white. Her thin, white hands rested +limply on the arms of the chair, and she was rocking back and +forth, back and forth, steadily, quietly,--just rocking and +staring at the Indian rug. + +Casey has since told me that she was the creepiest thing he ever +saw in his life. Yet he could not explain why it was so. The +woman's face was not so old, though it was lined and without +color. There was a terrible quiet in her features, but he felt, +somehow, that her thoughts were not quiet. It was as if her +thoughts were reaching out to him, telling him things too awful +for her thin, hushed lips to let pass. + +But after all, Casey's main object was to locate the man with the +rifle, and to do it before he himself was seen on the butte. He +watched a little longer the woman who rocked and rocked. Never +once did her eyes move from that fixed point on the rug. Never +once did her fingers move on the arm of the chair. Her mouth +remained immobile as the lips of a dead woman. He had to force +himself to leave the window; and when he did, he felt guilty, as +if he had somehow deserted some one helpless and needing him. He +sneaked back, lifted himself and took another long look. The old +woman was rocking back and forth, her face quiet with that +terrible, pent placidity which Casey could not understand. + +Away from the cabin a pebble's throw, he shook his shoulders and +pulled his mind away from her, back to the man with the rifle-- +and to Barney. Rocking in a chair never hurt anybody that he +ever heard of. And shooting from rim-rocks did. And Barney was +down there, holed up and helpless, though he had grub and water. +Casey was up here in a mighty dangerous place without much grub +or water but--he hoped--not quite helpless. His immediate, +pressing job was not to peek through a high-up window at an old +woman rocking back and forth in a chair, but to round up the man +who was interfering with Casey's peaceful quest for--well, he +called it wealth; but I think that adventure meant more to him. + +He picked his way carefully along the edge of the rim-rock, +keeping under cover when he could and watching always the country +ahead. And without any artful description of his progress, I +will simply say that Casey Ryan combed the edge of that rampart +for two miles before dark, and found himself at last on the side +farthest from Barney without having discovered the faintest trace +of any living soul save the woman who rocked back and forth in +the little, secret cabin. + +Casey sat down on a rock, took a restrained drink from his +canteen, and said everything he knew or could invent that was +profane and condemnatory of his luck, of the unseen assassin, of +the country and his present predicament. He got up, looked all +around him, sniffed unavailingly for some tang of smoke in the +thin, crisp air, reseated himself and said everything all over +again. + +Presently he rose and made his way straight across the butte, +going slowly to lessen his chance of making a noise for +unfriendly ears to hear, and with the stars for guidance. + + + +CHAPTER FOUR + +The night was growing cold, and Casey had no coat. At least he +could go down and tell Barney what he had discovered and had +failed to discover, and get something to eat. Barney would +probably be worrying about him, though there was a chance that a +bullet had found Barney before dark. Casey was uneasy, and once +he was down the fissure again, he hurried as much as possible. + +He managed to reach the camp by the little spring without being +shot at and without breaking a leg. But Barney was not there. +Just at first Casey believed he was dead; but a brief search told +Casey that two of the largest canteens were gone, together with a +side of bacon, some flour and all of the tobacco. White +assassins would have made a more thorough job of robbing the +camp. Barney, it was evident, had fled the fate of the burros. + +Casey told the stars what he thought of a partner like Barney. +Afterward he ate what was easiest to swallow without cooking, +overhauled what was left of their outfit, cached the remainder in +a clump of bushes, and wearily climbed the bluff again under a +capacity load. He concealed himself in the bottom of the fissure +to sleep, since he could search no farther. + +If he thought wistfully of the palled comfort of his apartment in +Los Angeles, and of the Little Woman there, he still did not +think strongly enough to send him back to them. For with a +canteen or two of water, some food and his two capable legs to +carry him, Casey Ryan could have made it to Barstow easily +enough. But because he was Casey Ryan, and Irish, and because he +was always on the hunt for trouble without recognizing it when he +met it in the trail, it never occurred to him to follow Barney +down to safer country. + +"That there Joshuay tree meant a lot more'n what it let on, +pointin' up this way!" Casey muttered, staring down upon a +somnolent wilderness blanketed with hushed midnight. "If it +thinks it's got Casey whipped, it better think agin and think +quick. I'll give it somethin' to point at, 'fore I leave this +here butte. + +"Funny, the way it kept pointin' up this way. I've saw Joshuays +before--miles of 'em. But I never seen one that looked so kinda +human and so kinda like it was tryin' to talk. Seems kinda +funny; an' that old lady rockin' an' lookin'--seems like her an' +the Joshuay has kinda throwed in together, hopin' somebody might +come along with savvy enough to kinda--aw, hell!" So did Casey +and his Irish belief in the supernatural fall plump against the +limitations of his vocabulary. + +Against the limitations proscribed by his material predicament, +however, Casey Ryan set his face with a grin. Somebody was going +to get the big jolt of his life before long, he told himself over +a careful breakfast fire built cunningly far back in the crevice +where a current of air sucked into the rock capping of the butte. +Something was going on up here that shouldn't go on. He did not +know what it was, but he meant to stop it. He did not know who +was making Indian war on peaceful prospectors, but Casey felt +that they were already as good as licked, since he was here with +breakfast under his belt and his six-shooter tucked handily +inside his waistband. + +He squinted up the crack in the ledge, made certain mental +alterations in its narrow, jagged walls, and reached for the +tough-handled, efficient prospector's pick he had thoughtfully +included in his meagre equipment. Slowly and methodically he +worked up the crevice, knocking off certain sharp points of rock, +and knowing all the while what would probably happen to him if he +were overheard. + +He was not discovered, however. When he laid elbows on the upper +level of the rim and pulled himself up, his coat was on his back +where it belonged, and even Barney could have followed him. Yet +the top showed no evidence of a widening of the fissure. The +bushy junipers hid him completely while he reconnoitred and +considered what he should do. + +Because the place was close and the invisible call was strong, +Casey went first to the rock hut, circled it carefully and found +that it was exactly what it had seemed at first sight; a hidden +place with no evident opening save that high, small window under +the eaves. There was no sign of pathway leading to it, no trace +of life outside its wall. But when he crept close and peeked in +again, there sat the old woman rocking back and forth. But +to-day she stared at the wall before her. + +Casey felt a distinct sensation of relief just in knowing that +she was, after all, capable of moving. Now her head was not +bent, but rested against the back of her chair. She was rocking +steadily, quietly, with never a halt. + +Casey rapped on the window and waited, fighting a nameless dread +of the mystery of her. But she continued to rock and to stare at +the wall; if she heard the tapping she gave no sign whatever. So +presently he turned away and set himself to the work of finding +the man with the rifle. + +To that end he first of all climbed the tallest pinon tree in +sight; a tree that stood on a rise of ground apart from its +brothers. From the concealment of its branches, he surveyed his +surroundings carefully, noting especially the notched unevenness +of the butte's rim and how just behind him it narrowed +unexpectedly to a thin ridge not more than a couple of hundred +yards in breadth. A jagged outcropping cut straight across and +Casey saw how yesterday he had mistaken that ledge for the rim of +the butte. His man must have been out on the point beyond him +all the while. He was out there now, very likely; there, or down +in the camp he had watched yesterday like a vulture. + +His search having narrowed to an area easily covered in an hour +or two, Casey turned his head and examined as well as he could +the deep canyon that had bitten into the butte and caused that +narrow peak. Trees blocked his view there, and he was feeling +about for a lower foothold so that he could make the descent when +a voice from the ground startled him considerably. + +"Come down outa there, before I shoot yuh down!" + +Casey looked down and saw what he afterwards declared was the +meanest looking man on earth, pointing straight at him the widest +muzzled shotgun he had ever seen in his life. + +Casey came down. The last ten feet of the distance he made in a +clean jump, planting his feet full in the old man's stomach. The +meanest looking man on earth gave a grunt and crumpled, with +Casey's fingers digging into his throat. + +Whether Casey would have killed him or not will never be known. +For just as the man was falling limp in his hands, another heavy +body landed upon Casey's back. Casey felt a hard, chill circle +pressed against his perspiring temple. His hands relaxed and +fall away from the throat, leaving finger marks there in the +flesh. + +"Git up off'n him!" a new voice commanded harshly, and Casey +obeyed. His captor shifted the gun muzzle to the back of Casey's +neck and poked the gasping, bearded old man with his toe. + +"Git up, Paw, you old fool, you! What'd you let 'im light on yuh +fer? Why couldn't you a stood back a piece, outa reach? You +like to got croaked." + +Casey found it prudent to hold his head rather still, as a man +does when he carries a boil on his neck. The muzzle of a +six-shooter has a quieting effect, when applied to the person by +an unfriendly hand. Casey did not at once see the intruder. But +presently "Paw" recovered himself and his shotgun, and swung it +menacingly toward Casey. Whereupon the cold circle left Casey's +medulla oblongata and a long-faced, long-legged youth stepped +somewhat hastily to one side. + +"Paw, you ol' fool, you, get your finger off'n that trigger +whilst you're aimin' at me!" he exclaimed pettishly. + +"I wa'n't aimin' at you. I was aimin' at this 'ere--" Casey +heard himself called many names, any one of which was good for a +fight when Casey was free. + +"Aw, you shut up, Paw. You ain't gittin' nobody nowhere," the +son interrupted. "You can't cuss 'im t' death--he looks like he +could cut loose a few of them pet names hisself if he got a +chancet. Yuh might tell us what you was doin' up that there tree, +mister. An' what you're doin' on this here butte, anyhow." + +Casey looked at him. Knowing Casey, I should say that his eyes +were not pleasant. "Talk to Paw," he advised contemptuously. +"The two of yuh may possibly be able to stand each other without +gittin' sick; but me, I never did git used to skunks!" + +That remark very nearly got him a through ticket to Land Beyond. +But, being very nearly what Casey had called them, they contented +themselves with mouthing vile epithets. + +"Better take 'im down to the mine an' keep 'im till Mart gets +back, Paw," the long-jawed youth suggested, when he ran short of +objurgations. "Mart'll fix 'im when he comes." + +"I'd fix 'im, here an', now," threatened Paw, "but Mart, he's so +damned techy lately--what we oughta do is bust 'is head with a +rock an, pitch 'im over the rim. That'd fix 'im." + +They wrangled over the suggestion, and finally decided to take +him down and turn him over to one whom they called Joe. Casey +went along peaceably, hopeful that he would later have a chance +to fight back. He told himself that they both had heads like +peanuts, and whenever they moved, he swore, he could hear their +brains rattle in their skulls. It doesn't take brains to shoot +straight, and he decided that the lanky young man was the one who +had shot from the rim-rock. They drove him down into the narrow, +deep gulch, following a steep trail that Casey had not seen the +day before. The trail led them to the mouth of a tunnel; and by +the size of the dump Casey judged that the workings were of a +considerable extent. They were getting out silver ore, he +guessed, after a glance or two at stray pieces of rock. + +Joe was a big, glum-looking individual with his left hand +bandaged. He chewed tobacco industriously and maintained a +complete silence while Hank, frequently telling Paw to shut up, +told how and where they had found Casey spying up on the butte. + +"We don't fancy stray desert rats prowlin' around without no +reason," said Joe. "Our boss that we're workin' for ain't at +home. We're lookin' for 'im back any day now, an' we'll just +hold yuh till he comes. He can do as he likes about yuh. You'll +have to work fer your board--c'm on an' I'll show yuh how." + +Hank followed Casey and Joe into the tunnel. Casey made no +objections whatever to going. The tunnel was a fairly long one, +he noticed, with drifts opening out of it to left and right. At +the end of the main tunnel, Joe turned, took Casey's candle from +him and stuck it into a seam in the wall, as he had done with his +own. + +"Ever drill in rock?" he asked shortly. + +"Mebbe I have an' mebbe I ain't," Casey returned defiantly. + +"Here's a drill, an' here's your single-jack. Now git t' work. +There ain't any loafin' around this camp, and spies never meant +good to nobody. Yuh needn't expect to be popular with us--but +you'll git your grub if yuh earn it. + +Casey looked at the drill, took the double-headed, four-pound +hammer and hesitated. He has said that it was pretty hard to +resist braining the two of them at once. But there would still +be the old man with the shotgun, and he admitted that he was +curious about the old woman who rocked and rocked. He decided to +wait awhile and see, why these miners found it necessary to shoot +harmless prospectors who came near the butte. So he spat into +the dust of the tunnel floor, squinted at Joe for a minute and +went to work. + +That day Casey was kept underground except during the short +interval of "shooting" and waiting for the dynamite smoke to +clear out of the tunnel; which process Casey assisted by +operating a hand blower much against his will. Joe remained +always on guard, eyeing Casey suspiciously. When at last he was +permitted to pick up his coat and leave the tunnel, night had +fallen so that the gulch was dim and shadowy. Casey was +conducted to a dugout cabin where bacon was frying too fast and +smoking suffocatingly. Paw was there, in a vile temper which +seemed to be directed toward the three impartially and to have +been caused chiefly by his temporary occupation as camp cook. + +Casey watched the old man place food for one person in little +dishes which he set in a bake pan for want of a tray. He added a +small tin teapot of tea and disappeared from the dugout. + +"Two of us waitin' to see your boss, huh?" Casey inquired boldly +of Joe. "Can't we eat together?" + +"You can call yourself lucky if you eat at all," Joe retorted +glumly. "The old man's pretty sore at the way you handled him. +He's runnin' this camp; I ain't." + +Casey let it go at that, chiefly because he was hungry and tired +and did not want to risk losing his supper altogether. Hounds +like these, he told himself bitterly, were capable of any +crime--from smashing a man's skull and throwing him off the +rim-rock to starving him to death. He was Casey Ryan, ready +always to fight whether his chance of winning was even or merely +microscopical; but even so, Casey was not inclined toward +suicide. + +When the old man presently returned and the three sat down to the +table, Casey obeyed a gesture and sat down with them. In spite +of Joe's six-shooter laid handily upon the table beside his +plate, Casey ate heartily, though the food was neither well +cooked nor over plentiful. + +After supper he rose and filled his pipe which they had permitted +him to keep. A stranger coming into the cabin might not have +guessed that Casey was a prisoner. When the table was cleared +and Hank set about washing the dishes, Casey picked up a grimy +dish towel branded black in places where it had rubbed sooty +kettles, and grinned cheerfully at Paw while he dried a tin +plate. Paw eyed him dubiously over a stinking pipe, spat +reflectively into the woodbox and crossed his legs the other way, +loosely swinging an ill-shod foot. + +"Y'ain't told us yet what brung yuh up on the butte," Paw +observed suddenly. "Yuh wa'n't lost--yuh ain't got the mark uh +no tenderfoot. What was yuh doin' up in that tree?" + +"Mebbe I mighta been huntin' mountain sheep," Casey retorted +calmly. + +"Huntin' mountain sheep up a tree is a new one," tittered Hank. +"Wish you'd give me a swaller uh that brand. Must have a kick +like a brindle mule." + +"More likely 'White Mule.'" Casey cocked a knowing eye at Hank. +"You're too late, young feller. I chewed the cork day before +yesterday," he declared. + +While he fished another plate out of the pan, Casey observed that +Paw looked at Joe inquiringly, and that Joe moved his head +sidewise a careful inch, and back again. + +"Moonshine, huh?" Paw hazarded hopefully. "Yuh peddlin' it, er +makin' it?" + +Casey grinned secretively. "A man can't be pinched without the +goods," he observed shrewdly. "I was raised in a country where +they took fools out an' brained 'em with an axe. You fellers +ain't been none too friendly, recollect. When's your boss +expected home, did yuh say? I'd kinda like to meet 'im." + +"He'll kinda like to meet you," Joe returned darkly. "Your +actions has been plumb suspicious. + +"Nothin' suspicious about MY actions," Casey stated truculently, +throwing discretion behind him. "The suspiciousness lays up here +somewheres on this butte. If yuh want to know what brung me up +here, Casey Ryan's the man that can tell yuh to your faces. I +come up here to find out who's been gittin' busy with a +high-power on my camp down below. Ain't it natural a man'd want +to know who'd shot his two burros--an' 'is pardner?" Casey had +impulsively decided to throw in Barney for good measure. "Casey +Ryan ain't the man to set under a bush an' be shot at like a +rabbit. You can ask anybody if Casey ever backed up fer man er +beast. I come up here huntin'. Shore I did. It wasn't sheep I +was after--that there's my mistake. It was goats." + +"Guess I got yourn," Hank leered "when stuck my gun in your back +hair." + +"If any one's 'been usin' a high-power it wasn't on this butte," +Joe growled. "None uh this bunch done any shootin'. Pap an' +Hank, they was up here huntin' burros an I caught yuh up a tree +spyin'. We got a little band uh antelope up here we're +pertectin'. Our boss got himself made a deppity fer just such +cases as yourn appears t' be--pervidin' your case ain't worse. + +"Now you say your pardner was shot down below in your camp. That +shore looks bad fer you, old-timer. The boss'll shore have t' +look into it when he gits here. Lucky we made up our minds t' +hold yuh--a murderer, like as not." He filled his pipe with +deliberation, while Casey, his jaw sagging, stared from one to +the other. + +Casey had meant to accuse them to their faces of shooting Barney +and the burros from the rim-rock. It had occurred to him that if +they believed Barney dead, they might reveal something of their +purpose in the attack. Concealment, he felt vaguely, would serve +merely to sharpen their suspicion of him. It had seemed very +important to Casey that these three should not know that Barney +was probably well on his way to Barstow by now. + +Barney in Barstow would mean Barney bearing news that Casey Ryan +was undoubtedly murdered by outlaws in the Panamints; which would +mean a few officers on the trail, with Barney to guide them to +the spot. Paw and Hank and Joe--outlaws all, he would have sworn +would get what Casey called their needin's. His jaw muscles +tightened when he thought of that, and the prospect held him +quiet under Joe's injustice. + +"I can prove anything I'm asked to prove when the time comes," he +said sourly, and began to roll himself a cigarette, since his +pipe had gone out. "But I ain't in any courtroom yet, an' you +fellers ain't any judge an' jury." + +"We got to hold ye," Paw spoke up unctiously, as if the decision +had been his. "Ef a crime's been committed, like you say it has, +we got to do our duty an' hold ye. The boss'll know what to do +with ye--like I said all along; when I hauled ye down outa that +tree, for instance. + +"Aw, shut up, Paw, you ol' fool, you," Hank commanded again with +filial gentleness. "He had yore tongue hangin' out a foot when I +come along an' captured 'im. Don't go takin' no credit to +yourself --you ain't got none comin'. Mart'll know what to do +with 'im, all right. But yuh needn't go an' try to let on to +Mart that you was the one that caught 'im. He had you caught. +An' he'd a killed yuh if I hadn't showed up an' pulled 'im off'n +yuh." + +"Well now, when it comes to KILLIN'," Casey interjected +spitefully, "I guess I coulda put the two of yuh away if I'd a +wanted to right bad. Casey Ryan ain't no killer, because he don't +have to be. G'wan an' hold me if yuh feel that way. Grub ain't +none too good, but I can stand it till your boss comes. I want a +man-to-man talk with him, anyway." + + + +CHAPTER FIVE + +That night Casey slept soundly in a bunk built above Joe's bed in +the dugout, with Hank and Paw on the opposite side of the room +with their guns handy. In the morning he thought well enough of +his stomach to get up and start breakfast when Hank had built the +fire. He was aware of Joe's suspicious gaze from the lower bunk, +and of the close presence of Joe's six-shooter eyeing him +balefully from underneath the top blanket. Hank, too, was +watchful as a coyote, which he much resembled, in Casey's +opinion. But Casey did not mind trifles of that kind, once his +mind was at ease about the breakfast and he was free to slice +bacon the right thickness, and mix the hot-cake batter himself. +For the first time in many weeks he sang --if you could call it +singing--over his work. + +When Casey Ryan sings over a breakfast fire, you may expect the +bacon fried exactly right. You may be sure the hot-cakes will be +browned correctly with no uncooked dough inside, and that the +coffee will give you heart for whatever hardship the day may +hold. + +Even Paw's surliness lightened a bit by the time he had speared +his tenth cake and walloped it in the bacon grease before +sprinkling it thick with sugar and settling the eleventh cake on +top. Casey was eyeing the fourteenth cake on Hank's plate when +Joe looked up at him over a loaded fork. + +"Save out enough dough for three good uns," Joe ordered, "an' +fill that little coffee pot an' set it to keep hot, before Hank +hogs the hull thing. Dad, seems like you're, too busy t' think +uh some things Mart wouldn't want forgot." Paw looked quickly at +Casey; but Casey Ryan had played poker all his life, and his +weathered face showed no expression beyond a momentary interest, +which was natural. + +"Other feller hurt bad?" he inquired carelessly, looking at +Joe's bandaged hand. He almost grinned when he saw the relieved +glances exchanged between Joe and Paw. + +"Leg broke," Joe mumbled over a mouthful. "Dad, he set it an' +it's doin' all right. He's up in another cabin." Through Hank's +brainless titter, Joe added carefully, "Bad ground in the first +right-hand drift. We had to abandon it. Rocks big as your head +comin' in on yuh onexpected. None uh them right-hand drifts is +safe fer a man t' walk in, much less work." + +Thereupon Casey related a thrilling story of a cave-in, and +assured Joe that he and his partner were lucky to get off with +mere broken bones. Casey, you will observe, was running contrary +to his nature and leaning to diplomacy. + +For himself, I am sure he would never have troubled to placate +them. He would have taken the first slim chance that offered--or +made one --and fought the three to a finish. + +But there was the old woman in the rock hut above them, rocking +back and forth and staring at a wall that had no visible opening +save one small window to let in the light of outdoors. Prisoner +she must be--though why, Casey could only guess. + +Perhaps she was some desert woman, the widow of some miner who +had been shot as these three had tried to shoot him and Barney +Oakes. Mean, malevolent as they were, they would still lack the +brutishness necessary to shoot an old woman. So they had shut +her up there in the rock hut, not daring to take her back to +civilization where she would tell of the crime. It was all plain +enough to Casey. The story of the crippled miner made him curl +his lip contemptuously when his back was safely turned from Joe. + +That day Casey thought much of the old woman in the hut, and of +Paw's worse than inferior cooking. Though he did not realize the +change in himself, six months of close companionship with the +Little Woman had changed Casey Ryan considerably. Time was when +even his soft-heartedness would not have impelled him to patient +scheming that he might help an old woman whose sole claim upon +his sympathy consisted of four rock walls and a look of calm +despair in her eyes. Now, Casey was thinking and planning for +the old woman more than for himself. + +Wherefore, Casey chose the time when he was "putting in an upper" +(which is miner's parlance for drilling a hole in the upper face +of the tunnel). He gritted his teeth when he swung back the +single-jack and landed a glancing blow on the knuckles of his +left hand instead of the drill end. No man save Casey Ryan or a +surgeon could have told positively whether the metacarpal bones +were broken or whether the hand was merely skinned and bruised. + +Joe came up, regarded the bleeding hand sourly, led Casey out to +the dugout and bandaged the hand for him. There would be no more +tunnel work for Casey until the hand had healed; that was +accepted without comment. + +That night Casey proved to Paw that, with one hand in a sling +much resembling Joe's, he could nevertheless cook a meal that +made eating a pleasure to look forward to. After that the old +woman in the little stone hut had pudding, sometimes, and cake +made without eggs, and pie; and the potatoes were mashed or baked +instead of plain boiled. Casey had the satisfaction of seeing the +dishes return empty to the dugout, and know that he was permitted +to add something to her comfort and well-being. The Little Woman +would be glad of that, Casey thought with a glow. She might +never hear of it, but Casey liked to feel that he was doing +something that would please the Little Woman. + +For the first few days after Casey was installed as cook, one of +the three remained always with him, making it plain that he was +under guard. Two were always busy elsewhere. Casey saw that he +was expected to believe that they were at work in the tunnel, +driving it in to a certain contact of which they spoke frequently +and at length. + +At supper they would mention their footage for that day's work, +and Casey would hide a grin of derision. Casey knew rock as he +knew bacon and beans and his sour-dough can. To make the footage +they claimed to be making in that tunnel, they would need to +shoot twice a day, with a round of, say, five holes to a shot. + +As a matter of fact, two holes a day, one shot at noon and one at +night, were the most Casey ever heard fired in the tunnel or +elsewhere about the mine. But he did not tell them any of the +things he thought; not even Joe, who had intelligence far above +Paw and Hank, ever guessed that Casey listened every day for +their shots and could tell, almost to an inch what progress they +were actually making in the tunnel. Nor did he guess that Casey +Ryan with his mouth shut was more unsafe than "giant powder" laid +out in the sun until it sweated destruction. + +Persistent effort, directed by an idea based solely upon an +abstract theory, must be driven by a trained intelligence. In +this case the abstract theory that every prisoner must be watched +must support itself unaided by Casey's behavior. Not even Joe's +intelligence was trained to a degree where the theory in itself +was sufficient to hold him to the continuous effort of watching +Casey. + +Wherefore Paw, Hank and Joe presently slipped into the habit of +leaving Casey alone for an hour or so; being careful to keep the +guns out of his reach, and returning to the dugout at unexpected +intervals to make sure that all was well. + +Casey Ryan knew his pots and pans, and how to make them fill his +days if need be. With savory suppers and his care-free, Casey +Ryan grin, he presently lulled them into accepting him as a handy +man around camp, and into forgetting that he was at least a +potential enemy. Afoot and alone in that unfriendly land, with +his left hand smashed and carried in a sling, and on his tongue +an Irish joke that implied content with his captivity, Casey Ryan +would not have looked dangerous to more intelligent men than +these three. + +They should have looked one night under the bedding in Casey's +bunk. More important still would have been the safeguarding of +their "giant powder" and caps and fuse. They should not have +left it in a gouged, open hollow under a boulder near the dugout. +They were not burdened by the weight of their brains, I imagine. + +Just here I should like to say a few words to those who are +wholly ignorant of the devastating power contained in "giant +powder"-- which is dynamite. If you have never had any +experience with the stuff, you are likely to go out with a bang +and a puff of bluish-brown smoke when you go. On the other hand, +you may believe the weird tales one reads now and then, of how +whole mountainsides have been thrown down by the discharge of a +few sticks of dynamite. Or of one man striking terror to the +very souls of a group of mutinous miners by threatening to throw +a piece at them. Very well, now this is the truth without any +frills of exaggeration or any belittlement: + +Dynamite MAY go off by being thrown so that it lands with a jar, +but it is not likely to be so hasty as all that. Whole boxes of +it have been dropped off wagons traveling over rough trails, with +no worse effect than a nervous chill down the spine of the driver +of the wagon. It is true that old stuff, after lying around for +months and months through varying degrees of temperature, may +perform erratically, exploding when it shouldn't and refusing to +explode when it should. The average miner refuses to take a +chance with stale "giant" if he can get hold of fresh. + +One stick the size of an ordinary candle, and from that to a +maximum amount of four sticks, may be used to "load" a hole +eighteen to twenty-four inches long, drilled into living rock. +The amount of dynamite used depends upon the quality of rock to +be broken and the skill and good judgment of the miner. In +average hard-rock mining, from three to five of these holes are +drilled in a space four-by-six feet in area. + +A stick of dynamite is exploded by inserting in one end of the +stick a high-power detonating cap which will deliver a +twenty-pound blow per X--whatever that means. From three- to +six-X caps are used in ordinary mining. Three-X caps sometimes +fail to explode a stick of dynamite. A six-X cap, delivering a +one-hundred-and-twenty-pound blow, may be counted upon to do the +work without fail. + +The cap itself is exploded by a spark running through a length of +fuse, the length depending altogether upon the time required to +reach a point of safety after the fuse is lighted. The cap is +really more dangerous to handle than is the dynamite itself. The +cap is a tricky thing that may go off at any jar or scratch or at +a spark from pipe or cigarette. You can, if you are sufficiently +careless of possible results, light the twisted paper end of a +stick of dynamite and watch the dynamite burn like wax in your +fingers; it MAY go off and set your friends to work retrieving +portions of your body. More likely, it will do nothing but burn +harmlessly. + +Well, then, a piece of fuse is inserted in the open end of the +cap, and the metal pressed tight against the fuse to hold it in +place. Pressed down by the miner's teeth, sometimes, if he has +been long in the business and has grown careless about his head; +otherwise he crimps the cap on with a small pair of pliers or the +back of his knife blade--and feels a bit easier when it is done +without losing a hand. + +You would think, unless you are accustomed to the stuff, that +when five holes are loaded with, probably, ten or twelve sticks +of dynamite to the lot, each hole containing a six-X exploding +cap as well, that the first shot would likewise be the last shot +and that the whole tunnel would cave in and the mountain behind +it would shake. Nothing like that occurs. If there are five +loaded holes in the tunnel face, and you do not hear, one after +the other, five muffled BOOMS, you will know that one hole failed +to go off--and that the miner is worried. It happens sometimes +that four holes loaded with eight sticks of dynamite explode +within a foot or so of the fifth hole and yet the fifth hole +remains "dead" and a menace to the miner until it is discharged. + +So please don't swallow those wild tales of a stick of dynamite +that threw down a mountainside. I once read a story--it was not +so long ago--of a Chinaman who wiped out a mine with a little +piece of dynamite which he carried in his pocket. I laughed. + +Casey Ryan, on the first day when he was left alone with his +crippled hand and his pots and pans for company, did nothing +whatever that he would not have done had one of the three been +present. He was suspicious of their going and thought it was a +trap set to catch him in an attempted escape. + +On the second day when the three went off together and left him +alone, Casey went out gathering wood and discovered just where +the "powder," fuse and caps were kept under a huge, black boulder +between the tunnel portal and the dugout. On the third day he +also gathered wood and helped himself to two sticks of dynamite, +three caps and eighteen inches of fuse. Not enough to be missed +unless they checked their supply more carefully than Casey +believed they did; but enough for Casey's purpose nevertheless. + +That night, while the moon shone in through the dingy window at +the head of his bunk and gave him a little light to work by, +Casey sat up in bed and snored softly and with a soothing rhythm +while he cut a stick of dynamite in two, capped five inches of +fuse for each piece working awkwardly with his one good hand and +pinching the caps tight with his teeth, which might have sent him +with a bang into Kingdom Come--and very carefully worked the caps +into the powder until no more than three inches of fuse protruded +from the end of the half stick. It would have been less +dangerous to land with a yell in the middle of the floor and +fight the three men with one bare hand, but Casey's courage never +turned a hair. + +Still snoring mildly, he held up to the moonlight two deadly +weapons and surveyed them with much satisfaction. They would not +be so quick, as fiction would have them, but if his aim was +accurate in throwing, they would be deadly enough. Moreover, he +could count with a good deal of certainty upon a certain degree +of terror which the sight of them in his hand would produce. + +When Casey Ryan cooked breakfast next morning, he carried two +half-sticks of loaded dynamite under his hand in the sling. Can +you wonder that even he shied at standing over the stove cooking +hot cakes and complained that his broken hand pained him a lot +and that the heat made it worse? But a shrewd observer would +have noticed on his face the expression of a cat that has been +shut in the pantry over night. + +Joe volunteered to take another look at the hand and see if blood +poison was "setting in"; but Casey said it didn't feel like blood +poison. He had knocked it against the bunk edge in his sleep, he +declared. He'd dose 'er with iodine after a while, and she'd be +all right. + +Joe let it go at that, being preoccupied with other matters at +which Casey could only guess. He conferred with Paw outside the +dugout after breakfast, called Hank away from the dish-washing +and the three set off toward the tunnel with a brisker air than +usually accompanied them to work. Casey watched them go and felt +reasonably sure of at least two hours to himself. + +The first thing Casey did after he had made sure that he was +actually alone was to remove the deadly stuff from the sling and +lay it on a shadowed shelf where it would be safe but convenient +to his hand. Then, going to his bunk, he reached under the +blankets and found the other stick of dynamite which he had not +yet loaded. This he laid on the kitchen table and cut it in two +as he had done last night with the other stick. With his +remaining cap he loaded a half and carried it back to his bunk. +He was debating in his mind whether it was worth while purloining +another cap from a box under the boulder when another fancy took +him and set him grinning. + +Four separate charges of dynamite, he reasoned, would not be +necessary. It was an even chance that the sight of a piece with +the fuse in his hand would be sufficient to tame Paw or Hank or +Joe--or the three together, for that matter--without going +further than to give them a sight of it. + +With that idea uppermost, Casey split the paper carefully down +the side of the remaining half-stick, took out the contents in a +tin plate and carried it outside where he buried it in the sand +beneath a bush. Returning to the dugout he made a thick dough of +leftover pancake batter and molded it into the dynamite wrapping +with a fragment of harmless fuse protruding from the opened end. +When the thing was dry, Casey thought it would look very deadly +and might be useful. After several days of helplessness for want +of a weapon, Casey was in a mood to supply himself generously. + +He finished the dish-washing, working awkwardly with one hand. +After that he put a kettle of beans on to boil, filled the stove +with pinon sticks and closed the drafts. He armed himself with +the two loaded pieces of dynamite from the cupboard, filled his +pockets with such other things as he thought he might need, and +went prospecting on his own account. + +At the portal of the tunnel he stopped and listened for the +ping-g, ping-g of a single-jack striking steadily upon steel. +But the tunnel was silent, the ore car uptilted at the end of its +track on the dump. Yet the three men were supposedly at work in +the mine, had talked at breakfast about wanting to show a certain +footage when the boss returned, and of needing to hurry. + +Casey went into the tunnel, listening and going silently; sounds +travel far in underground workings. At the mouth of the first +right-hand drift he stopped again and listened. This, if he +would believe Joe, was the drift where the bad ground had caused +the accident to Joe and his partner whose leg had been broken. +Casey found the drift as silent as the main tunnel. He went in +ten feet or so and lighted the candle he had pulled from inside +his shirt. With the candle held in the swollen fingers of his +injured hand, and a prospector's pick taken from the portal in +his other, Casey went on cautiously, keeping an eye upon the roof +which, to his wise, squinting eyes, looked perfectly solid and +safe. + +If a track had ever been laid in this drift it had long since +been removed. But a well-defined path led along its center with +boot tracks going and coming, blurring one another with much +passing. Casey grinned and went on, his ears cocked for any sound +before or behind, his shoes slung over his arm by their tied +laces. + +So he came, in the course of a hundred feet or so, to a crude +door of split cedar slabs, the fastening padlocked on his side. +Casey had vaguely expected some such bar to his path, and he +merely gave a grunt of satisfaction that the lock was old and on +his side of the door. + +With his jackknife Casey speedily took off one side of the lock +and opened it. Making the door appear locked behind him when he +had passed through was a different matter, and Casey did not +attempt it. Instead, he merely closed the door behind him, +carrying the padlock in with him. + +As Casey reviewed his situation, being on the butte at all was a +risk in itself. One detail more or less could not matter so +much. Besides, he was a bold Casey Ryan with two loaded +half-sticks of dynamite in his sling. + +A crude ladder against the wall of a roomy stope beyond the door +did not in the least surprise him. He had expected something of +this sort. When he had topped the ladder and found himself in a +chamber that stretched away into blackness, he grunted again his +mental confirmation of a theory working out beautifully in fact. +His candle held close to the wall, he moved forward along the +well-trodden path, looking for a door. Mechanically he noticed +also the formation of the wall and the vein of ore--probably +high-grade in pockets, at least--that had caused this chamber to +be dug. The ore, he judged, had long since been taken out and +down through the stope into the tunnel and so out through the +main portal. These workings were old and for mining purposes +abandoned. But just now Casey was absorbed in solving the one +angle of the mystery which he had stumbled upon at first, and he +gave no more than a glance and a thought to the silent testimony +of the rock walls. + +He found the door, fastened also on the outside just as he had +expected it would be. Beside it stood a rather clever heating +apparatus which Casey did not examine in detail. His Irish heart +was beating rather fast while he unfastened the door. Beyond +that door his thoughts went questing eagerly but he hesitated +nevertheless before he lifted his knuckles and rapped. + +There was no reply. Casey waited a minute, knocked again, then +pulled the door open a crack and looked in. The old woman sat +there rocking back and forth, steadily, quietly. But her thin +fingers were rolling a corner of her apron hem painstakingly, as +if she meant to hem it again. Her eyes were fixed absently upon +the futile task. Casey watched her as long as he dared and +cleared his throat twice in the hope that she would notice him. +But the old woman rocked back and forth and rolled her apron hem; +unrolled it and carefully rolled it again. + +"Good morning, ma'am," said Casey, clearing his throat for the +third time and coming a step into the room with his candle +dripping wax on the floor. + +For just an instant the uneasy fingers paused in their rolling of +the apron hem. For just so long the rockers hesitated in their +motion. But the old woman did not reply nor turn her face toward +him; and Casey pushed the door shut behind him and took two more +steps toward her. + +"I come to see if yuh needed anything, ma'am; a friend, mebbe." +Casey grinned amiably, wanting to reassure her if it were +possible to make her aware of his presence. "They had yuh locked +in, ma'am. That don't look good to Casey Ryan. If yuh wanta get +out--if they got yuh held a prisoner here, or anything like +'that, you can trust Casey Ryan any old time. Is--can I do +anything for yuh, ma'am?" The old woman dropped her hands to her +lap and held them there, closely clasped. Her head swung slowly +round until she was looking at Casey with that awful, fixed stare +she had heretofore directed at the wall or the floor. + +"Tell those hell-hounds they have a thousand years to burn--every +one of them!" she said in a deep, low voice that had in it a +singing resonance like a chant. "Every cat, every rat, every +mouse, every louse, has a thousand year's to burn. Tell Mart the +hounds of hell must burn!" Her voice carried a terrible +condemnation far beyond the meaning of the words themselves. It +was as if she were pronouncing the doom of the whole world. +"Every cat, every rat, every mouse, every louse--" + +Casey Ryan's jaw dropped an inch. He backed until he was against +the door. He had to swallow twice before he could find his +voice, and those of you who know Casey Ryan will appreciate that. +He waited until she had finished her declaration. + +"No, ma'am, you're wrong. I come up here to see if I could help +yuh." + +"Hounds of hell--black as the bottomless pit that spewed you +forth to prey upon mankind! The world will have to burn. Tell +those hounds of hell that bay at the gibbous moon the world will +have to burn. Every cat, every rat, every mouse, every louse has +a thousand years to burn!" + +Casey Ryan, with his mouth half open and his eyes rather wild, +furtively opened the door behind him. Still meeting fixedly the +dull glare of the old woman's eyes, Casey slid out through the +door and fastened it hastily behind him. With an uneasy glance +now and then over his shoulder as if he feared the old woman +might be in pursuit of him, he hurried back down the ladder to +the closed door in the drift, pulled the door shut behind him and +put the padlock in place before he breathed naturally. + +He stopped then to put on his shoes, made his way to the drift +opening and listened again for voices or footsteps. When he +found the way clear he hurried out and back to the dugout. The +first thing he did was to fill his pipe and light it. Even then +the sonorous voice of the old woman intoning her dreadful +proclamation against the world rang in his ears and sent +occasional ripples of horror down his spine. Seen through the +window, she had looked a sad, lonely old lady who needed sympathy +and help. At closer range she was terrible. Casey was trying to +forget her by busying himself about the stove when Joe walked in +unexpectedly. + +Joe stood just inside the door, staring at Casey with a glassy +look in his eyes. Something in Joe's face warned Casey of +impending events; but with that terrible old woman still fresh in +his mind, Casey was in the mood to welcome distraction of any +sort. He shifted his hand in the sling so that his concealed +weapons lay more comfortably therein, secure from detection, and +waited. + +Joe leaned forward, lifted an arm slowly and aimed a finger at +Casey accusingly. + +"Pap says that you're a Federal officer!" he began, waggling his +finger at Casey. "Pap thinks you come here spyin' around t' see +what we're up to on this here butte. Now, you can't pull nothin' +like that! You can't get away with it. + +"Hank, he wants t' bump yuh off an' say nothin' to anybody. Now, +I come t' have it out with yuh. If you're a Federal officer +we're goin' t' settle with yuh an' take no chances. Mart, he's +more easy-goin' in some ways, on account of havin' his crazy ol' +mother on 'is hands t' take care of. Mart don't want no +killin'--on account of his mother goin' loony when 'is dad got +killed. But Mart ain't here. Pap an' Hank, they been at me all +mornin' t' let 'em bump yuh off. + +"But Pap an' Hank, they're drunk, see? I'm the only sober man +left on the job. So I come up here t' settle with yuh myself. +Takes a sober man with a level head t' settle these things. Now, +if you come up here spyin' an' snoopin', you git bumped off an' +no argument about it. Mart's got his mother t' take care of--an' +we aim t' pertect Mart. If you're a Federal officer, I want t' +know it here an' now. If yuh ain't, I want yuh t' sample some uh +the out-kickin'est 'White Mule' yuh ever swallered. Now which +are yuh, and what yuh goin' t' do? I want my answer here an' +now, an' no argument an' no foolin'!" + +Casey blinked but his mouth widened in a grin. "Me, I never went +lookin' fer nothin, I wouldn't put under my vest, Joe," he +declared convincingly. So that was it! He was thinking against +time. Moonshiners as well as would-be murderers they were--and +Joe drunk and giving them away like a fool. Casey wished that he +knew where Hank and Paw were at this moment. He hoped, too, that +Joe was right --that Hank and Paw were drunk. He'd have the +three of them tied in a row before dark, in any case. The thing +to do now was to humor Joe along--leave it to Casey Ryan! + +Joe was uncorking a small, flat bottle of pale liquor. Now he +held it out to Casey. Casey took it, thinking he would pretend +to drink, would urge Joe to take a drink; it would be simple, +once he got Joe started. But Joe had a few ideas of his own +concerning the celebration. He pulled a gun unexpectedly, leaned +against the closed door to steady himself and aimed it full at +Casey. + +"In just two minutes I'm goin' t' shoot if that there bottle +ain't empty," he stated gravely, nodding his head with intense +pride in his ability to handle the situation. "If you're a +Federal officer, yuh won't dast t' drink. If yuh ain't, you'll +be almighty glad to. Anyway, it'll be settled one way or t'other. +Drink 'er down!" + +Casey blinked again, but this time he did not grin. He debated +swiftly his chance of scaring Joe with the dynamite before Joe +would shoot. But Joe had his finger crooked with drunken +solemnity upon the trigger. The time for dynamite was not now. + +"Pap an' Hank, they lap up anything an' call it good. I claim +that's got a back-action kick to it. Drink 'er down!" + +Casey drank 'er down. It was like swallowing flames. It was a +half-pint flask, and it was full when Casey, with Joe's eyes +fixed upon him, tilted it and began to drink. Under Joe's +baleful glare Casey emptied the flask before he stopped. + +Joe settled his shoulders comfortably against the doorway and +watched Casey make for the water bucket. + +"I claim that's the out-kickin'est stuff that ever was made on +Black Butte. How'd yuh like it?" + +"All right," Casey bore witness, keeping his eyes fixed on Joe +and the gun and trying his best to maintain a nonchalant manner. +"I'd call it purty fair hootch." + +"It's GOOD hootch!" Joe declared impressively, apparently quite +convinced that Casey was not a Federal officer. "Can yuh feel +the kick'to it?" + +Casey backed until he sat on the edge of the table his good right +hand supporting his left elbow outside the sling. He grinned at +Joe and while he still keenly realized that he was playing a part +for the sole purpose of gaining somehow an advantage over Joe, he +was conscious of a slight giddiness. An unprejudiced observer +would have noticed that his grin was not quite the old, Casey +Ryan grin. It was a shade foolish. + +"Bet your life I can feel the kick!" he agreed, nodding his head. +"You can ask anybody." Then Casey discovered something strange +in Joe's appearance. He lifted his head, held it very still and +regarded Joe attentively. + +"Say, Joe, what yuh tryin' to do with that six-gun? Tryin' to +write your name in the air with it?" + +Joe looked inquiringly down at the gun, eyeing it as if it were a +new and absolutely unknown object. He satisfied himself +apparently beyond all doubt that the gun was doing nothing it +should not do, and finally turned his attention to Casey sitting +on the table and grinning at him meaninglessly. + +"Ain't writin' nothin'," Joe stated solemnly. "It's yore eyes. +Gun's all right--yo'r seein' crooked. It's the hootch. +Back-action kick to it. Ain't that right?" + +"That's right," nodded Casey and he added, grinning more +foolishly, "Darn right, that's right! Back-action kick--bet your +life." + +Joe pushed the gun inside his waistband and crooked his finger at +Casey, beckoning mysteriously. "C'mon an' I'll show yuh how it's +made," he invited with heavy enthusiasm. "Yore a judge uh hootch +all right--I can see that. I'll show yuh how we do it. Best +White Mule in Nevada. Ain't that right? Ain't that the real +hootch?" + +"'S right, all right," Casey agreed earnestly. "Puttin' the hoot +in hootch--you fellers. You can ask anybody if that ain't +right." + +Joe laughed hoarsely. "Puttin' the hoot in hootch--that's right. +I knowed you was all right. Didn't I say you was? I told Hank +an' Pap you wasn't no Federal officer. They know it, too. I was +foolin' back there. I knowed you didn't need no gun pulled on +yuh t' make yuh put away the hootch. Lapped it up like a thirsty +hound. I knowed yuh would--I was kiddin' yuh, runnin' that razoo +with the gun. Ain't that right?" + +"Darn right, that's right! I knew you was foolin' all along. You +knew Casey Ryan's all right--sure, you knowed it!" Casey laid +his good hand investigatively against his stomach. "Pretty hot +hootch--you can ask anybody if it ain't! Workin' like an air +drill a'ready." + +He blinked inquisitively at Joe, who stared back inquiringly. +"Who's your friend?" Casey demanded pugnaciously. "He sneaked +in on yuh. I never seen 'im come in." + +Joe turned slowly and looked behind him at the blank boards of +the unpainted door. Just as slowly he turned back to Casey. A +slow grin split his leathery face. + +"Ain't nobody. It's the hootch. Told yuh, didn't I? Gittin' the +best of yuh, ain't it? C'mon--I'll show yuh how it's made." + +"Take a barr'l t' git the besta--Casey Ry'n," Casey boasted, his +words blurring noticeably. "Where's y'r White Mule? Let 'er +kick--Casey Ry'n can lead 'er an' tame 'er--an' make'r eat outa +'s hand!" Following Joe, Casey stepped high over a rock no +bigger than his fist. + +With a lurch he straightened and tried to pull his muddled wits +out of the fog that was fast enveloping them. Dimly he sensed +the importance of this discovery which Joe had forced upon him. +In flashes of normalcy he knew that he must see all he could of +their moonshine operations. He must let them think he was drunk +until he knew all their secrets. He assured himself vaguely that +he must, above all things, keep his head. + +But it was all pretty hazy and rapidly growing hazier. Casey +Ryan, you must know, was not what is informally termed a drinking +man. In his youth he might have been able to handle a sudden +half-pint of moonshine whisky and keep as level a head as he now +strove valiantly to retain. But Casey's later years had been +more temperate than most desert men would believe. Unfortunately +virtue is not always it own reward; at least Casey now found +himself the worse for past abstinences. + +Joe led him into the tunnel, laughing sardonically because Casey +found it scarcely wide enough for his oscillating progress. They +turned into a drift. Casey did not know which drift it was, +though he tried foggily to remember. He was still, you must +know, trying to keep a level head and gain valuable information +for the sheriff who he hoped would return to the butte with +Barney. + +Paw and Hank were wrangling somewhere ahead. Casey could hear +their raised voices mingled in a confused rumbling in the pent +walls of the drift. Casey thought they passed through a doorway, +and that Joe closed a heavy door behind them, but he was not +sure. + +Memory of the old woman intoning her horrible anathema surged +back upon Casey with the closing of the door. The voices of Hank +and Paw he now mistook for the ravings of the woman in the stone +hut. Casey balked there, and would not go on. He did not want to +face the old woman again, and he said so repeatedly--or believed +that he did. + +Joe caught him by the arm and pulled him forward by main +strength. The voices of Paw and Hank came closer and clarified +into words; or did Casey and Joe walk farther and come into their +presence? + +They were all standing together somewhere, in a large, +underground chamber with a hole letting in the sunlight high up +on one side. Casey was positive there was a hole up there, +because the sun shone in his eyes and to avoid it he moved aside +and fell over a bucket or a keg or something. Hank laughed +loudly at the spectacle, and Paw swore because the fall startled +him; but it was Joe who helped Casey up. + +Casey knew that he was sitting on a barrel--or something--and +telling a funny story. He thought it must be very funny indeed, +because every one was laughing and bending double and slapping +legs while he talked. Casey realized that here at last were men +who appreciated Casey Ryan as he deserved to be appreciated. +Tears ran down his own weathered cheeks--tears of mirth. He had +never laughed so much before in all his life, he thought. Every +one, even Paw, who was normally a mean, cantankerous old cuss, +was having the time of his life. + +They attempted to show Casey certain intricacies of their still, +which made it better than other stills and put a greater kick in +the White Mule it bred. Somewhere back in the dim recesses of +Casey's mind, he felt that he ought to listen and remember what +they told him. Vaguely he knew that he must not take another +drink, no matter how insistent they were. In the brief glow of +that resolution Casey protested that he could hoot without any +more hootch. But he hated to hurt Paw's feelings, or Hank's or +Joe's. They had made the hootch with a new and different twist, +and they were honestly anxious for his judgment and approval. He +decided that perhaps he really ought to take a little more just +to please them; not much--a couple of drinks maybe. Wherefore, +he graciously consented to taste the "run" of the day before. +Thereafter Casey Ryan hooted to the satisfaction of everybody, +himself most of all. + +After an indeterminate interval the four left the still, taking a +bottle with them so that it might be had without delay, should +they meet a snake or a hydrophobia skunk or some other venomous +reptile. It was Casey who made the suggestion, and he became +involved in difficulties when he attempted the word venomous. +Once started Casey was determined to pronounce the word and +pronounce it correctly, because Casey Ryan never backed up when +he once started. The result was a peculiar humming which +accompanied his reeling progress down the drift (now so narrow +that Casey scraped both shoulders frequently) to the portal. + +They stopped on the flat of the dump and argued over the +advisability of taking a drink apiece before going farther, as a +sort of preventive. Joe told them solemnly that they couldn't +afford to get drunk on the darn' stuff. It had too hard a +back-action kick, he explained, and they might forget themselves +if they took too much. It was important, Joe explained at great +length, that they should not forget themselves. The boss had +always impressed upon them the grim necessity of remaining sober +whatever happened. + +"We never HAVE got drunk," Joe reiterated, "and we can't afford +t' git drunk now. We've got t' keep level heads, snakes or no +snakes." + +Casey Ryan's head was level. He wabbled up to Joe and told him +so to his face, repeating the statement many times and in many +forms. He declaimed it all the way up the path to the dugout, +and when they were standing outside. Beyond all else, Casey was +anxious that Joe should feel perfectly certain that he, Casey +Ryan, knew what he was doing, knew what he was saying, and that +his head was and always had been perr-rf'c'ly level-l-l. + +"Jus' t' prove-it--I c'n kill that +jack-over-there--without-no-gun!" Casey bragged bubblingly, +running his words together as if they were being poured in muddy +liquid from his mouth. "B'lieve it? Think-I-can't?" + +The three turned circumspectly and stared solemnly at a gray +burro with a crippled front leg that had limped to the dump heap +within easy throwing distance from the cabin door. Hobbling on +three legs it went nosing painfully amongst a litter of tin cans +and bent paper cartons, hunting garbage. As if conscious that it +was being talked about, the burro lifted its head and eyed the +four mournfully, its ears loosely flopping. + +"How?" questioned Paw, waggling his beard disparagingly. "Spit +'n 'is eye?" + +"Talk 'm t' death," Hank guessed with imbecile shrewdness. + +"Think-I-can't? What'll--y'bet?" + +They disputed the point with drunken insistence and mild +imprecations, Hank and Paw and Joe at various times siding +impartially for and against Casey. Casey gathered the impression +that none of them believed him. They seemed to think he didn't +know what he was talking about. They even questioned the fact +that his head was level. He felt that his honor was at stake and +that his reputation as a truthful man and a level-headed man was +threatened. + +While they wrangled, the fingers of Casey's right hand fumbled +unobserved in the sling on his left, twisting together the two +short lengths of fuse so that he might light both as one piece. +Even in his drunkenness Casey knew dynamite and how best to +handle it. Judgment might be dethroned, but the mechanical +details of his profession were grooved deep into habit and were +observed automatically and without the aid of conscious thought. + +He braced himself against the dugout wall and raised his hand to +the cigarette he had with some trouble rolled and lighted. A +spitting splutter arose, that would have claimed the attention of +the three, had they not been unanimously engaged in trying to +out-talk one another upon the subject of Casey's ability to kill +a burro seventy-five feet away without a gun. + +Casey glanced at them cunningly, drew back his right hand and +pitched something at the burro. + +"Y' watch 'im!" he barked, and the three turned around to look, +with no clear conception of what it was they were expected to +watch. + +The burro jerked its head up, then bent to sniff at the thin curl +of powder smoke rising from amongst the cans. Paw and Hank and +Joe were lifted some inches from the ground with the explosion. +They came down in a hail of gravel, tin cans and fragments of +burro. Casey, flattened against the wall in preparation for the +blast, laughed exultantly. + +Paw and Hank and Joe picked themselves up and clung together for +mutual support and comfort. They craned necks forward, goggling +incredulously at what little was left of the burro and the pile +of tin cans. + +"'Z that a bumb?" Paw cackled nervously at last, clawing gravel +out of his uncombed beard. "'Z got me all shuck up. Whar's that +'r bottle?" + +"'Z goin' t' eat a bumb--ol' fool burro!" Hank chortled weakly, +feeling tenderly certain nicks on his cheeks where gravel had +landed. "Paw, you ol' fool, you, don't hawg the hull thing +--gimme a drink!" + +"Casey's sure all right," came Joe's official O.K. of the +performance. "Casey said 'e c'd do it--'n' Casey done it!" He +turned and slapped Casey somewhat uncertainly on the back, which +toppled him against the wall again. "Good'n on us, Casey! Darn' +good joke on us--'n' on the burro!" + +Whereupon they drank to Casey solemnly, and one and all, they +proclaimed that it was a VERY good joke on the burro. A merciful +joke, certainly; as you would agree had you seen the poor brute +hungry and hobbling painfully, hunting scraps of food amongst the +litter of tin cans. + +After that, Casey wanted to sleep. He forced admissions from the +three that he, Casey Ryan, was all right and that he knew exactly +what he was doing and kept a level head. He crawled laboriously +into his bunk, shoes, hat and all; and, convinced that he had +defended his honor and preserved the Casey Ryan reputation +untarnished, he blissfully skipped the next eighteen hours. + + + +CHAPTER SIX + +Casey awoke under the vivid impression that some one was driving +a gadget into his skull with a "double-jack." The smell of bacon +scorching filled his very soul with the loathing of food. The +sight of Joe calmly filling his pipe roused Casey to the fighting +mood-- with no power to fight. He was a sick man; and to remain +alive was agony. + +The squalid disorder and the stale aroma of a drunken orgy still +pervaded the dugout and made it a nightmare hole to Casey. Hank +came tittering to the bunk and offered him a cup of coffee, muddy +from too long boiling, and Joe grinned over his pipe at the +colorful language with which Casey refused the offering. + +"Better take a brace uh hootch," Joe suggested with no more than +his normal ill nature. "I got some over at the still we made +awhile back that, ain't quite so kicky. Been agin' it in wood +an' charcoal. That tones 'er down. I'll go git yuh some after we +eat. Kinda want a brace, myself. That new hootch shore is a +kickin' fool." + +Paw accepted this remark, as high praise, and let three hot cakes +burn until their edges curled while he bragged of his skill as a +maker of moonshine. Paw himself was red-eyed and loose-lipped +from yesterday's debauch. Hank's whole face, especially in the +region of his eyes, was puffed unbecomingly. Casey, squinting an +angry eye at Hank and the cup of coffee, spared a thought from +his own misery to acknowledge surprise that anything on earth +could make Hank more unpleasant to look upon. Joe had a sickly +pallor to prove the potency of the brew. + +For such is the way of moonshine when fusel oil abounds, as it +does invariably in new whisky distilled by furtive amateurs +working in secret and with neither the facilities nor the +knowledge for its scientific manufacture. There is grim +significance in the sardonic humor of the man who first named it +White Mule. The kick is certain and terrific; frequently it is +fatal as well. The worst of it is, you never know what the +effect will be until you have drunk the stuff; and after you have +drunk it, you are in no condition to resist the effect or to +refrain from courting further disaster. + +That is what happened to Casey. The poison in the first +half-pint, swallowed under the eye of Joe's six-shooter, upset +his judgment. The poison in his further potations made a wholly +different man of Casey Ryan; and the after effect was so terrific +that he would have swallowed cyanide if it promised relief. + +He gritted his teeth and suffered tortures until Joe returned and +gave him a drink of whisky in a chipped granite cup. Almost +immediately he felt better. The pounding agony in his head eased +perceptibly and his nerves ceased to quiver. After a while he +sat up, gazed longingly at the water bucket and crawled down from +the bunk. He drank largely in great gulps. His bloodshot eyes +strayed meditatively to the coffee pot. After an undecided +moment he walked uncertainly to the stove and poured himself a +cup of coffee. + +Casey lifted the cup to drink, but the smell of it under his nose +sickened him. He weaved uncertainly to the door, opened it and +threw out the coffee--cup and all. Which was nature flying a +storm flag, had any one with a clear head been there to observe +the action and the look on Casey's face. + +"Gimme another shot uh that damn' hootch," he growled. Joe +pushed the bottle toward Casey, eyeing him curiously. + +"That stuff they run yesterday shore is kicky," Joe ruminated +sympathetically. "Pap's proud as pups over it. He thinks it's +the real article--but I dunno. Shore laid yuh out, Casey, an' +yuh never got much, neither. Not enough t' lay yuh out the way +it did. Y' look sick." + +"I AM sick!" Casey snarled, and poured himself a drink more +generous than was wise. "When Casey Ryan says he's sick, you can +put it down he's SICK! He don't want nobody tellin' 'im whether +'e's sick 'r not. --he KNOWS 'e's sick!" He drank, and swore +that it was rotten stuff not fit for a hawg (which was absolute +truth). Then he staggered to the stove, picked up the coffee +pot, carried it to the door and flung it savagely outside because +the odor offended him. + +"Mart got back last night," Joe announced casually. "You was dead +t' the world. But we told 'im you was all right, an' I guess he +aims t' give yuh steady work an' a cut-in on the deal. We been +cleanin' up purty good money--but Mart says the market ain't what +it was; too many gone into the business. You're a good cook an' +a good miner an' a purty good feller all around--only the boss +says you'll have t' cut out the booze." + +"'J you tell 'im you MADE me drink it?" Casey halted in the +middle of the floor, facing Joe indignantly. + +"I told 'im I put it up t' yuh straight--what your business is, +an' all. You got no call t' kick--didn't I go swipe this bottle +uh booze for yuh t' sober up on, soon as the boss's back was +turned? I knowed yuh needed it; that's why. We all needed it. +I'm just tellin' yuh the boss don't approve of no celebrations +like we had yest'day. I got up early an' hauled that burro outa +sight 'fore he seen it. That's how much a friend I be, an' it +wouldn't hurt yuh none to show a little gratitude!" + +"Gratitude, hell! A lot I got in life t' be grateful for!" +Casey slumped down on the nearest bench, laid his injured hand +carefully on the table and leaned his aching head on the other +while he discoursed bitterly on the subject of his wrongs. + +His muddled memory fumbled back to his grievance against traffic +cops, distorting and magnifying the injustice he had received at +their hands. He had once had a home, a wife and a fortune, he +declared, and what had happened? Laws and cops had driven him +out, had robbed him of his home and his family and sent him out +in the hills like a damned kiotey, hopin' he'd starve to death. +And where, he asked defiantly, was the gratitude in that? + +He told Joe ramblingly but more or less truthfully how he had +been betrayed and deserted by a man he had befriended; one Barney +Oakes, upon whom Casey would like to lay his hands for a minute. + +"What I done to the burro ain't nothin' t' what I'd do t' that +hound uh hell!" he declared, pounding the table with his good +fist. + +Homeless, friendless; but Joe was his friend, and Paw and Hank +were his friends--and besides them there was in all the world not +one friend of Casey Ryan's. They were good friends and good +fellows, even if they did put too much hoot in their hootch. +Casey Ryan liked his hootch with a hoot in it. + +He was still hooting (somewhat incoherently it is true, with +recourse now and then to the bottle because he was sick and he +didn't give a darn who knew it) when the door opened and he whom +they called Mart walked in. Joe introduced him to Casey, who sat +still upon the bench and looked him over with drunken +disparagement. Casey had a hazy recollection of wanting to see +the boss and have it out with him, but he could not recall what +it was that he had been so anxious to quarrel about. + +Mart was a slender man of middle height, with thin, intelligent +face and a look across the eyes like the old woman who rocked in +the stone hut. He glanced from the bottle to Casey, eyeing him +sharply. Drunk or sober, Casey was not the man to be stared +down; nevertheless his fingers strayed involuntarily to his shirt +collar and pulled fussily at the wrinkles. + +"So you're the man they've been holding here for my inspection," +Mart said coolly, with a faint smile at Casey's evident +discomfort. "You're still hitting it up, I see. Joe, take that +bottle away from him. When he's sober enough to talk straight, +I'll give him the third degree and see what he really is, anyway. +Guess he's all right--but he sure can lap up the booze. That's a +point against him." + +Casey's hand went to the bottle, beating Joe's by three inches. +He did not particularly want the whisky, but it angered him to +hear Mart order it taken from him. Away back in his mind where +reason had gone into hiding, Casey knew that some great injustice +was being done him; that he, Casey Ryan, was not the man they +were calmly taking it for granted that he was. + +With the bottle in his hand he rose and walked unsteadily to his +bunk. He did not like this man they called the boss. He +remembered that in his bunk, under the bedding, he had concealed +something that would make him the equal of them all. He fumbled +under the blankets, found what he sought and with his back turned +to the others he slipped the thing into his sling out of sight. + +Mart and Joe were talking together by the table, paying no +attention to Casey, who was groggily making up his mind to crawl +into his bunk and take another sleep. He still meant to have it +out with Mart, but he did not feel like tackling the job just +now. + +Mart turned to the door and Joe got up to follow him, with a +careless glance over his shoulder at Casey, who was lifting a +foot as if it weighed a great deal, and was groping with it in +the air trying to locate the edge of the lower bunk. Joe +laughed, but the laugh died in his throat, choked off suddenly by +what he saw when Mart pulled open the door. + +Casey turned suspiciously at the laugh and the sound of the door +opening. He swung round and steadied himself with his back +against the bunk when he saw Mart and Joe lift their hands and +hold them there, palms outward, a bit higher than their heads. +Something in the sight enraged Casey unreasoningly. A flick of +the memory may have carried him back to the old days in the +mining camps when Casey drove stage and hold-ups were frequent. + +"What 'r yuh tryin' to pull on me now?" he bawled, and rushed +headlong toward them, pushing them forcibly out into the open +with a collision of his body against Joe. Outside, a voice +harshly commanded him to throw up his hands--and it was then that +Casey Ryan's Irish fighting blood boiled and bubbled over. +Unconsciously he pushed his hat forward over one eye, drew back +his lips in a fighting grin, stepped down off the low doorsill +with a lurch that nearly sent him sprawling and went weaving +belligerently toward a group of five men whose attitude was +anything but conciliatory. + +"Casey Ryan! I'm dogged if it ain't Casey!" exclaimed a familiar +voice in the group, whereat the others looked astonished. Through +his slits of swollen lids Casey glared toward the voice and +recognized Barney Oakes, grinning at him with what Casey +considered a Judas treachery. He saw two men step away from Joe +and the boss, leaving them in handcuffs. + +"Take them irons off'n my friends!" bellowed Casey as he charged. +"Whadda yuh think you're doin', anyway? Take 'em off! It's +Casey Ryan that's tellin' yuh, an' yuh better heed what he says, +before you're tore from limb to limb!" + +"B-but, Casey! This 'ere's a shurf's possy!" The voice of +Barney rose in a protesting 'squawk. "I brung 'em all the way +over here to your rescue! They brung a cor'ner to view your +remains! Don't you know your pardner, BARNEY OAKES? + +"Ah-h--I know yuh think I don't? I know yuh to a fare-yuh-well! +Brung a cor'ner, did yuh? Tha's all right--goin' t' need a +cor'ner-but he won't set on Casey Ryan's remains--you c'n ask +anybody if any cor'ners ever set on Casey Ryan yit! Naw." Casey +snarled as contemptuously as was possible to a man in his +condition. "No cor'ner ever set on Casey Ryan, an' he ain't goin' +to!" + +The men glanced questioningly at one another. One laughed. He +was a large, smooth-jowled man inclined to portliness, and his +laugh vibrated his entire front contagiously so that the others +grinned and took it for granted that Casey Ryan was a comedy +element introduced unexpectedly where they had thought to find +him a tragedy. + +"No, you're a pretty lively man for me to sit on; I admit it," +the portly man remarked. "I'm the coroner, and it looks as if I +wouldn't sit, this trip." + +Casey eyed him blearily, not in the least mollified but instead +swinging to a certain degree of lucidity that was nevertheless +governed largely by the hoot he had swallowed in the hootch. + +"There's part of a burro 'round here some'er's you c'n set on," +Casey informed him grimly, and fumbled in his coat pocket for his +pipe. He drew it out empty, looked at it and returned it to his +pocket. One who knew Casey intimately would have detected a +hidden purpose in his manner. The warning was faint, indefinable +at best, and difficult to picture in words. One might say that +an intimate acquaintance would have detected a false note in +Casey's defiance. His manner was restrained just when violence +would have been more natural. + +"Damn a pipe," Casey grumbled with drunken petulance. "Anybody +got a cigarette? I'm single-handed an' I ain't able t' roll +'em." + +It was the coroner himself who handed Casey a "tailor-made." +Casey nodded glumly, accepted a match and lighted the cigarette +almost as if he were sober. He looked the group over +noncommittally, eyed again the handcuffs on Mart and Joe, sent a +veiled glance toward Barney Oakes and turned away. He still held +the center of the stage. Fully expecting to find him dead, the +sheriff and his men were slow to adjust themselves to the fact +that he was very much alive and very drunk and apparently not +greatly interested in his rescue. + +Casey halted in his unsteady progress toward the dugout. The +sheriff was already questioning his two prisoners about other +members of the gang; but he looked up when Casey lifted up his +voice and spoke his mind of the moment. + +"Brung a cor'ner, did yuh, lookin' for some one to set on! +Barney Oakes is the man that'll need a cor'ner in a minute. +You're all goin' to need 'im. Casey Ryan never stood around yit +whilst his friends was hobbled up by a shurf--turn 'em loose an' +turn 'em loose quick! An' git back away from Barney Oakes so he +won't drop on yuh in chunks--I'll fix 'im for yuh to set on!" + +His hand had gone up to his cigarette, but only Joe knew what was +likely to follow. Joe gave a yell of warning, ducked and ran +straight away from the group. The sheriff yelled also and gave +chase. The group was broken--luckily--just as Casey heaved +something in that direction. + +"I blowed up a jackass yesterday when they thought I couldn't +--I'll blow up a bunch of 'em to-day! Yuh c'n set on what's left +uh Barney Oakes!" + +The explosion scattered dirt and small stones--and the sheriff's +posse. Casey sent one malevolent glance over his shoulder as he +stumbled into the dugout. + +"Missed 'im!" he grumbled disgustedly to himself when he saw no +fragments of Barney falling. His ferociousness, like the +dynamite, annihilated itself with the explosion. "Missed 'im! +Casey Ryan's gittin' old; old an' sick an' a damn' fool. Missed +'im with the last shot--drunk--drunk an' don't give a darn!" + +He slammed the door shut behind him, pushed his hat forward so +violently that it rested on the bridge of his nose, and wabbled +over to his bunk. This time his foot found the edge of the lower +bunk, and he scratched and clawed his way up and rolled in upon +the blankets. + +He was asleep and snoring when the sheriff, edging his way in as +if he were an animal trainer's apprentice entering the lion's +cage, sneaked on his toes to the bunk and slipped the handcuffs +on Casey. + + + +CHAPTER SEVEN + +Casey awoke almost sober and considerably surprised when he +discovered the handcuffs. His injured hand was throbbing from +the poison in his system and the steel band on his swollen wrist. +His head still ached frightfully and his tongue felt thick and +dry as flannel in his mouth. + +He rolled over and sat up, staring uncomprehendingly at the cabin +full of men. The sight of Barney Oakes recalled in a measure his +performance with the dynamite; at least, he felt a keen +disappointment that Barney was alive and whole and grinning. +Casey could not see what there was to grin about, and he took it +as a direct insult to himself. + +Mart and Joe sat sullenly on a bench against the wall, and Paw +reclined in his bunk at the farther end of the room. A +blood-stained bandage wrapped Paw's head turbanwise, and his +little, deep-set eyes gleamed wickedly in his pallid face. Casey +looked for Hank, but he was not there. + +A strange man was cooking supper, and Casey wanted to tell him +that he was slicing the bacon twice as thick as it should be. +The corpulent man, whom he dimly remembered as a coroner, was +talking with a big, burly individual whom Casey guessed was the +sheriff. A man came in and announced to the big man that the car +was fixed and they could go any time. Mart, who had been staring +morosely down at his shackled wrists, lifted his head and spoke +to the sheriff. + +"You'll have to do something about my mother," he said, and bit +his lip at the manner in which every head swung his way. + +"What about your mother?" the sheriff asked moving toward him. +"Is she here?" His eyes sent a quick glance around the room +which obviously had four outside walls. + +Mart swallowed. "She has a cabin to herself," he explained +constrainedly. "She--she isn't quite right. Strangers excite +her. She--hasn't been well since my father was killed in the +mine; she's quiet enough with us--she knows us. I don't know how +she'll be now. I'm afraid--but she can't be left here alone; all +I ask is, be as gentle as you can." + +The sheriff looked from him to Joe. Joe nodded confirmation. +"Plumb harmless," he said gruffly. "It IS kinda--pitiful. +Thinks everybody in the world is damned and going to hell on a +long lope." He gave a snort that resembled neither mirth nor +disgust. "Mebbe she's right at that," he added grimly. + +The sheriff asked more questions, and Mart stood up. "I'll show +you where she is, sure. But can't you leave her be till we're +ready to start? She--it ain't right to bring her here." + +"She'll want her supper," the sheriff reminded Mart. "We'll be +driving all night. Is she sick abed?" + +Casey lay down again and turned his face to the wall. He +remembered the old woman now, and he hoped sincerely they would +not bring her into the cabin. But whatever they did, Casey +wanted no part in it whatever. He wanted to be left alone, and +he wanted to think. More than all else he wanted not to see again +the old woman who chanted horrible things while she rocked and +rocked. + +He was roused from uneasy slumber by two officious souls, one of +whom was Barney Oakes. Their intentions were kindly enough, they +only wanted to give him his supper. But Casey wanted neither +supper nor kindly intentions, and he was still unregenerately +regretful that Barney Oakes was not lying out on the garbage heap +in a more or less fragmentary condition. They raised him to a +sitting posture, and Casey swung his legs over the edge of the +bunk and delivered a ferocious kick at Barney Oakes. + +He caught Barney under the chin, and Barney went down for several +counts. After that Casey wore hobbles on his feet, and was +secretly rather proud of the fact that they considered him so +dangerous as all that. Had his mood not been a sulky one which +refused to have speech with any one there, they would probably +have found it wise to gag him as well. + +That is one night in Casey's turbulent life which he never +recalled if he could help it. Two cars had brought the sheriff's +party, and one was a seven-passenger. In the roomy rear seat of +this car, Casey, shackled and savage, was made to ride with Mart +and his mother. Two deputies occupied the folding seats and never +relaxed their watchfulness. + +Casey's head still ached splittingly, and the jolting of the car +did not serve to ease the, pain. The old woman sat in the +middle, with a blanket wound round and round her to hold her +quiet; which it failed to do. Into Casey's ear rolled the full +volume of her rich contralto voice as she monotonously intoned +the doom of all mankind--together with every cat, every rat, etc. +Mart's fear had proved well-founded. Strangers had excited the +woman and it was not until sheer exhaustion silenced her that she +ceased for one moment her horrible chant. + +I read the story in the morning paper, and made a flying trip to +San Bernardino. Casey was in jail, naturally; but he didn't care +much about that so long as he owned a head with an air-drill +going inside. At least, that is what he told me when I was let +in to see him. I was working to get him out of there on bail if +possible before I sent word to the Little Woman, hoping she had +not read the papers. I had some trouble piecing the facts +together and trying to get the straight of things before I sent +word to the Little Woman. I went out and got him some medicine +guaranteed, by the doctor who wrote the prescription, to take the +hoot out of the hootch Casey had swallowed. That afternoon Casey +left off glaring at me, sat up, accepted a cigarette and +consented to talk. + +"--an' all I got to say is, Barney Oakes is a liar an' the father +uh liars. I never was in cahoots with him at no time. When he +says I got 'im to foller a Joshuay palm jest to git 'im out in +the hills an' kill 'im off, he lies. Let 'im come an' tell me +that there story!" + +Casey was still slightly abnormal, I noticed, so I calmed him as +best I could and left him alone for a time. There was some +hesitancy about the bail, too, which I wished to overcome. +Throwing that half-stick of dynamite might be construed as an +attempt at wholesale murder. I did not want the county officials +to think too long and harshly about the matter. + +I explained later to Casey that Barney Oakes had reported his +disappearance to the officials in Barstow. The sheriff's office +had long suspected a nest of moonshiners somewhere near Black +Butte, and it was rumored that one Mart Hanson, who owned a mine +up there, was banking more money than was reasonable, these hard +times, for a miner, who ships no ore. Casey's disappearance had +crystallized the suspicions into an immediate investigation. And +Barney's assertion that Casey had been murdered took the coroner +along with the posse. + +It had all been straight and fairly simple until they reached the +mine and discovered Casey uproariously one of the gang. Throwing +loaded dynamite at sheriffs is frowned upon nowadays in the best +official circles, I told Casey; he would have to explain that in +court, I was afraid. + +Then Barney, after Casey had kicked him in the chin, had reversed +his first report of the trouble and was now declaiming to all who +would listen that he had been decoyed to Black Butte by Casey +Ryan and there ambushed and nearly killed. Casey, as Barney now +interpreted the incident, had joined his confederates under the +very thin pretense of climbing the butte to come at them from +behind. Barney now remembered that he had been shot at from three +different angles, and that the burros had been killed by pistol +shots fired at close range--presumably by Casey Ryan. + +It was like taming tigers to make Casey sit still and listen to +all this, but I had to do it so that he would know what to +disprove. Afterwards I had a talk with Joe and Paw, separately, +and so got at the whole truth. They bore no malice toward Casey +and were perfectly willing to see him out of the scrape. They +were a sobered pair; Hank, like a fool, had fired at the posse +and was killed. + +The next day came the Little Woman to the rescue. I told her the +whole story, not even omitting the burro, before she went to the +jail to see Casey. It was a pretty mess--take it all around--and +I was secretly somewhat doubtful of the outcome. + +The Little Woman is game as women are made. She went with me to +the jail, and she met Casey with a whimsical smile. We found him +sitting on the side of his bunk with his legs stretched out and +his feet crossed, his good hand thrust in his trousers pocket and +a cigarette in one corner of his mouth, which turned sourly +downward. He cocked an eye up at us and rose, as the Little Woman +had maybe taught him was proper. But he did not say a word until +the Little Woman walked up and kissed him on both cheeks, turning +his face this way and that with her hand under his chin. + +Casey grinned sheepishly then and hugged her with his good arm. I +wish you could have seen the look in his eyes when they dwelt on +the Little Woman! + +"Casey Ryan, you need a shave. And your shirt collar is a +disgrace to a Piute," she drawled reprovingly. + +Casey looked at me over her shoulder and grinned. He hadn't a +word to say for himself, which was unusual in Casey Ryan. + +"It's lucky for you, Casey Ryan, that I remembered to go down to +the police station and get the proof that you were pinched twice +on Broadway just five days before Barney Oakes says he found you +stalled in the trail north of Barstow; and that you had been +pinched pretty regularly every whip-stitch for the last six +months, and were a familiar and unwelcome figure in downtown +traffic and elsewhere. + +"The sheriff who raided Black Butte admitted to me that it is +utterly impossible for the world to hold more than one Casey Ryan +at a time; and that he, for one, is willing to accept the word of +the city police that you were there raising the record for +traffic trouble and not moonshining at Black Butte. He doesn't +approve of throwing dynamite at people, but--well, I talked with +the prosecuting attorney, too, and they both seem to be mighty +nice men and reasonable. I'm afraid Barney Oakes will see his +beautiful story all spoiled." + +"He'll forget it when he feels the ruin to his face I'm goin' t' +create for him if I ever meet up with 'im again," Casey commented +grimly. + +"Babe sent you a pincushion she made in school. I think she made +beautiful, neat stitches in that C," went on the Little Woman in +a placid, gossipy tone invented especially for domestic +conversation. "And--oh, yes! There's a new laundryman on our +route, and he PERSISTS in running across the lawn and dumping the +laundry in the front hall, though I've told him and TOLD him to +deliver it at the back. And there's a new tenant in Number Six, +and they hadn't been in more than three days before he came home +drunk and kept everybody in the house awake, bellowing up and +down the hall and abusing his wife and all. I told him held have +to go when his month is up, but he says he'll be damned if he +will. He says he won't and I can't make him." + +"He won't, hey?" A familiar, pale glitter came into Casey's +eyes. "You watch and see whether he goes or not! He better tell +Casey Ryan he won't go! Who'd, they think's runnin' the place? +Lemme ketch that laundry driver oncet, runnin' across our lawn; +I'll run 'im across it--on his nose! They take advantage of you +quick as my back's turned. I'll learn 'em they got Casey Ryan to +reckon with!" + +The Little Woman gave me a smiling glance over Casey's shoulder, +and lowered a cautious eyelid. I left them then and went away to +have a satisfying talk with the sheriff and the prosecuting +attorney. + + + +CHAPTER EIGHT + +In the desert, where roads are fewer and worse than they should +be, a man may travel wherever he can negotiate the rocks and +sand, and none may say him nay. If any man objects, the traveler +is by custom privileged to whip the objector if he is big enough, +and afterwards go on his way with the full approval of public +opinion. He may blaze a trail of his own, return that way a year +later and find his trail an established thoroughfare. + +In the desert Casey gave trail to none nor asked reprisals if he +suffered most in a sudden meeting. In Los Angeles Casey was +halted and rebuked on every corner, so he complained; hampered +and annoyed by rules and regulations which desert dwellers never +dreamed of. + +Since he kept the optimistic viewpoint of a child, experience +seemed to teach him little. Like the boy he was at heart, he was +perfectly willing to make good resolutions--all of which were +more or less theoretical and left to a kindly Providence to keep +intact for him. + +So here he was, after we had pried him loose from his last +predicament, perfectly optimistic under his fresh haircut, and +thinking the traffic cops would not remember him. Thinking, +too--as he confided to the Little Woman--that Los Angeles looked +pretty good, after all. He was resolved to lead henceforth a +blameless life. It was time he settled down, Casey declared +virtuously. His last trip into the desert was all wrong, and he +wanted you to ask anybody if Casey Ryan wasn't ready at any and +all times to admit his mistakes, if he ever happened to make any. +He was starting in fresh now, with a new deal all around from a +new deck. He had got up and walked around his chair, he told us, +and had thrown the ash of a left-handed cigarette over his right +shoulder; he'd show the world that Casey Ryan could and would +keep out of gunshot of trouble. + +He was rehearsing all this and feeling very self-righteous while +he drove down West Washington Street. True, he was doing +twenty-five where he shouldn't, but so far no officer had yelled +at him and he hadn't so much as barked a fender. Down across +Grand Avenue he larruped, never noticing the terrific bounce when +he crossed the water drains there (being still fresh from desert +roads). He was still doing twenty-five when he turned into Hill +Street. + +Busy with his good resolutions and the blameless life he was +about to lead, Casey forgot to signal the left-hand turn. In the +desert you don't signal, because the nearest car is probably +forty or fifty miles behind you and collisions are not imminent. +West- Washington-and-Hill-Street crossing is not desert, however. +A car was coming behind Casey much closer than fifty miles; one +of those scuttling Ford delivery trucks. It locked fenders with +Casey when he swung to the left. The two cars skidded as one +toward the right-hand curb; caught amidships a bright yellow, +torpedo-tailed runabout coming up from Main Street, and turned it +neatly on its back, its four wheels spinning helplessly in the +quiet, sunny morning. Casey himself was catapulted over the +runabout, landing abruptly in a sitting position on the corner of +the vacant lot beyond, his self-righteousness considerably +jarred. + +A new traffic officer had been detailed to watch that +intersection and teach a driving world that it must not cut +corners. A bright, new traffic button had been placed in the +geographical center of the crossing; and woe be unto the +right-hand pocket of any man who failed to drive circumspectly +around it. New traffic officers are apt to be keenly +conscientious in their work. At twenty-five dollars per cut, +sixteen unhappy drivers had been taught where the new button was +located and had been informed that twelve miles per hour at that +crossing would be tolerated, and that more would be expensive. + +Not all drivers take their teaching meekly, and the new traffic +officer near the end of his shift had pessimistically decided +that the driving world is composed mostly of blamed idiots and +hardened criminals. + +He gritted his teeth ominously when Casey Ryan came down upon the +crossing at double the legal speed. He held his breath for an +instant during the crash that resounded for blocks. When the +dust had settled, he ran over and yanked off the dented sand of +the vacant lot a dazed and hardened malefactor who had committed +three traffic crimes in three seconds: he had exceeded the speed +limit outrageously, cut fifteen feet inside the red button, and +failed to signal the turn. + +"You damned, drunken boob!" shouted the new traffic cop and shook +Casey Ryan (not knowing him). + +Shaking Casey will never be safe until he is in his coffin with a +lily in his hand. He was considerably jolted, but he managed a +fourth crime in the next five minutes. He licked the traffic cop +rather thoroughly--I suppose because his onslaught was wholly +unexpected--kicked an expostulating minister in the pit of the +stomach, and was profanely volunteering to lick the whole darned +town when he was finally overwhelmed by numbers and captured +alive; which speaks well for the L. A. P. + +Wherefore Casey Ryan continued his ride down town in a dark car +that wears a clamoring bell the size of a breakfast plate under +the driver's foot, and a dark red L. A. Police Patrol sign +painted on the sides. Two uniformed, stern-lipped cops rode with +him and didn't seem to care if Casey's nose WAS bleeding all over +his vest. A uniformed cop stood on the steps behind, and another +rode beside the driver and kept his eye peeled over his shoulder, +thinking he would be justified in shooting if anything started +inside. Boys on bicycles pedaled furiously to keep up, and many +an automobile barely escaped the curb because the driver was +goggling at the mussed-up prisoner in the "Black Maria." + +The Little Woman telegraphed me at San Francisco that night. The +wire was brief but disquieting. It merely said, "CASEY IN JAIL +SERIOUS NEED HELP." But I caught the Lark an hour later and +thanked God it was running on time. + +The Little Woman and I spent two frantic days getting Casey out +of jail. The traffic cop's defeat had been rather public; and +just as soon as he could stand up straight in the pulpit, the +minister meant to preach a series of sermons against the laxity +of a police force that permits such outrages to occur in broad +daylight. More than that, the thing was in the papers, and +people were reading and giggling on the street cars and in +restaurants. Wherefore, the L. A. P. was on its tin ear. + +Even so, much may be accomplished for a man so wholesomely human +as Casey Ryan. On the third day the charge against him was +changed from something worse to "Reckless driving and disturbing +the peace." Casey was persuaded to plead guilty to that charge, +which was harder to accomplish than mollifying the L. A. P. + +He paid two fifty-dollar fines and was forbidden to drive a car +"in the County of Los Angeles, State of California, during the +next succeeding period of two years." He was further advised +(unofficially but nevertheless with complete sincerity) to pay +all damages to the two cars he had wrecked and to ask the +minister's doctor what was his fee; a new uniform for the traffic +cop was also suggested, since Casey had thrust his foot violently +into the cop's pocket which was not tailored to resist the +strain. The judge also observed, in the course of the +conversation, that desert air was peculiarly invigorating and +that Casey should not jeopardize his health and well-being by +filling his lungs with city smoke. + +I couldn't blame Casey much for the mood he was in after a +setback like that to his good resolutions. I was inclined to +believe with Casey that Providence had lain down on the job. + + + +CHAPTER NINE + +At the corner of the Plaza where traffic is heaviest, a dingy +Ford loaded with camp outfit stalled on the street-car track just +as the traffic officer spread-eagled his arms and turned with +majestic deliberation to let the East-and-West traffic through. +The motorman slid open his window and shouted insults at the +driver, and the traffic cop left his little platform and strode +heavily toward the Ford, pulling his book out of his pocket with +the mechanical motion born of the grief of many drivers. + +Casey Ryan, clinging to the front step of the street car on his +way to the apartment house he once more called home, swung off +and beat the traffic officer to the Ford. He stooped and gave a +heave on the crank, obeyed a motion of the driver's head when the +car started, and stepped upon the running board. The traffic +officer paused, waved his book warningly and said something. The +motorman drew in his head, clanged the bell, and the afternoon +traffic proceeded to untangle. + +"Get in, old-timer," invited the driver whom Casey had assisted. +Casey did not ask whether the driver was going in his direction, +but got in chuckling at the small triumph over his enemies, the +police. + +"Fords are mean cusses," he observed sympathetically. "They like +nothing better than to get a feller in bad. But they can't pull +nothin' on me. I know 'em to a fare-you-well. Notice how this +one changed 'er mind about gettin' you tagged, soon as Casey Ryan +took 'er by the nose?" + +"Are you Casey Ryan?" The driver took his eyes off the traffic +long enough to give Casey an appraising look that measured him +mentally and physically. "Say, I've heard quite a lot about you. +Bill Masters, up at Lund, has spoke of you often. He knows you, +don't he?" + +"Bill Masters sure had ought t' know me," Casey grinned. In a +big, roaring, unfriendly city, here sounded a friendly, familiar +tone; a voice straight from the desert, as it were. Casey forgot +what had happened when Barney Oakes crossed his path claiming +acquaintance with Bill Masters, of Lund. He bit off a chew of +tobacco, hunched down lower in the seat, and prepared himself for +a real conflab with the man who spoke the language of his tribe. + +He forgot that he had just bought tickets to that evening's +performance at the Orpheum, as a sort of farewell offering to his +domestic goddess before once more going into voluntary exile as +advised by the judge. Pasadena Avenue heard conversational +fragments such as, "Say! Do you know--? "Was you in Lund +when--?" + +Casey's new friend drove as fast as the law permitted. He talked +of many places and men familiar to Casey, who was in a mood that +hungered for those places and men in a spiritual revulsion +against the city and all its ways. + +Pasadena, Lamanda Park, Monrovia--it was not until the car slowed +for the Glendora speed-limit sign that Casey lifted himself off +his shoulder blades, and awoke to the fact that he was some +distance from home and that the shadows were growing rather long. + +"Say! I better get out here and 'phone to the missus," he +exclaimed suddenly. "Pull up at a drug store or some place, will +yuh? I got to talkin' an' forgot I was on my way home when I +throwed in with yuh." + +"Aw, you can 'phone any time. There is street cars running back +to town all the time I or you can catch a bus anywhere's along +here. I got pinched once for drivin' through here without a +tail-light; and twice I've had blowouts right along here. This +town's a jinx for me and I want to slip it behind me." + +Casey nodded appreciatively. "Every darn' town's a jinx for me," +he confided resentfully. "Towns an' Casey Ryan don't agree. +Towns is harder on me than sour beans." + +"Yeah--I guess L. A.'s a jinx for you all right. I heard about +your latest run-in with the cops. I wish t' heck you'd of +cleaned up a few for me. I love them saps the way I like rat +poison. I've got no use for the clowns nor for towns that +actually hands 'em good jack for dealin' misery to us guys. The +bird never lived that got a square deal from 'em. They grab yuh +and dust yuh off--" + +"They won't grab Casey Ryan no more. Why, lemme tell yuh what +they done!" + +Glendora slipped behind and was forgotten while Casey told the +story of his wrongs. In no particular, according to his version, +had he been other than law-abiding. Nobody, he declaimed +heatedly, had ever taken HIM by the scruff of the neck and shaken +him like a pup, and got away with it, and nobody ever would. +Casey was Irish and his father had been Irish, and the Ryan never +lived that took sass and said thank-yuh. + +His new friend listened with just that degree of sympathy which +encourages the unburdening of the soul. When Casey next awoke to +the fact that he was getting farther and farther away from home, +they were away past Claremont and still going to the full extent +of the speed limit. His friend had switched on the lights. + +"I GOT to telephone my wife!" Casey exclaimed uneasily. "I'll +gamble she's down to the police station right now, lookin' for +me. An' I want the cops t' kinda forgit about me. I got to +talkin' along an' plumb forgot I wasn't headed home." + +"Aw, you can 'phone from Fontana. I'll have to stop there anyway +for gas. Say, why don't yuh stall 'er off till morning? You +couldn't get home for supper now if yuh went by wireless. I guess +yuh wouldn't hate a mouthful of desert air after swallowing smoke +and insults, like yuh done in L. A. Tell her you're takin' a +ride to Barstow. You can catch a train out of there and be home +to breakfast, easy. If you ain't got the change in your clothes +for carfare," he added generously, "Why, I'll stake yuh just for +your company on the trip. Whadda yuh say?" + +Casey looked at the orange and the grapefruit and lemon orchards +that walled the Foothill Boulevard. All trees looked alike to +Casey, and these reminded him disagreeably of the fruit stalls in +Los Angeles. + +"Well, mebby I might go on to Barstow. Too late now to take the +missus to the show, anyway. I guess I can dig up the price uh +carfare from Barstow back." He chuckled with a sinful pride in +his prosperity, which was still new enough to be novel. "Yuh +don't catch Casey Ryan goin' around no more without a dime in his +hind pocket. I've felt the lack of 'em too many times when they +was needed. Casey Ryan's going to carry a jingle louder'n a lead +burro from now on. You can ask anybody." + +"You bet it's wise for a feller to go heeled," the friend of Bill +Masters responded easily. "You never know when yuh might need +it. Well, there's a Bell sign over there. You can be askin' your +wife's consent while I gas up." + +Innocent pleasure; the blameless joy of riding in a Ford toward +the desert, with a prince of a fellow for company, was not so +easily made to sound logical and a perfectly commonplace incident +over a long-distance telephone. The Little Woman seemed struck +with a sense of the unusual; her voice betrayed trepidation and +she asked questions which Casey found it difficult to answer. +That he was merely riding as far as Barstow with a desert +acquaintance and would catch the first train back, she apparently +failed to find convincing. + +"Casey Ryan, tell me the truth. If you're in a scrape again, you +know perfectly well that Jack and I will have to come and get you +out of it. San Bernardino sounds bad to me, Casey, and you're +pretty close to the place. Do you really want me to believe that +you're coming back on the next train?" + +"Sure as I'm standin' here! What makes yuh think I'm in a +scrape? Didn't I tell yuh I'm goin' to walk around trouble from +now on? When Casey tells you a thing like that, yuh got a right +to put it down for the truth. I'm going to Barstow for a breath +uh fresh air. This is a feller that knows Bill Masters. I'll be +home to breakfast. I ain't in no trouble an, I ain't goin' to be. +You can believe that or you can set there callin' Casey Ryan a +liar till I git back. G'by." + +Whatever the Little Woman thought of it, Casey really meant to do +exactly what he said he would do. And he really did not believe +that trouble was within a hundred miles of him. + + + +CHAPTER TEN + +"Wanta drive?" Casey's friend was rolling a smoke before he +cranked up. "They tell me up in Lund that no man livin' ever got +the chance to look back and see Casey Ryan swallowing dust. I've +heard of some that's tried. But I reckon," he added pensively, +while he rubbed the damp edge of the paper down carefully with a +yellowed thumb, "Fords is out of your line, now. Maybe you don't +toy with nothin' cheaper than a twin-six." + +"Well, you can ask anybody if Casey Ryan's the man to git +big-headed! Money don't spoil ME none. There ain't anybody c'n +say it does. Casey Ryan is Casey Ryan wherever an' whenever yuh +meet up with him. Yuh might mebby see me next, hazin' a burro +over a ridge. Or yuh might see me with ten pounds uh flour, a +quart uh beans an' a sour-dough bucket on my back. Whichever way +the game breaks--you'll be seein' Casey Ryan; an' you'll see 'im +settin' in the game an' ready t' push his last white chip to the +center." + +"I believe it, Casey. Darned if I don't. Well, you drive 'er +awhile; till yuh get tired, anyway." He bent to the crank, gave +a heave and climbed in, with Casey behind the wheel, looking +pleased to be there and quite ready to show the world he could +drive. + +"Say, if I drive till I'm TIRED," he retorted, "I'm liable to +soak 'er hubs in the Atlantic Ocean before I quit. And then, +mebby I'll back 'er out an' drive 'er to the end of Venice Pier +just for pastime." + +"Up in Lund they're talkin' yet about your drivin'," his new +friend flattered him. "They say there's no stops when you get +the wheel cuddled up to your chest. No quittin' an' no passin' +yuh by with a merry laugh an' a cloud of alkali dust. I guess +it's right. I've been wantin' to meet yuh." + +"That there last remark sounds like a traffic cop I had a run-in +with once!" Casey snorted--merely to hide his gratification. +"You sound good, just to listen to, but you ain't altogether +believable. There's men in Lund that'd give an ear to meet me in +a narrow trail with a hairpin turn an' me on the outside an' +drunk. + +"They'd like it to be about a four-thousand-foot drop, straight +down. Lund as a town ain't so crazy about me that they'd close up +whilst I was bein' planted, an' stop all traffic for five +minutes. A show benefit was sprung on Lund once, to help Casey +Ryan that was supposed to be crippled. An' I had to give a good +Ford--a DARN' good Ford! --to the benefitters, so is they could +git outa town ahead uh the howlin' mob. That's how I know the +way Lund loves Casey Ryan. Yuh can't kid ME, young feller." + +Meanwhile, Casey swung north into Cajon Pass; up that long, +straight, cement-paved highway to the hills he showed his new +friend how a Ford could travel when Casey Ryan juggled the wheel. +The full moon was pushing up into a cloud bank over a high peak +beyond the Pass. The few cars they met were gone with a whistle +of wind as Casey shot by. + +He raced a passenger train from the mile whistling-post to the +crossing, made the turn and crossed the track with the white +finger of the headlight bathing the Ford blindingly. He +completed that S turn and beat the train to the next crossing +half a mile farther on; where he "spiked 'er tail", as he called +it, stopping dead still and waiting jeeringly for the train to +pass. The engineer leaned far out of the cab window to bellow +his opinion of such driving; which was unfavorable to the full +extent of his vocabulary. + +"Nothin' the matter with a Ford, as I can see," Casey observed +carelessly, when he was under way again. + +"You sure are some driver," his new friend praised him, letting +go the edge of the car and easing down again into the seat. +"Give yuh a Ford and all the gas yuh can burn and I can't see +that you'd need to worry none about any of them saps that makes +it their business to interfere with travelin'. I'm glad that +moon's quit the job. Gives the headlights a show. Hit 'er up +now, fast as yuh like. After that crossin' back there I ain't +expectin' to tremble on no curves. I see you're qualified to +spin 'er on a plate if need be. And for a Ford, she sure can +travel." + +Casey therefore "let 'er out", and the Ford went like a scared +lizard up the winding highway through the Pass. At Cajon Camp he +slowed, thinking they would need to fill the radiator before +attempting to climb the steep grade to the summit. But the young +man shook his head and gave the "highball." (Which, if you don't +already know it, is the signal for full speed ahead.) + +Full speed ahead Casey gave him, and they roared on up the steep, +twisting grade to the summit of the Pass. Casey began to feel a +distinct admiration for this particular Ford. The car was +heavily loaded--he could gauge the weight by the "feel" of the +car as he drove yet it made the grade at twenty-five miles an +hour and reached the top without boiling the radiator; which is +better than many a more pretentious car could do. + +"Too bad you've made your pile already," the young man broke a +long silence. "I'd like to have a guy like you for my pardner. +The desert ain't talkative none when you're out in the middle of +it, and you know there ain't another human in a day's drive. +I've been going it alone. Nine-tenths of these birds that are +eager to throw in with yuh thinks that fifty-fifty means you do +the work and they take the jack. I'm plumb fed upon them +pardnerships. But if you didn't have your jack stored away--a +hull mountain of it, I reckon --I'd invite yuh to set into the +game with me; I sure would." + +Casey spat into the dark beside the car. "They's never a pile so +big a feller ain't willin' to make it bigger," he replied +sententiously. "Fer, as I'm concerned, Casey's never backed up +from a dollar yet. But I ain't no wild colt no more, runnin' +loose an' never a halter mark on me. I'm bein' broke to harness, +and it's stable an' corral from now on, an' no more open range +fer Casey. The missus hopes to high-school me in time. She's a +good hand--gentle but firm, as the preacher says. And I guess +it's time fer Casey Ryan to quit hellin' around the country an' +settle down an' behave himself." + +"I could put you in the way of adding some easy money to your +bank roll," the other suggested tentatively. + +But Casey shook his head. "Twenty years ago yuh needn't have +asked me twice, young feller. I'd 'a' drawed my chair right up +and stacked my chips a mile high. Any game that come along, I +played 'er down to the last chip. Twenty years ago--yes, er +ten!--Casey Ryan woulda tore that L. A. jail down rock by rock +an' give the roof t' the kids to make a playhouse. Them L. A. +cops never woulda hauled me t' jail in no wagon. I mighta loaded +'em in behind, and dropped 'em off at the first morgue an' drove +on a-whistlin'. That there woulda been Casey Ryan's gait a few +years back. Take me now, married to a good woman an' gettin' +gray--" Casey sighed, gazing wishfully back at the Casey Ryan he +had been and might never be again. + +"No, sir, I ain't so darned rich I ain't willin' to add a few +more iron men to the bunch. But on account of the missus I've +got to kinda pick my chances. I ain't had money so long but what +it feels good to remind myself I got it. I carry a thousand +dollars or so in my inside pocket, just to count over now an' +then to convince myself I needn't worry about a grubstake. I've +got to soak it into my bones gradual that I can afford to settle +down and live tame, like the missus wants. Stand-up collars +every day, an' step into a chiny bathtub every night an' +scrub--when you ain't doin' nothin' to git dirt under your finger +nails even! Funny, the way city folks act. The less they do to +git dirty, the more soap they wear out. You can ask anybody if +that ain't right. + +"Can't chew tobacco in the house, even, 'cause there's no place +yuh dast to spit. I stuck m' head out of the bedroom window +oncet, an I let fly an' it landed on a lady; an' the missus went +an' bought her a new hat an took my plug away from me. I had to +keep my chewin' tobacco in the tool-box of my car, after that, +an' sneak out to the beach now an' then an' chew where I could +spit in the ocean. That's city life for yuh!" + +"When I git to thinkin' about hittin' out into the hills +prospectin, or somethin', that roll uh dough I pack stands right +on its hind legs an' says I got no excuse. I've got enough to +keep me in bacon an' beans, anyway. An' the missus gits down in +the mouth when I so much as mention minin'." + +"A guy grows old fast when he quits the game and sets down to do +the grandpa-by-the-fire. First you know, a clown that thinks +it's time he took it easy is gummin' 'is grub, and shiverin' when +yuh open the door, an' takin' naps in the daytime same as babies. +Let a guy once preach he's gettin' old--" + +Casey jerked the gas lever and jumped the car ahead viciously. +"Well, now, any time yuh see CASEY RYAN gummin' 'is grub an' +needin' a nap after dinner--" + +"A clown GITS that way once he pulls out of the game. I've saw +it happen time an' again." The young man laughed rather +irritatingly. "Say, when I tell it to Bill Masters that Casey +Ryan has plumb played out his string an' laid down an' QUIT, by +hock, and can be seen hereafter SETTIN' WITH A SHAWL OVER HIS +SHOULDERS--" + +Casey nearly turned the Ford over at that insult. He jerked it +back into the road and sent it ahead again at a faster pace. + +"Well, now, any time yuh see CASEY RYAN settin' with a shawl over +his shoulders--" + +"Well, maybe not YOU; but the bird sure comes to it that thinks +he's too old to play the game. Why, you'll never be ready to +settle down! Take yuh twenty years from now--I'd rather bank on a +pardner like you'd be than some young clown that ain't had the +experience. From the yarns I've heard about yuh, yuh don't back +down from nothing. And you're willing to give a pardner a chance +to get away with his hide on him. I'd rather be held up by the +law than by some clown that's workin' with me." + +He paused; and when he, spoke again his tone had changed to meet +a prosaic detail of the drive. + +"Stop here in Victorville, will yuh, Casey? I'll take a look at +the radiator and maybe take on some more gas and oil. I've been +stuck on the desert a few times with an empty tank--and that +learns a guy to keep the top of his gas tank full and never mind +the bottom." + +"Good idea," said Casey shortly, his own tone relaxing its +tension of a few minutes before. "I run a garage over at Patmos +once, an' the boobs I seen creepin' in on their last spoonful uh +gas--walkin' sometimes for miles to carry gas back to where they +was stalled-- learnt Casey Ryan to fill 'er up every chancet he +gits." + +But although the subject of age had been dropped half a mile back +in the sand, certain phrases flung at him had been barbed and had +bitten deep into Casey Ryan's self-esteem. They stung and +rankled there. He had squirmed at the picture his new friend had +so ruthlessly drawn with crude words, but bold, of doddering old +age. Casey resented the implication that he might one day fill +that picture. + +He began vaguely to resent the Little Woman's air of needing to +protect him from himself. Casey Ryan, he told himself +boastfully, had never needed protection from anybody. He had +managed for a good many years to get along on his own hook. The +Little Woman was all right, but she was making a mistake--a big +mistake--if she thought she had to close-herd him to keep him out +of trouble. + +He rolled a smoke and wished that the Little Woman would settle +down with him somewhere in the desert, where he could keep a +couple of burros and go prospecting in the hills. Where +sagebrush could grow to their very door if it wanted to, and the +moon could show them long stretches of mesa land shadowed with +mystery, and then drop out of sight behind high peaks. + +He felt that he might indeed grow old fast, shut up in a city. It +occurred to him that the Little Woman was unreasonable to expect +it of him. Her idea of getting him out of town for a time, as +the judge had advised, was to send him up to San Francisco to be +close-herded there. Casey had promised to go, but now the +prospect jarred. He wasn't feeble-minded, that he knew of; it +seemed natural to want to do his own deciding now and then. When +he got back home in the morning, Casey meant to have a serious +talk with the Little Woman, and get right down to cases, and tell +her that he was built for the desert, and that you can't teach an +old dog new tricks. + +"They been tryin' to make Casey Ryan over into something he +ain't," he muttered under his breath, while his new friend was in +the garage office paying for the gas. "Jack an' the Little +Woman's all right, but they can't drive Casey Ryan in no town +herd. Cops is cops; and they got 'em in San Francisco same as +they got 'em in L. A. If they got 'em, I'll run agin' 'em. I'll +tell 'em so, too." + +The young man came out, sliding silver coins into his trousers +pocket. He glanced up and down the narrow, little street already +deserted, cranked the Ford and climbed in. + +"All set," he observed cheerfully, "Let's go!" + +Casey slipped his cigarette to the upper, left-hand corner of his +whimsical, Irish mouth, forced a roar out of the little engine +and whipped around the corner and across the track into the +faintly lighted road that led past shady groves and over a hill +or two, and so into the desert again. + +His new friend had fallen into a meditative mood, staring out +through the windshield and whistling under his breath a pleasant +little melody of which he was probably wholly unaware. Perhaps +he felt that he had said enough to Casey just at present +concerning a possible partnership. Perhaps he even regretted +having said anything at all. + +Casey himself drove mechanically, his rebellious mood slipping +gradually into optimism. You can't keep Casey Ryan down for +long; in spite of his past unpleasant experiences he was +presently weaving optimistic plans of his own. The young fellow +beside him seemed to return Casey's impulsive friendship. Casey +thought pleasureably of the possibility of their driving over the +desert together, sharing alike the fortunes of the game and the +adventures of the trail. Casey himself had learned to be shy of +partnerships--witness Barney Oakes!--but any man with a drop of +Irish in his blood and a bit of Irish twinkle in his eye would +turn his back on defeat and try again for a winning. + +They had just passed over a hilly stretch with many turns and +windings, the moon blotted out completely now by the cloud bank. +For half an hour they had not seen any evidence that other human +beings were alive in the world. But when they went rattling +across a small mesa where the sand was deep, a car with one +brilliant spotlight suddenly showed itself around a turn just +ahead of them. + +Casey slowed down automatically and gave a twist to the steering +wheel. But the sand just here was deep and loose, and the front +wheels of the Ford gouged unavailingly at the sides of the ruts. +Casey honked the horn warningly and stopped full, swearing a +good, Caseyish oath. The other car, having made no apparent +effort to turn out, also stopped within a few feet of Casey, the +spotlight fairly blinding him. + +The young man beside Casey slid up straight in the seat and +stopped whistling. He leaned out of the car and stared ahead +without the dusty interference of the windshield. + +"You can back up a few lengths and make the turn-out all right," +he suggested. + +"If I can back up, so can he. He's got as much road behind him +as what I'VE got," Casey retorted stubbornly. "He never made a +try at turnin' out. I was watchin'. Any time I can't lick a +road hawg, he's got a license to lick me. Make yourself +comf'table, young feller--we're liable to set here a spell." +Casey grinned. "I spent four hours on a hill once, out-settin, a +road hawg that wanted me to back up." + +The man in the other car climbed out and came toward them, +walking outside the beams cast by his own glaring spotlight. He +bulked. rather large in the shadows; but Casey Ryan, blinking at +him through the windshield, was still ready and willing to fight +if necessary. Or, if stubbornness were to be the test, Casey +could grin and feel secure. A little man, he reflected, can sit +just as long as a big man. + +The big man walked leisurely up to the car and smiled as he +lifted a foot to the running board. He leaned forward, his eyes +going past Casey to the other man. + +"I kinda thought it was you, Kenner," he drawled. "How much +liquor you got aboard to-night?" + +Casey, slanting a glance downward, glimpsed the barrel of a big +automatic looking toward them. + +"What if I ain't got any?" the young man parried glumly. "You're +taking a lot for granted." + +The big man chuckled. "If you ain't loaded with hootch, it's +because one of the boys met up with yuh before I did. Open 'er +up. Lemme see what you got." + +The young fellow scowled, swore under his breath and climbed out, +turning toward the loaded tonneau with reluctant obedience. + +"I can't argue with the law," he said, as he began to pull out a +roll of bedding wedged in tightly. "But, for cripes sake, go as +easy as you can. I'm plumb lame from my last fall!" + +The big man chuckled again. "The law's merciful as, it can +afford to be, and I've got a heart like an ox. Got any jack on +yuh?" + +"I'm just about cleaned, and that's the Gawd's truth. Have a +heart, can't yuh? A man's got t' live." + +"Slip me five hundred, anyway. How much is your load?" + +"Sixty gallons--bottled, most of it. Two kegs in bulk." Young +Kenner was proceeding stoically with the unloading. Casey, his +mouth clamped tight shut, was glaring stupifiedly straight out +through the windshield. + +"Pile out thirty gallons of the bottled goods by that bush. You +can keep the kegs." The big man's eyes shifted to Casey Ryan's +expressionless profile and dwelt there curiously. + +"Seems like I know you," he said abruptly. "Ain't you the guy +that was brought in with that Black Butte bunch of moonshiners +and got off on account of a nice wife and an L. A. alibi? Sure +you are! Casey Ryan. I got yuh placed now." He threw back his +head and laughed. + +Casey might have been an Indian making a society call for all the +sign of life he gave. Young Kenner, having deposited his camp +outfit in a heap on the ground, began lifting out tall, round +bottles, four at a time and ricking them neatly beside the large +sagebush indicated by the officer. + +Standing upon the running board at Casey's shoulder where he had +a clear view, the big man watched the unloading and at the same +time kept an eye on Casey. It was perfectly evident that for all +his easy good nature, he was not a man who could be talked out of +his purpose. + +"All right, pile in your blankets," the big man ordered at last, +and young Kenner unemotionally began to reload the camp outfit. +The big man's attention shifted to Casey again. He looked at him +curiously and grinned. + +"Say, that's a good one you pulled! You had all the county +officials bluffed into thinking you were the victim of that Black +Butte bunch, instead of being in cahoots. That alibi of yours +was a bird. Does Kenner, here, know you hit the hootch pretty +strong at times? Bootlegging's bad business for a man that laps +it up the way you do. Where's that piece of change, Kenner?" + +"Aw, can't yuh find some way to leave me jack enough to buy gas +and grub?" Young Kenner asked sullenly, reaching into his +pocket. The big man shook his head. + +"I'm doing a lot for you boys, when I let yuh get past me with +the Lizzie, to say nothing of half your load. I'd ought to +trundle yuh back to San Berdoo; you both know that as well as I +do. I'm too soft-hearted for this job, anyway. Hand over the +roll." + +Young Kenner swore and extended his arm behind Casey. "That +leaves me six bits," he growled, as the big man dropped something +into his coat pocket. "You might give me back ten, anyway." + +"Couldn't possibly. I have to have something to square myself +with if this leaks out. Just back up, till you can get around my +car. Turn to the left where the sand ain't so deep and you ain't +likely to run over the booze." + +With the big man still standing at his shoulder on the running +board, Casey Ryan did what he had rashly declared he never would +do; he backed the Ford, turned it to the left as he had been +commanded to do, and drove around the other car. It was bitter +work for Casey; but even he recognized the fact that the +"settin'" was not good that evening. Back in the road again, he +stopped when he was told to stop, and waited, with a surface calm +altogether strange to Casey, while the officer stepped off and +gave a bit of parting advice. + +"Better keep right on going, boys. I'd hate to see yuh get in +trouble, so you'd better take this old road up ahead here. +That'll bring yuh out at Dagget and you'll miss Barstow +altogether. I just came from there; there's a hard gang hanging +around on the lookout for anything they can pick up. Don't get +caught again. On your way!" + +Casey drove for half a mile still staring straight before him. +Then young Kenner laughed shortly. + +"That's Smilin' Lou," he said. "He's a mean boy to monkey with. +Talk about road hawgs--he's one yuh can't outset!" + + + +CHAPTER ELEVEN + +"So that's the kind uh game yuh asked me to set in on!" Casey +broke another long silence. He had felt in his bones that young +Kenner was watching him secretly, waiting for him to take his +stand for or against the proposition. + +"I'd like to know who passed the word around amongst outlaws that +Casey Ryan is the only original easy mark left runnin' wild, an' +that he can be caught an' made a goat of any time it's handy! +Look at the crowd of folks bunched on that crossing this +afternoon! Why didn't yuh pick some one else for the goat? Outa +all them hundreds uh people, why'n hell did yuh have to go an' +pick on Casey Ryan? Ain't he had trouble enough tryin' to keep +outa trouble? + +"Naw! Casey Ryan's went an' blowed hisself to show tickets, an' +he's headed home, peaceful an' on time, so's he can shave an' put +on a clean collar an' slick up to please his wife an' take 'er to +the show! Nothin' agin the law in that! Not a damn' thing yuh +can haul 'im to jail fer! So YOU had to come along, loaded to +the guards with hootch--stall your Ford on the car track right +under m' nose, an' tell Casey Ryan to git in! Couldn't leave 'im +to go home peaceful to 'is wife--naw! You had t' haul 'im away +out here an' git 'im in wrong with a cop agin! That's a fine +game you're playin'! That's a DARNED fine game!" + +"Sure, it is! It's better than the game you've been playing," +young Kenner stated calmly. "Take your own story, for instance. +You've been dubbin' along, tryin' t' play the way the law tells +you to. An' the saps has been flockin' to yuh like a bunch uh +hornets--every bird tryin' t' sink his stinger in first. Ain't +that right? + +"Keepin' the law has laid yuh in jail twice in the last month, by +your own tell. Why, a clown like you, that's aimin' t' keep the +law an' live honest, is the easiest mark in the world. Them's +the guys that do the most harm--they make graftin' so darned +easy! Them's the guys the saps lay for and dust off regular in +the shape of fines an' taxes an' the like uh that. Oncet in +awhile they'll snatch yuh fer somethin' yuh never done at all an' +lay yuh away fer a day or two, just t' keep yuh scared and easy +t' handle next time. + +"Now, yuh take me, fer instance. I play agin' the law--an' I'm +cleanin' up right along, and have yet to take my morning sunlight +in streaks. I know as much about the inside of a jail as I know +about the White House--an' no more. I've hauled hootch all over +the country, an' I never yet was dusted off so hard by the law +that I didn't come through with a roll uh jack they'd overlooked. + +"Take this highjackin' to-night, for instance. Look what Smilin' +Lou took off'n me! And yet," Kenner turned and grinned +impudently at Casey, "don't never think I didn't come out a long +jump ahead! I carry nothin' cheap; nothin' but good whisky an' +brandy that the liquor houses failed to declare when the world +went dry. Then there's real, honest-to-gosh European stuff run in +from Mexico; now you're in, Casey, I'll tell yuh the snap. When +I said easy money, I was in my right mind. + +"You can count on highjackers leavin' yuh half your load; mebby a +little more, if yuh set purty. They don't aim t' force yuh out +uh the business. They grab what the traffic'll bear, an' let yuh +go on an make a profit so you'll stay. + +"Now there's a card you can slip up your sleeve for this game. +Yuh load in the best stuff first--see? Anything real special you +wanta put in kegs with double sides an' ends which you fill with +moonshine. Yuh never can tell--they might wanta sample it. +Smilin' Lou did once--an' you notice to-night he left the kegs +be. So they get a good grade of whisky from the liquor houses. +And they pass up the best, imported stuff that can be got to-day. +We'll have regular customers for that; and you can gamble they'll +pay the price!" He laughed at some secret joke which he +straightway shared with Casey. + +"You noticed I got my gas-tank behind--a twenty-gallon tank at +that. Well, what if I tell yuh that right under this front seat +there's a false bottom to the tool-box and under that--well, +suppose you're settin' on forty pints uh French champagne? +More'n all that, this cushion we're settin' on has got a +concealed pocket down both sides --for hop. So yuh see, Casey, a +man can make an honest livin' at this game, even if he's +highjacked every trip. Now you're in, I can show yuh all kinds +uh tricks." + +The muscles, along Casey's jaw had hardened until they looked +bunched. His eyes, fixed upon the winding trail in front of him, +were a pale, unwinking glitter. + +"Who says I'm in? Yuh ain't heard Casey Ryan say it yet, have +yuh? Yuh better wait till Casey says he's in b'fore yuh bank on +'im too strong. Casey may be an easy mark--he may be the +officious goat pro tem of every darn' bootlegger an' moonshiner +an' every darn' cop that crosses his trail; but you can ask +anybody if Casey Ryan don't do 'is own decidin'! + +"Before you go any further, young feller, I'll tell yuh just how +fur Casey's in your game--an' that's as fur as Barstow. When +Casey says he'll do a thing he comes purty near doin' it. I +ain't playin' no bootleg game, young feller; White Mule an' me +ain't an' never was trail pardners. Make me choose between +bootleggers an' cops, an' I'd have to flip a dollar on it. Only +fer Bill Masters bein' your friend, I dunno but what I'd take yuh +right back with me t' L. A. an' let yuh sleep in a jail +oncet--seein' you've never had the pleasure!" + +The young man laughed imperturbably. "Flip that dollar for me, +Casey, to see whether I shoot yuh now an' dump yuh out in the +brush somewheres, or make yuh play the hootch game an' like it. +Why, you didn't think for one minute, did yuh, that I was takin' +any chance with you? Not a chance in the world! Go squeal to +the law--an' what would it get yuh? + +"You was drivin' this car yourself when Smilin' Lou stopped us, +recollect. He had yuh placed as one of that Black Butte gang +quick as he lamped yuh. Yuh think Smilin' Lou is goin' to take a +chance? You was caught with the goods t'night, old-timer, an' +it's the second time inside a month. It'd be the third time you +an' the law has tangled. Why, you set there yourself an' told me +how you was practically run outa L. A., right this week. You set +still a minute and figure out about how many years they'd give +yuh! + +"How come Smilin' Lou overlooked cleanin' yuh of your roll when +he took mine, do yuh think? He was treatin' yuh white, an' +givin' yuh a chance to come back strong next time--that's why. +They got so much on yuh now after to-night, that he knows you got +just one chance to sidestep a stretch in the pen. That's to play +the game with pertection. Smilin' Lou never to my knowledge +throwed down a guy that come through on demand. + +"Smilin' Lou stood there an' sized yuh up about the same as I +did, somethin' like this: 'Here Is Casey Ryan--a clown that's +safe anywhere in the desert States. He got honest prospector +wrote all over 'im. Why, if you boarded a street car the +conductor would be guessin', wild-eyed, how much gold dust it +takes to make a nickel, expectin' you to haul out your poke an' +look around fer the gold scales. Why, you could git by where a +town guy couldn't. You've got a rep a mile long as a fightin', +squareshootin' Irishman that's a drivin' fool an' knows the +desert like he knows ham-an'-eggs. Tie on some picks an' shovels +an' put you behind the wheel, and only the guys that are in the +know would ever get wise in a thousand years. + +"Why, look what he said about you havin' 'em all bluffed in San +Berdoo! Grabbed you with a bunch uh moonshiners, and you fightin' +the saps harder'n any of 'em--and then, by heck, you slips the +noose an' leaves 'em thinkin' you're honest but unlucky. + +"So you 'n' me is pardners till I say when. We'll clean up some +real jack together. Minin' ain't in it, no more, with hootch +runnin'--if yuh play it right. The good old White Mule goes +under the wire, old-timer, an' takes the money. Burros is +extinct." + +"Burros ain't any extincter than what you'll be when I git +through with yuh," gritted Casey savagely, shutting off the gas. +"Bill Masters can like it or not--I'm goin' to lick the livin' +tar outa you here an' now. When I'm through with yuh, if you're +able to wiggle the wheel, yuh can take your load uh hootch an' go +tahell! I'll hoof it down here to the next station on the +railroad an' ketch a ride back to L. A." + +Kenner laughed. "An' what would I be doin', you poor nut? Set +here meek till yuh tell me to git out an' take a lickin'? Yuh +feel that gun proddin' yuh in the ribs, don't yuh? I can't help +wonderin' how your wife would feel towards you if you was found +with a hole drilled through your middle, an' a carload uh booze. +That'd jar the faith of the most believin' woman on earth. You +take this cut-off road up here an' drive till I tell yuh t' stop. +As you may know, a man can't be chickenhearted and peddle +hootch--an' I'm called an expert. So you think that over, +Casey--an' drive purty, see?" + +Casey drove as "purty" as was possible with a six-shooter pressed +irritatingly against his lowest floating rib; but he did not +dwell upon the spectacle of himself found dead with a carload of +booze. He wished to heaven he hadn't let the Little Woman talk +him out of packing a gun, and waited for his chance. + +Young Kenner was thoughtful, brooding through the hours of +darkness with his head slightly bent and his eyes, so far as +Casey could determine, fixed steadily on the uneven trail where +the headlights revealed every rut, every stone, every chuck-hole. +But Casey was not deceived by that quiescence. The revolver +barrel never once ceased its pressure against his side, and he +knew that young Kenner never for an instant forgot that he was +riding with Casey Ryan at the wheel, waiting for a chance to kill +him. + +By daylight, such was Casey's driving, they were well down the +highway which leads to Needles and on through Arizona. Casey was +just thinking that they would soon run out of gas, and that he +would then have a fighting chance, when he was startled almost +into believing that he had spoken his plan. + +"I told you there's a twenty-gallon tank on this car; well, it +holds twenty-five. I've got a special carburetor that gives an +actual mileage of twenty-two miles to the gallon on ordinary +desert roads. I filled 'er till she run over at Victorville--and +I notice you're easy on the gas with your drivin'. Figure it +yourself, Casey, and don't be countin' on a stop till I'm ready +t' stop." + +Casey grunted, more crestfallen than he would ever admit. But he +hadn't given up; the give-up quality had been completely +forgotten when Casey's personality was being put together. He +drove on, around the rubbly base of a blackened volcano long +since cold and bleak, and bored his way through the sandy stretch +that leads through Patmos. + +Patmos was a place of unhappy memories, but he drove through the +little hamlet so fast that he scarcely thought of his unpleasant +sojourn there the summer before. Young Kenner had fallen silent +again and they drove the sixty miles or so to Goffs with not a +word spoken between them. + +Casey spent most of that time in mentally cursing the Ford for +its efficiency. He had prayed for blowouts, a fouled timer, for +something or anything or everything to happen that could possibly +befall a Ford. He couldn't even make the radiator boil. Worst +and most persistent of his discomforts was the hard pressure of +that six-shooter against his side. Casey was positive that the +imprint of it would be worn as a permanent brand upon his person +for the rest of his life. Young Kenner's voice speaking to him +came so abruptly that Casey jumped. + +"I've been thinking over your case," Kenner said cheerfully. +"Stop right here while we talk it over." + +Casey stopped right there. + +"I've changed my mind about havin' you for a pardner," young +Kenner went on. "You'd be a valuable man all right; but when a +harp like you gets stubborn-bitter, my hunch tells me to break +away clean. You're a mick--an' micks is all alike when they git a +grudge. I can't be bothered keepin' yuh under my eye all the +time, and the way I've felt yuh oozin' venom all this while shows +me I'd have to. An' bumpin' yuh off would be neither pleasant ner +safe. + +"Now, the way I've doped this out, I'm goin' to sell yuh the +outfit fer just what jack yuh got in your clothes. Fork it over, +an' I'll give yuh the layout just as she stands." + +"Yuh better wait till Casey says he wants t' buy!" Swallowing +resentment all night had made his voice husky; and it was bitter +indeed to sit still and hear himself called a harp and a mick. + +"Why wait? Hand over the roll, and that closes the deal. I +didn't ask yuh would yuh buy--I'm givin' yuh somethin' fer your +money, is all. I could take it off yuh after yuh quit kickin' +and drive your remains in to this little burg, with a tale of how +I'd caught a bootlegger that resisted arrest. So fork over the +jack, old-timer. I want to catch that train over there that's +about ready to pull out." He prodded sharply with the gun, and +Casey heard a click which needed no explanation. + +Casey fumbled for a minute inside his vest and glumly "forked +over." Young Kenner inspected the folded bank notes, smiled and +slipped the flat bundle inside his shirt. + +"You're stronger on the bank roll than what yuh let on," he +remarked contentedly. "I don't stand to lose so much, after all. +Sixteen hundred, I make it. What's in your pants pockets?" + +Casey, still balefully silent, emptied first one pocket and then +the other into Kenner's cupped palm. With heavy sarcasm he felt +in his watch pocket and produced a nickel slipped there after +paying street-car fare. He held it out to young Kenner between +his finger and thumb, still gazing straight before him. + +Young Kenner took it and grinned. "Oh, well--you're rich! Drive +on now, and when you get about even with that caboose, slow to +twelve miles whilst I hop off; and then hit 'er up again an' keep +'er goin'. If yuh don't, I'll grab yuh fer a bootlegger, sure. +And I'd have the hull train crew to help me wrassle yuh down. +They'd be willin' to sample the evidence, I guess, an' be +witnesses against yuh. An' bear in mind, Casey, that yuh got a +darned good Ford and all its valuable contents for sixteen +hundred and some odd bucks. If you meet up with the law, you can +treat 'em white an' still break even on the deal yuh just +consummated with me." + +"Like hell I consummated the deal!" Casey was goaded into +muttering. + +He drove abreast of the caboose, and at a final prod in the ribs +Casey slowed down. Young Kenner dropped off the running board, +alighted running with his body slanted backwards and his lips +smiling friendly-wise. + +"Don't take any bad money--an' don't let 'em catch yuh!" he cried +mockingly, as he headed for the caboose. + +At a crossing, two miles farther on, Casey came larruping out of +the sand hills and was forced to wait while the freight train +went rattling past, headed east on a downhill grade. + +Young Kenner, up in the cupola, leaned far out and waved his hat +as the caboose flicked by. + + + +CHAPTER TWELVE + +The highway north from the Santa Fe Railroad just west of Needles +climbs an imperceptible grade across barren land to where the +mesa changes and becomes potentially fertile. Up this road, +going north, a cloud of yellow dust rolled swiftly. See at close +range, the nose of a dingy Ford protruded slightly in front of +the enveloping cloud --and behind it Casey Ryan, hard-eyed and +with his jaw set to the fighting mood, gripped the wheel and +drove as if he had a grudge against the road. + +At the first signpost Casey canted a malevolent eye upward and +went lurching by at top speed. The car bulked black for a +moment, dimmed, and merged into the fleeing cloud that presently +seemed no more than a dust-devil whirling across the mesa. At +the second signpost Casey slowed, his eyes dwelling speculatively +upon the legend: + +"JUNIPER WELLS 3 M" + +The arrow pointed to the right where a narrow, little-used trail +angled crookedly away through the greasewood. Casey gave a +deciding twist to the steering wheel and turned into the trail. + +Juniper Wells is not nearly so nice a place as it sounds. But it +is the first water north of the Santa Fe, and now and then a +wayfarer of the desert leaves the main highway and turns that +way, driven by necessity. It is a secluded spot, too +unattractive to tempt people to linger; because of its very +seclusion it therefore tempted Casey Ryan. + +When a man has driven a Ford fifteen hours without once leaving +the wheel or taking a drink of water or a mouthful of food, +however great his trouble or his haste, his first thought will be +of water, food and rest. Even Casey's deadly rage at the +diabolical trick played upon him could not hold his thoughts from +dwelling upon bacon and coffee and a good sleep afterwards. + +Wind and rain and more wind, buffeting that trail since the last +car had passed, made "heavy going." The Ford labored up small +hills and across gullies, dipping downward at last to Juniper +Wells; there Casey stopped close beside the blackened embers left +by some forgotten traveler of the wild. He slid stiffly from +behind the wheel to the vacant seat beside him, and climbed out +like the old man he had last night determined never to become. +He walked away a few paces, turned and stood glaring back at the +car as if familiarizing himself with an object little known and +hated much. + +Fate, he felt, had played a shabby trick upon an honest man. +Here he stood, a criminal in the eyes of the law, a liar in the +eyes of the missus. An honest man and a truthful, here he +was--he, Casey Ryan--actually afraid to face his fellow men. + +"HE wasn't no friend of Bill Masters; the divil himself wouldn'ta +owned him fer a friend!" snarled Casey, thinking of Kenner. +"Me-- CASEY RYAN!--with a load uh booze wished onto me--and a car +that may have been stolen fer all I know--an' not a darn' nickel +to my name! They can make a goat uh Casey Ryan once, but watch +clost when they try it the second time! Casey MAY be gittin' +old; he might possibly have softenin' of the brain; but he'll git +the skunk that done this, or you'll find his carcass layin' +alongside the trail bleachin' like a blowed-out tire! I'll trail +'im till my tongue hangs down to my knees! I'll git 'im an' I'll +drown 'im face down in a bucket of his own booze!" Whipped by +emotion, his voice rose stridently until it cracked just under a +shout. + +"That sounds pretty businesslike, old man," a strange voice spoke +whimsically behind Casey. "Who's all this you're going to trail +till your tongue hangs down to your knees? Going to need any +help?" + +Casey whirled belligerently upon the man who had walked quietly +up behind him. + +"Where the hell did YOU come from?" he countered roughly. + +"Does it matter? I'm here," the other parried blandly. "But by +the way! If you've got the makings of a meal in your car--and +you look too old a hand in the desert to be without grub--I won't +refuse to have a snack with you. I hate to invite myself to +breakfast, but it's that or go hungry--and an empty belly won't +stand on ceremony." + +The hard-bitten features of Casey Ryan, tanned as they were by +wind and sun to a fair imitation of leather, were never meant to +portray mixed emotions. His face, therefore, remained impassive +except for a queer, cornered look in his eyes. With a sick +feeling at the pit of his stomach he wondered just how much of +his impassioned soliloquy the man had overheard; who and what +this man was, and how he had managed to approach within six feet +of Casey without being overheard. With a sicker feeling, he +wondered if there were any grub in the car; and if so, how he +could get at it without revealing his contraband load to this +stranger. + +But Casey Ryan was nothing if not game. He reached for his +trusty plug of tobacco and pried off a corner with his teeth. He +lifted his left hand mechanically to the back of his head and +pushed his black felt hat forward so that it rested over his +right eyebrow at a devil-may-care angle. These preparations made +involuntarily and unconsciously, Casey Ryan was himself again. + +"All right--if you're willin' to rustle the wood an' start a +fire, I'll see if I can dig up somethin'." He cocked an eye up +at the sun. "I et my breakfast long enough ago so I guess it's +settled. I reckon mebby I c'd take on some bacon an' coffee +myself. Feller I had along with me I ditched, back here at the +railroad. He done the packin' up--an' I'd hate to swear to what +he put in an' what he left out. Onery cuss--I wouldn't put +nothin' past him. But mebby we can make out a meal." + +The stranger seemed perfectly satisfied with this arrangement and +studied preamble. He started off to gather dead branches of +greasewood; and Casey, having prepared the way for possible +disappointment, turned toward the car. + +Fear and Casey Ryan have ever been strangers; yet he was +conscious of a distinct, prickly chill down his spine. The +glance he cast over his shoulder at the stranger betrayed +uneasiness, best he could do. He turned over the roll of bedding +and cautiously began a superficial search which he hoped would +reveal grub in plenty-- without revealing anything else. He +wished now that he had taken a look over his shoulder when young +Kenner was unloading the car at Smiling Lou's command. He would +be better prepared now for possible emergencies. He remembered, +with a bit of comfort, that the bootlegger had piled a good deal +of stuff upon the ground before Casey first heard the clink of +bottles. + +A grunt of relief signaled his location of a box containing grub. +A moment later he lifted out a gunny sack bulging unevenly with +cooking utensils. He fished a little deeper, turned back a +folded tarp and laid naked to his eyes the top of a whisky keg. +With a grunt of consternation he hastily replaced the tarp, his +heart flopping in his chest like a fresh-landed fish. + +The stranger was kneeling beside a faintly crackling little pile +of twigs, his face turned inquiringly toward, Casey. Casey, +glancing guiltily over his shoulder, felt the chill hand of +discovery reaching for his very soul. It was as if a dead man +were hidden away beneath that tarp. It seemed to him that the +eyes of the stranger were sharp, suspicious eyes, and that they +dwelt upon him altogether too attentively for a perfectly +justifiable interest even in the box of grub. + +Black coffee, drunk hot and strong, gave the world a brighter +aspect. Casey decided that the situation was not so desperate, +after all. Easy enough to bluff it out--easiest thing in the +world! He would just go along as if there wasn't a thing on his +mind heavier than his thinning, sandy hair. No man living had +any right or business snooping around in his car, unless he +carried a badge of an officer of the law. Even with the badge, +Casey told himself sternly, a man would have to show a warrant +before he could touch a finger to his outfit. + +Over his third cup of coffee Casey eyed the stranger guardedly. +He did not look like an officer. He was not big and burly, with +arrogant eyes and the hint of leashed authority in his tone. +Instead, he was of medium height, owned a pair of shrewd gray +eyes and an easy drawl, and was dressed in the half military +style so popular with mining men, surveyors and others who can +afford to choose what garb they will adopt for outdoor living. + +He had shown a perfect familiarity with cooking over a campfire, +and had fried the bacon in a manner which even Casey could not +criticize. Before the coffee was boiled he had told Casey that +his name was Mack Nolan. Immediately afterward he had grinned +and added the superfluous information that he was Irish and +didn't care who knew it. + +"Well, I'm Irish, meself," Casey returned approvingly and with +more than his usual brogue. "You can ask anybody if Casey Ryan +has ever showed shame fer the blood that's in' 'im. 'Tis the +Irish that never backs up from a rough trail or a fight." He +poured a fourth cup of coffee into a chipped enamel cup and took +his courage in his two hands. Mack Nolan, he assured himself +optimistically, couldn't possibly know what lay hidden under the +camp outfit in the Ford. Until he did know, he was harmless as +anybody, so long as Casey kept an eye on him. + + + +CHAPTER THIRTEEN + +During the companionable smoke that followed breakfast, Casey +learned that Mack Nolan had spent some time in Nevada, ambling +through the hills, examining the geologic formation of the +country with a view to possible future prospecting in districts +yet undeveloped. + +"The mineral possibilities of Nevada haven't been more than +scratched," Mack Nolan observed, lying back with one arm thrown +up under his head as a makeshift pillow and the other hand +negligently attending to the cigarette he was smoking. His gray +army hat was tilted over his eyes, shielding them from the sun +while they dwelt rather studiously upon the face of Casey Ryan. + +"Every spring I like to get out and poke around through these +hills where folks as a rule don't go. Never did much +prospecting--as such. Don't take kindly enough to a pick and +shovel for that. What I like best is general field work. If I +run across something rich, time enough then to locate a claim or +two and hire a couple of strong backs to do the digging. + +"I've been out now for about three weeks; and night before last, +just as I stopped to make camp and before I'd started to unpack, +my two mules got scared at a rattler and quit the country. Left +me flat, without a thing but my clothes and six-shooter, and what +I had in my pockets." He lifted the cigarette from between his +lips--thin, they were, and curved and rather pitiless, one could +guess, if the man were sufficiently roused. + +"I wasted all yesterday trying to trail 'em. But you can't do +much tracking in these rocks back here toward the river. I was +hitting for the highway to catch a ride if I could, when I saw +you topping this last ridge over here. Don't blame me much for +bumming a breakfast, do you?" And he added, with a sigh of deep +physical content, "It sure-lee was some feed!" + +His lids drooped lower as if sleep were overtaking him in spite +of himself. "I'd ask yuh if you'd seen anything of those mules-- +only I don't give a damn now. I wish this was night instead of +noon; I could sleep the clock around after that bacon and bannock +of yours. Haven't a care in the world," he murmured drowsily. +"Happy as a toad in the sun, first warm day of spring. How soon +you going to crank up?" + +Casey stared at him unwinkingly through narrowed lids. He pushed +his hat forward with a sharp tilt over his eyebrow--which meant +always that Casey Ryan had just 0. K.'d an idea--and reached for +his chewing tobacco. + +"Go ahead an' take a nap if yuh want to," he urged. "I got some +tinkerin' to do on the Ford, an' I was aimin' to lay over here +an' do it. I'm kinda lookin' around, myself, for a likely +prospect; I got all the time there is. I guess I'll back the car +down the draw a piece where she'll set level, an' clean up 'er +dingbats whilst you take a sleep." + +Casey left the breakfast things where they were, as a silent +reassurance to Mack Nolan that the car would not go off without +him. It was a fine, psychological detail of which Casey was +secretly rather proud. A box of grub, a smoked coffee pot and +dirty breakfast dishes left beside a dead campfire establishes +evidence, admissible before any jury, that the owner means to +return. + +Casey went over and cranked the Ford, grimly determined to make +the coffee pot lie for him if necessary. He backed the car down +the draw a good seventy-five yards, to where a wrinkle in the +bank hid him from the breakfast camp. He stopped there and left +the engine running while he straddled out over the side and went +forward to the dip of the front fender to see if the Ford were +still visible to Mack Nolan. He was glad to find that by +crouching and sighting across the fender he could just see the +campfire and the top of Nolan's hat beyond it. The man need only +lift his head off his arm to see that the Ford was standing just +around the turn of the draw. + +"The corner was never yet so tight that Casey Ryan couldn't find +a crack somewhere to crawl through," he told himself +vaingloriously. "An' I hope to thunder the feller sleeps long an' +sleeps solid!" + +For fifteen minutes the mind of Casey Ryan was at ease. He had +found a shovel in the car, placed conveniently at the side where +it could be used for just such an emergency as this. For fifteen +minutes he had been using that shovel in a shelving bank of loose +gravel just under an outcropping of rhyolite a rod or so behind +the car and well out of sight of Nolan. + +He was beginning to consider his excavation almost deep enough to +bury two ten-gallon kegs and forty bottles of whisky, when the +shadow of a head and shoulders fell across the hole. Casey did +not lift the dirt and rocks he had on his shovel. He froze to a +tense quiet, goggling at the shadow. + +"What are yuh doing, Casey? Trying to outdig a badger?" Mack +Nolan's chuckle was friendliness itself. + +Casey's head snapped around so that he could cock an eye up at +Nolan. He grinned mechanically. "Naw. Picked up a rich-lookin' +piece uh float. Thought I'd just see if it didn't mebby come from +this ledge." + +Mack Nolan stepped forward interestedly and looked at the ledge. + +"Where's the piece you found?" he very naturally inquired. "The +formation just here wouldn't lead me to expect gold-bearing rock; +but of course, anything is possible with gold. Let's have a look +at the specimen." + +Casey had once tried to bluff a stranger with two deuces and a +pair of fives, and two full stacks of blue chips pushed to the +center to back the bluff. The stranger had called him, with +three queens and a pair of jacks. Casey felt like that now. + +He had laughed over his loss then, and he grinned now and reached +carelessly to the bank beside him as if he fully expected to lay +his hand on the specimen of gold-bearing rock. He went so far as +to utter a surprised oath when he failed to find it. He felt in +his pockets. He went forward and scanned the top of the ledge +almost convincingly. He turned and stood a-straddle, his hands +on his hips, and gazed on the pile of dirt he had thrown out of +the hole. Last, he pushed his hat back so that with the next +movement he could push it forward again over his eyebrow. + +"Now if that there lump uh high-grade ain't went an' slid down +the bank an' got covered up with the muck!" he exclaimed +disgustedly. "I'm a son of a gun if Fate ain't playin' agin' +Casey Ryan with a flock uh aces under its vest!" + +Mack Nolan laughed, and Casey slanted a look his way. "Thought I +left you takin, a nap," he said brazenly. "What's the matter? +Didn't your breakfast set good?" + +Mack Nolan laughed again. It was evident that he found Casey +Ryan very amusing. + +"The breakfast was fine," he replied easily. "A couple of +lizards got to playing tag over me. That woke me up, and the sun +was so hot I just thought I'd come down and crawl into the car +and go to sleep there. Go ahead with your prospecting, Casey--I +won't bother you." + +Casey went on with his digging, but his heart was not in it. With +every laggard shovelful of dirt, he glanced over his shoulder +apprehensively, watching Mack Nolan crawl into the back of the +car and settle himself, with an audible sigh of satisfaction, on +top of the load. He had one wild, wicked impulse to lengthen the +hole and make it serve as a grave for more than bootleg whisky; +but it was an impulse born of desperation, and it died almost +before it had lived. + + + +CHAPTER FOURTEEN + +Casey left his digging and returned to the Ford, still determined +to carry on the bluff and pretend that much tinkering was +necessary before he could travel further. With a great show of +industry he rummaged for pliers and wrenches, removed the hood +from the motor and squinted down at the little engine. + +By that time Mack Nolan was snoring softly in deep slumber. Casey +listened suspiciously, knowing too well how misleading a snore +could be. But his own eyelids were growing exceeding heavy, and +the soporific sound acted hypnotically upon his sleep-hungry +brain. He caught himself yawning, and suddenly threw down the +wrench. + +"Aw, hell!" he muttered disgustedly, and went and crawled under +the back of the car where it was shady. + +The sun was nearly down when Casey awoke and crawled out. Mack +Nolan was still curled comfortably in the car, his back against +the bed roll. He opened his eyes and yawned when Casey leaned +and looked in upon him. + +"By Jove, that was a fine sleep I had," he announced cheerfully, +lifting himself up and dangling his legs outside the car. "Strike +anything yet?" + +"Naw." Casey's grunt was eloquent of the mood he was in. + +"Get the car fixed all right?" Mack Nolan's cheerfulness seemed +nothing less than diabolical to Casey. + +"Naw." Then Casey added grimly, "I'm stuck. I dunno what ails +the damned thing. Have to send to Vegas fer new parts, I guess. +It's only three miles out here to the road. Mebby you better +hike over to the highway an' ketch a ride with somebody. I might +send in for a timer an' some things, too. No use waitin' fer me, +Nolan-- can't tell how long I'll be held up here." + +Mack Nolan climbed out of the car. Casey's spirits rose +instantly. Nolan came forward and looked down at the engine as +casually as he would glance at a nickel alarm clock. + +"She was hitting all right when you backed down here," Nolan +remarked easily. "I'll just take a look at her myself. Fords +are cranky sometimes. But I've assembled too many of them in the +factory to let one get the best of me in the desert." + +Casey could almost hear his heart when it slumped down into his +boots. But he wasn't licked yet. + +"Aw, let the darned thing alone till we eat," he said, pushing +his hat forward to hurry his wits. + +"Well--I can throw a Ford together in the dark, if necessary," +smiled Mack Nolan. "Eat, it is, if you want it that way. That +breakfast I put away seems to have sharpened my appetite for +supper. Tell you what, Ryan. I'll do a little trouble-shooting +here while you cook supper. How'll that be?" + +That wouldn't be, if Casey could prevent it. His pale, +narrow-lidded eyes dwelt upon Nolan unwinkingly. + +"Well, mebby I'm kind of a crank about my car," he hedged, with a +praiseworthy calmness. "Fords is like horses, to me. I drove +stage all m' life till I took to prospectin'--an' I never could +stand around and let anybody else monkey with my teams. I ain't +a doubt in the world, Mr. Nolan, but what you know as much about +Fords as I do. More, mebby. But Casey Ryan's got 'is little +ways, an' he can't seem to ditch 'em. We'll eat; an' then mebby +we'll look 'er over together. + +"At the same time," he went on with rising courage, "I'm liable +to stick around here for awhile an' prospect a little. If you +wanta find them mules an' outfit, don't bank too strong on Casey +Ryan. He's liable to change 'is mind any old time. Day or night, +you can't tell what Casey might take a notion to do. That +there's a fact. You can ask anybody if it ain't." + +Mack Nolan laughed and slapped Casey unexpectedly on the +shoulder. "You're a man after my own heart, Casey Ryan," he +declared enigmatically. "I'll stick to you and take a chance. +Darn the mules! Somebody will find them and look after them until +I show up." + +Casey's spirits, as he admitted to himself, were rising and +falling like the hammer of a pile driver; and like the pile +driver, the hammer was driving him deeper and deeper into +hopelessness. He would have given an ear to know for certain +whether Mack Nolan were as innocent and friendly as he seemed. +Until he did know, Casey could see nothing before him but to wait +his chance to give Nolan the slip. + +Sitting cross-legged in the glow of the campfire after supper, +with a huge pattern of stars drawn over the purple night sky, +Casey pulled out the old pipe with which he had solaced many an +evening and stuffed it thoughtfully with tobacco. Across the +campfire, Mack Nolan sat with his hat tilted down over his eyes, +smoking a cigarette and seeming at peace with all the world. + +Casey hoped that Nolan would forget about fixing the Ford. He +hoped that Nolan would sleep well to-night. Casey was perfectly +willing to sacrifice a good roll of bedding and the cooking +outfit for the privilege of traveling alone. No man, he told +himself savagely, could ask a better deal than he was prepared to +give Nolan. He bent to reach a burning twig for his pipe, and +found Nolan watching him steadily from under his hat brim. + +"What sort of looking fellows were those, Ryan, that left a load +of booze on your hands?" Nolan asked casually when he saw that +he was observed. + +Casey burned his fingers with the blazing twig. "Who said +anything about any fellers leavin' me booze?" he evaded sharply. +"If it's a drink you're hintin' for, you won't get it. Casey +Ryan ain't no booze peddler, an' now's as good a time as any to +let that soak into your system." + +Mack Nolan's gray eyes were still watching Casey with a +steadfastness that was disconcerting to a man in Casey's dilemma. + +"It might help us both considerably," he said quietly, "if you +told me all about it. You can't cache that booze you've got in +the car-- I won't let you, for one thing; for another, that would +be merely dodging the issue, and if you'll forgive my frankness, +dodging doesn't seem to be quite in your line." + +Casey puffed hard on his pipe. "The world's gittin' so darned +full uh crooks, a man can't turn around now'days without bumpin' +into a few!" he exploded bitterly. "What kind uh hold-up game +YOU playin', Mr. Nolan? If that's your name," he added fiercely. + +Mack Nolan laughed to himself and rubbed the ash from his +cigarette against the sole of his shoe. "Why," he answered +genially, "my game is holding up bootleggers--and crooked cops. +Speaking off-hand (which I don't often do) I should say you have +a fine chance to sit in with me. I'm just guessing, now," he +added dryly, "but I'm tolerably good at guessing; a man's got to +be, these days." + +"A man's got to do better than guess--with Casey Ryan," Casey +remarked ominously. "The last man that guessed Casey Ryan, +guessed 'im plumb wrong." + +"Meaning that you'd refuse to help me round up bootleggers and +the officers that protect them?" A steel edge crept into Mack +Nolan's voice. He leaned forward, his elbows on his knees, his +eyes boring into Casey's mind. + +"Man, don't stall with me! You've got brains enough to know that +if I were a crook I'd have held you up long before now. You gave +me three splendid opportunities to stick a gun in your back--and +I could have made others. And," he added with a smile, "if I had +thought that you were a bootlegger or a crook of any other kind, +I'd have had you in Las Vegas jail by this time. You're no more +a crook than I am. You've got neither the looks nor the actions +of a slicker. I may say I know you pretty well--" + +Casey thrust out a pugnacious chin. "Say! D' you know Bill +Masters, too? That's all I wanta know!" + +"Bill Masters? Why, is he the fellow who stepped out from under +this load of hootch? If he is, he must have picked himself a new +name; I never heard it." + +Casey glared suspiciously for twenty seconds before he settled +back glumly into his mental corner. + +"Ryan, I've been all day sizing you up. I'm going to be +perfectly honest with you and tell you why I think you're +straight--although you must admit the evidence is rather against +you. + +"I happened to be right close when you drove down in here and +stopped. As a matter of fact, I was behind that little clump of +junipers. Had you driven around them instead of stopping this +side, you couldn't have failed to see me. + +"You came down here mad at the trick that had been played you. +You were so mad, you started talking to yourself as a safety +valve --blowing off mental steam. You've spent a lot of time in +the desert --alone. Men like that frequently talk aloud their +thoughts, just to hear a human voice. You made matters pretty +plain to me before you knew there was any one within miles of +you. For instance, you're not at all sure this car you've got +wasn't stolen. You're inclined to think it was. You're +broke--robbed, I take it, by the men who somehow managed to leave +you with the car and a load of booze on your hands. The trick +must have been turned this morning; down at the railroad, I +imagine--because you hadn't taken time to stop and size up the +predicament you were in until you got here. + +"Your main idea was to get off somewhere out of sight. You were +scared. You didn't hear me behind you until I spoke--which proves +you're a green hand at dodging. And that, Ryan, is a very good +recommendation to a man in my line of work. But you're shrewd, +and you're game-- dead game. You're a peach at thinking up +schemes to get yourself out of a hole. Of course, being new at +it, you don't think quite far enough. For instance, because you +found me afoot it never occurred to you that I might know +something about a car; but the rest of your plan was a dandy. + +"Your idea of backing down there around the turn and burying the +booze was all right. With almost any other man it would have +worked. Once you got that hootch off your mind, I rather think +you'd have been glad to have me along with you, instead of giving +me broad hints to leave. But you haven't got the booze buried +yet, and you've been figuring all the evening. You don't see how +the devil you're going to manage it with me around. + +"I'll do a little more guessing, now: I guess you've doped it out +that you'll pack the bedroll up here, tuck me in and pray to the +Lord I'll sleep sound. You're hoping you can cache the booze and +make your getaway while I've gone bye-low. Or possibly, if you +got the booze put away safe from my prying eyes, you might come +back to bed and I'd find you here in the morning just as if +nothing had happened. How Is that for guesswork?" + +"You go tahell!" growled Casey, swallowing a sickly grin. He +pressed down the tobacco in his pipe, eyeing Nolan queerly. "If +them damn' lizards had uh let yuh alone, I wouldn't have nothin' +on m' mind now but my hat." He looked across the fire and +grinned again. + +"Keep on; you'll be tellin' me what the missus an' I was arguin' +about last night over long-distance. I've heard tell uh this +four-bit mind reading an' forecastin' your horrorscope fer a +dime; but I never met up with it before. If you're aimin' to +take up a collection after the show, you'll fare slim. I've been +what a feller called 'dusted off'." He added, after a pause that +was eloquent, "They done it thorough!" + +Mack Nolan laughed. "They usually are thorough, when they're +'dusting off a chump', as I believe they call it." + +Casey grunted. "'Chump' is right, mebby. But anyways, you're +too late, Mr. Nolan. I'm cleaned." + +Mack Nolan rolled another cigarette, lighted it and flipped the +match into the campfire. He smoked it down to the last inch, +staring into the fire and saying nothing the while. When the +cigarette stub followed the match, he leaned back upon one elbow +and began tracing a geometrical figure in the sand with a stick. + +"Ryan," he said abruptly, "you're square and I know it. The very +nature of my business makes me cautious about trusting men--but +I'm going to trust you." He stopped again, taking great pains +with the point of a triangle he was drawing. + +Casey knocked the ashes out of his pipe against a rock. "Puttin' +it that way, Mr. Nolan, the man's yet to live that Casey Ryan +ever double-crossed. Cops I got no use for; nor yet bootleggers. +Whether I got any use for you, Mr. Nolan, I can say better when +I've heard yuh out. A goat I've been for the last time. But I'm +willin' to HEAR yuh out--and that there's more'n what I'd uh said +this morning." + +"And that's fair enough, Ryan. If you jumped into things with +your eyes shut, I don't think I'd want you with me." + +Casey squirmed, remembering certain times when he had gone too +headlong into things. + +"I'm going to ask you, Ryan, to tell me the whole story of this +car and its load of whisky. Before you do that, I'll tell you +this much to show good faith and prove to you how much I trust +you: I'm an officer, and my special work right now is to clean up +a gang of bootleggers and the crooked officers who are protecting +them. What I know about your case leads me to believe that you've +run afoul of them and that you're the man I've been looking for +that can help me set a trap for them. Would you like to do +that?" + +"If it's that bunch you're after, Mr. Nolan, I'd ruther land 'em +in jail than to find a ledge of solid gold ten feet thick an' a +mile long. One thing I'd like to know first. Are yuh or ain't +yuh huntin' mules?" + +Mack Nolan laughed. "I am, yes. But the mule I'm hunting is +white!" + +Casey studied that until he had the fresh pipeful of tobacco +going well. Then he looked up and grinned understandingly. + +"So it's White Mule you're trailin'." He kicked a stub of +greasewood branch back into the flames and laughed. "Well, the +tracks is deep an' plenty, and if that's the trail you're takin', +I'm with yuh. You ain't a cop--leastways you don't spread your +arms every time you turn around. Gosh, I hate them wing-floppin' +kind! They's one thing an' one only that I hate worse--an' +that's bootleggers an' moonshiners. If you got a scheme to give +them cusses their needin's, you can ask anybody if Casey Ryan +ain't the feller you can bank on." + +"Yes. That's what I've been thinking. Now, I wish you'd tell me +exactly what you've been up against. Don't leave out anything, +however trivial it might seem to you." + +Wherefore, Casey sat with the firelight flickering across his +seamed, Irish face and told the story of his wrongs. Trivial +details Nolan had asked for--and he got them with the full Casey +Ryan flavor. Even the old woman who rocked, Casey pictured--from +his particular angle. Mack Nolan sat up and listened, his eyes +steady and his mouth, that had curved to laughter many times +during the recital, once more firm and somewhat pitiless when +Casey finished. + +"This Smiling Lou; you'd know him again, of course?" + +"Know him! Say, I'd know him after he'd fried a week in hell!" +Casey's tone left no doubt of his meaning. + +"And I suppose you could tell this man Kenner a mile off and +around a corner. Now, I'll tell you what I want you to do, +Casey. This may jar you a little--until I explain. I want +you--"Mack Nolan paused, his lips twitching in a faint smile--"to +do a little bootlegging yourself." + +"Yuh--WHAT?" In the firelight Casey's eyes were seen to bulge. + +"I want you to bootleg this whisky you've got in the car." +Nolan's eyes twinkled. "I want you to go back and peddle this +booze, and I want you to do it so that Smiling Lou or one of his +bunch will hold you up and highjack you. Do you see what I mean? +You don't--so I'll tell you. We'll put it in marked bottles. I +have the bottles and the seals and labels for every brand of +liquor to be had in the country to-day. With marked money and +marked bottles, we ought to be able to get the goods on that +gang." + +Casey thought of something quite suddenly and held out an +imperative, pointing finger. + +"There's something else that feller told me was in the car!" he +cried agitatedly. "He said he had forty pints of French +champagne cached in a false bottom under the front seat. And he +said the front cushion had a blind pocket around the edges that +was full uh dope. Hop, he called it." + +Mack Nolan whistled under his breath. + +"And he turned the whole outfit over to you for sixteen hundred +dollars or so?" He stared thoughtfully into the fire. Abruptly +he looked at Casey. + +"What the deuce had you done to him, Ryan?" he asked, with a +quizzical intentness. "He must have been scared stiff, to let go +of all that stuff for sixteen hundred. Why, man, the 'junk'-- +that's dope--alone must be worth more than that. And the +champagne --forty pints, you say? He ought to get twenty dollars +a pint for that. Figure it yourself. I hope," he added +seriously, "the fellow wasn't too scared to show up again." + +"Well," Casey said grimly, "I dunno how scart he is--but he knows +darn' well I'll kill 'im. I told im I would." + +Again Mack Nolan laughed. "Catching's much better than killing, +Ryan. It hurts a man worse, and it lasts a heap longer. What do +you say to turning in? To-morrow we'll have a full day at my +private bottling works." + +They moved their cooking outfit down near the Ford for safety's +sake. While it was wholly improbable that the car would be robbed +in the night, Mack Nolan was a man who took as few chances as +possible. It happened that the excavation Casey had so hopefully +made that morning formed a convenient level for their bed; +wherefore they spread it there, talking in low tones of their +plans until they went to sleep. + + + +CHAPTER FIFTEEN + +Dawn was just thinning the curtain of darkness when Nolan woke +Casey with a shake of the shoulder. + +"I think we'd better be moving from here before the world's +astir. You can back on down this draw, Ryan, and strike an old +trail that cuts over the ridge and up the next gulch to an old, +deserted mine where I've made headquarters. It isn't far, and we +can have breakfast at my camp." + +Casey swallowed his astonishment, and for once in his life he did +as he was told without argument. + +Mack Nolan's camp was fairly accessible by roundabout trail with +a few tire tracks to point the way for Casey. Straight across +the ridges, it would not have been more than two miles to Juniper +Wells. Nevertheless not one man in a year would be tempted to +come this way, unless it were definitely known that some one +lived here. + +As the camp of a man who was prospecting for pastime rather than +for a grubstake, the place was perfect. Mack Nolan had taken +possession of a cabin dug into the hill at the head of a long +draw. A brush-covered shed of makeshift construction sheltered a +car of the ubiquitous Ford make. Fifty yards away and in full +sight of the cabin, the mouth of a tunnel yawned blackly under a +rhyolite ledge. + +Casey swept the camp with an observant glance and nodded approval +as and stopped before the cabin. + +"As a prospector, Mr. Nolan, I'll say 'tis a fine layout you got +here. An' tain't the first time an honest-lookin' mine has been +made to cover things far off from minin'. Like the Black Butte +bunch, f'r instance. But if any one was to ride up on yuh +unexpected here, I'll say yuh could meet 'em with a grin an' feel +easy about your secrets." + +"That's praise indeed, coming from an old hand like you," Nolan +declared. "Now I'll tell you something else. With Casey Ryan in +the camp the whole thing's twice as convincing. Come in. I want +to show you what I call an artistic interior." + +Grinning, Casey followed him inside and exclaimed profanely in +admiration of Mack Nolan's genius. The cabin showed every mark +of the owner's interest in the geologic formation of that +immediate district. + +On the floor along the wall lay specimens of mineralized rock, a +couple of prospector's picks, a single-jack and a set of drills; +a sample sack, grimed and with a hole in the corner mended by the +simple process of gathering the cloth together around it and +tying it tightly with a string, hung from a nail above the tools. +On the window sill were specimens of ore; two or three of the +pieces showed a richness that lighted Casey's eyes with the +enthusiasm of an old prospector. Mining journals and a +prospector's manual lay upon a box table at the foot of the bunk. +For the rest, the cabin looked exactly what it was--the orderly +home of a man quite accustomed to primitive living far off from +his fellows. + +They had a very satisfactory breakfast cooked by Mack Nolan from +his own supplies and eaten in a leisurely manner while Nolan +talked of primary formations and secondary, and of mineral +intrusions and breaks. Casey listened and learned a few things +he had not known, for all his years of prospecting. Mack Nolan, +he decided, could pass anywhere as a mining expert. + +"And now, said Nolan briskly, when he had hung up the dishpan and +draped the dishcloth over it to dry, "I'll show you the bottling +works. We'll have to do the work by lantern-light. There's not +one chance in fifty that any one would show up here--but you +never can tell. We could get the stuff out of sight easily enough +while the car was coming up the gulch. But the smell is a +different matter. We'll take no chances." + +At the head of the bunk, a curtained space beneath a high shelf +very obviously did duty as a wardrobe. A leather motor coat hung +there, one sleeve protruding beyond the curtain of flowered +calico. Other garments bulged the cloth here and there. Nolan, +smiling over his shoulder at Casey, nodded and pushed the +clothing aside. A door behind opened inward, admitting the two +into a small recess from which another door opened into a cellar +dug deep into the hill. + +Undoubtedly this had once been used as a frost-proof storeroom. A +small ventilator pipe opened--so Nolan told Casey--in the middle +of a greasewood clump. Nolan lighted a gasoline lantern that +shed a white brilliance upon the room. On the long table which +extended down one side of the room, Casey saw boxes of bottles +and other supplies which he did not at the moment recognize. + +"We'll have to rebottle all the whisky," said Nolan. + +"You'll see a certain mark blown into the, bottom of each one of +these. The champagne, I'm afraid, I must either confiscate and +destroy or run the risk of marking the labels. The hop we'll lay +aside for further consideration." + +Casey grinned, thinking of the speedy downfall of his enemies, +Smiling Lou and Kenner--and, as a secondary consideration other +crooks of their type. + +"So now we'll unload the stuff, Ryan, and get to work here." +Nolan adjusted the white flame in the mantle of the gasoline +lantern and led the way outside. "Take in the seat-cushion, +Casey. I don't fancy opening it outside, even in this howling +wilderness." + +"I think I'll just pack in the kegs first, Mr. Nolan." For the +first time since the shock of Mr. Nolan's "mind-reading" the +night before, Casey ventured a suggestion. "Anybody comes along, +it's the kegs they'd look at cross-eyed. Cushions is expected in +Fords --if I ain't buttin' in," he added meekly. + +"Which you're not. You're acting as my agent now, Ryan, and it +will take two heads to put this over without a hitch. Sure, put +the kegs out of sight first. The bottles next--and then we'll +make short work of the dope in the cushion." + +Casey carried in the kegs while Nolan kept watch for inopportune +visitors. It was thought inadvisable to unload the camp outfit +from the car until the whisky was all removed. The outfit +effectually hid what was below--and they were taking no chances. +They both breathed freer when the two kegs were in the cellar. +Nolan was pleased; too, when Casey came out with the sample bag +and announced that he would carry the bottles in the bag. Then +Nolan fancied he heard a car, and walked away to where he would +have a longer view down the gulch. He would whistle, he said, +and warn Casey if someone was coming. + +He had not proceeded fifty yards when Casey yelled and brought +him back at a run. Casey was rummaging in the car, throwing +things about with a recklessness which ill-became an agent of the +self-possessed Mack Nolan. + +"There ain't a damn' bottle here!" he bellowed indignantly. +"Them crooks gypped me outa ten gallons uh good, bottle whisky! +Now what do you know about that, Mr. Nolan? That feller said it +was high-grade stuff he had packed away at the bottom. He lied. +There ain't nothin' here but a set uh skid chains an' a jack. +An' the champagne, mebby, under the front seat!" + +Mack Nolan's eyes narrowed. "I think Ryan, I'll have a look +under that front seat." + +He had a look--several looks, in fact. There was the false +bottom under the seat, but there was nothing in it. He took his +pocket knife, opened a blade and split the edge of the +seat-cushion at the bottom. He inserted a finger and thumb and +drew out a bit of hair stuffing. He stood up and eyed Casey +sharply, and Casey stared back defensively. + +"He was a darned liar from start t' finish. He said there was +champagne an' he said there was hop," Casey stated flatly. + +"I wondered at his letting go of stuff as valuable as that," said +Nolan. "I think we'd better take a look at those kegs." + +They went into the cellar and took a look at the kegs. Both +kegs. Afterward they stood and looked at each other. Casey's +hands went to his hips, and the muscles along his jaw hardened +into lumps. He spat into the dirt of the cellar floor. + +"Water!" He snorted disgustedly. "Casey Ryan with the devil an' +all scart outa him, thinkin' he had ownership of a load uh booze +an' hop sufficient t' hang 'im!" His hand slid into his trousers +pocket, reaching for the comforting plug of tobacco. "Stuck up +an' robbed is what happens t' Casey. You can ask anybody if it +ain't highway robbery!" + +Nolan stopped whistling under his breath. "There's the Ford," he +reminded Casey comfortingly. + +"Which I wisht it wasn't!" snarled Casey. "You know yourself, +Mr. Nolan, it's likely stole, an' the first man I meet in the +trail'll likely take it off me, claimin' it's his'n!" + +Mack Nolan started whistling again, but checked himself abruptly. +"Well, our trap's wanting bait, I see. This leaves me still +hunting the White Mule." + +"Aw, tahell with your White Mule! Tahell with everything!" +Casey kicked the nearest keg viciously and went out into the +sunshine, swearing to himself. + + + +CHAPTER SIXTEEN + +In the shade of a juniper that grew on the highest point of the +gulch's rim, Mack Nolan lay sprawled on the flat of his back, one +arm for a pillow, and stared up into the serene blue of the sky +with cottony flakes of cloud swimming steadily to the northeast. +Three feet away, Casey Ryan rested on left hip and elbow and +stared glumly down upon the cabin directly beneath them. +Whenever his pale, straight-lidded eyes focussed upon the dusty +top of the Ford car standing in front of the cabin, Casey said +something under his breath. Miles away to the south, pale +violet, dreamlike in the distance, the jagged outline of a small +mountain range stood as if painted upon the horizon. A wavy +ribbon of smudgy brown was drawn uncertainly across the base of +the mountains. This, Casey knew, when his eyes lifted to look +that way, marked the line of the Sante Fe and a train moving +heavily upgrade to the west. + +Toward it dipped the smooth stretch of barren mesa cut straight +down the middle with a yellow line that was the highway up which +Casey had driven the morning before. The inimitable magic of +distance and high desert air veiled greasewood, sage and sand +with the glamour of unreality. The mountains beyond, unspeakably +desolate and forbidding at close range, and the little black +buttes standing afar, off--small spewings of age-old volcanos +dead before man was born--seemed fascinating, unknown islets +anchored in a sea of enchantment. Across the valley to the west +nearer mountains, all amethyst and opal tinted, stood bold and +inscrutable, with jagged peaks thrust into the blue to pierce and +hold the little clouds that came floating by. Even the gulch at +hand had been touched by the enchanter's wand and smiled +mysteriously in the vivid sunlight, the very air a-quiver with +that indescribable beauty of the high mesa land which holds +desert dwellers in thrall. + +When first Casey saw the smoke smudge against the mountains to +the south, he remembered his misadventure of the lower desert and +swore. When he looked again, the majestic sweep of distance gave +him a satisfied feeling of freedom from the crowded pettinesses +of the city. For the first time since trouble met him in the +trail between Victorville and Barstow, Casey heaved a sigh of +content because he was once more out in the big land he loved. +Those distant, painted mountains, looking as impossible as the +back drop of a stage, held gulches and deep canyons he knew. The +closer hills he had prospected. The mesa, spread all around him, +seemed more familiar than the white apartment house in Los +Angeles which Casey had lately called home. And if the thought +of the Little Woman brought with it the vague discomfort of a +schoolboy playing hookey, Casey could not have regretted being +here with Mack Nolan if he had tried. + +They were lying up here in the shade--following the instinct of +other creatures of the wild to guard against surprises--while +they worked out a nice problem in moonshine. And since the +desert had never meant a monotonously placid life to Casey--who +carried his problems philosophically as a dog bears patiently +with fleas--he had every reason now for feeling very much at +home. When he reached mechanically into his pocket for his Bull +Durham and papers, any man who knew him well would have +recognized the motion as a sign that Casey was himself again, +once more on his mental feet and ready to go boring +optimistically into his next bunch of trouble. + +Mack Nolan raised his head off his arm and glanced at Casey +quizzically. + +"Well--we can't catch fish if we won't cut bait," he volunteered +sententiously. "I've a nice little job staked out for you, +Casey." + +Casey gave a grunt that might mean one of several things, and +which probably meant them all. He waited until he had his +cigarette going. "If it ain't a goat's job I'm fer it," he said. +"Casey Ryan ain't the man t' set in the shade whilst there's men +runnin' loose he's darned anxious t' meet." + +"I've been thinking over the deal those fellows pulled on you. If +the man Kenner had left you the booze and dope he told you was in +the car, I'd say it was a straight case of a sticky-fingered +officer letting a bootlegger by with part of his load, and a +later attack of cold feet on the part of the bootlegger. But +they didn't leave you any booze. So I have doped it this way, +Ryan. + +"The thing's deeper than it looked, yesterday. Those two were +working together, part of a gang, I should say, with a fairly +well-organized system. By accident--and probably for a greater +degree of safety in getting out of the city, Kenner invited you +to ride with him. He wanted no argument with that traffic cop-- +no record made of his name and license number. So he took you +in. When he found out who you were, he knew you were at outs with +the law. He knew you as an experienced desert man. He had you +placed as a valuable member of their gang, if you could be won +over and persuaded to join them. + +"As soon as possible he got you behind the wheel--further +protection to himself if he should meet an officer who was +straight. He felt you out on the subject of a partnership. And +when you met Smiling Lou--well, this Kenner had decided to take +no chance with you. He still had hopes of pulling you in with +them, but he was far from feeling sure of you. He undoubtedly +gave Smiling Lou the cue to make the thing appear an ordinary +case of highjacking while he ditched his whole load so that there +would be no evidence against him if he lost out and you turned +nasty. + +"I'm absolutely certain, Casey, that if you had not been along, +Smiling Lou would not have touched that load. They'd probably +have stopped there for a talk, exchanged news and perhaps +perfected future plans, and parted like two old cronies. It's +possible, of course, that Smiling Lou might have taken some +whisky back with him--if he had needed it. Otherwise, I think +they split more cash than booze, as a rule." + +Casey sat up. "Well, they coulda played me for a sucker easy +enough," he admitted reluctantly. "An' if it'll be any help to +yuh, Mr. Nolan, I'll say that I never seen the money passed from +Kenner to Smilin' Lou, an' I never seen a bottle unloaded from +the car. I heard 'em yes. An' I'll say there was a bunch of 'em +all right. But what I SEEN was the road ahead of me and that car +of Smilin' Lou's standin' in the middle of it. He had a gun +pulled on me, mind yuh--and you can ask anybody if a feller feels +like rubberin' much when there's only the click of a trigger +between him an' a six-foot hole in the ground." + +"All the more reason," said Nolan, also sitting up with his hands +clasped around his knees, "why it's important to catch them with +the goods. You'll have to peddle hootch, Casey, until we get +Smiling Lou and his outfit." + +"And where, Mr. Nolan, do I git the booze to peddle?" asked Casey +practically. + +Nolan laughed to himself. "It can be bought," he said, "but I'd +rather not. Since you've never monkeyed with the stuff, it might +make you conspicuous if you went around buying up a load of +hootch. And of course I can't appear in this thing at all. But I +have what I think is a very good plan." + +Casey looked at him inquiringly, and again Nolan laughed. + +"Nothing for it, Casey,--we'll have to locate a still and rob it. +That, or make some of our own, which takes time. And it's an +unpleasant, messy job anyway." + +Casey stared dubiously down into the gulch. "That'd be fine, Mr. +Nolan, if we knew where was the still. Or mebby yuh do know." + +Mack Nolan shook his head. "No, I don't, worse luck. I haven't +been long enough in the district to know as much about it as I +hope to know later on. Prospecting for this headquarters took a +little time; and getting my stuff moved in here secretly took +more time. A week ago, Casey, I shouldn't have been quite ready +to use you. But you came when you were needed, and so--I feel +sure the White Mule will presently show up." + +Casey lifted his head and stared meditatively out across the +immensity of the empty land around them. + +"She's a damn' big country, Mr. Nolan. I dunno," he remarked +doubtfully. "But Casey Ryan has yet t' go after a thing an' fail +t' git it. I guess if it's hootch we want, it ought t' be easy +enough t' find; it shore has been hard t' dodge it lately! If yuh +want White Mule, Mr. Nolan, you send Casey out travelin' peaceful +an' meanin' harm t' nobody. Foller Casey and you'll find 'im +tangled up with a mess uh hootch b'fore he gits ten miles from +camp." + +"You could go out and highjack some one." Nolan agreed, taking +him seriously--which Casey had not intended. "I think we'll go +down and load the camp outfit into my car, Ryan, and I'll start +you out. Go up into your old stamping ground where people know +you. If you're careful in picking your men, you could locate some +hootch, couldn't you, without attracting attention?" + +Casey studied the matter. "Bill Masters could mebby help me +out," he said finally. "Only I don't like the friends Bill's +been wishin' onto me lately. This man Kenner, that held me up, +knowed Bill Masters intimate. I'm kinda losin' my taste fer Bill +lately." + +Mack Nolan seized upon the clue avidly. Before Casey quite +realized what he had done, he found himself hustled away from +camp in Mack Nolan's car, headed for Lund in the service of his +government. Since young Kenner had been able to talk so +intimately of Bill Masters, Mack Nolan argued that Bill Masters +should likewise be able to give some useful information +concerning young Kenner. Moreover, a man in Bill Masters' +position would probably know at least a few of the hidden trails +of the White Mule near Lund. + +"If you can bring back a load of moonshine Ryan, by all means do +so," Nolan instructed Casey at the last moment. "Here's money to +buy it with. We should have enough to make a good haul for +Smiling Lou. Twenty gallons at least--forty, if you can get them. +Keep your weather eye open, and whatever happens, don't mention +my name or say that you are working with the law. In five days, +if you are not here, I shall drive to Las Vegas. Get word to me +there if anything goes wrong. Just write or wire to General +Delivery. But I look for you back, Ryan, not later than Friday +midnight. Take no unnecessary risk; this is more important than +you know." + +Nolan's crisp tone of authority remained with Casey mile upon +mile. And such was the Casey Ryan driving that midnight found him +coasting into Bill Masters' garage in Lund with the motor shut +off and a grin on the Casey Ryan face. + + + +CHAPTER SEVENTEEN + +Mack Nolan had just crawled into his bunk on Wednesday night when +he thought he heard a car laboring up the gulch. He sat up in +bed to listen and then got hurriedly into his clothes. He was +standing just around the corner of the dugout where the +headlights could not reach him, when Casey killed the engine and +stopped before the door. Steam was rising in a small cloud from +the radiator cap, and the sound of boiling water was distinctly +audible some distance away. + +Mack Nolan waited until Casey had climbed out from behind the +wheel and headed for the door. Then he stepped out and hailed +him. Casey started perceptibly, whirling as if to face an enemy. +When he saw that it was Nolan he apparently lost his desire to +enter the cabin. Instead he came close to Nolan and spoke in a +hoarse whisper. + +"We better run 'er under the shed, Mr. Nolan, and drain the +darned radiator. I dunno am I follered or not, but I was awhile +back. But the man that catches Casey Ryan when he's on the trail +an' travelin, has yet t' be born. An' you can ask anybody if +that ain't so." + +Mack Nolan's eyes narrowed. "And who followed you then?" he +asked quietly. "Did you bring any hootch?" + +"Did yuh send Casey Ryan after hootch, or was it mebby spuds er +somethin'?" Casey retorted with heavy dignity. "Will yuh pack +it in, Mr. Nolan, whilst I back the car in the shed, or shall I +bring it when I come? It ain't so much," he added drily, "but +it cost the trouble of a trainload." + +"I'll take it in," said Nolan. "If any one does come we want no +evidence in reach." + +Casey turned to the car, clawed at his camp outfit and lifted out +a demijohn which he grimly handed to Nolan. "Fer many a mile it +rode on the seat with me so I could drink 'er down if they got me +cornered," he grinned. "One good swaller is about the size of +it, Mr. Nolan." + +Nolan grinned in sympathy and turned into the cabin, bearing the +three-gallon, wicker-covered glass bottle in his arms. Presently +he returned to the doorway and stood there listening down the +gulch until Casey came up, walking from the shed. + +"'Tis a good thing yuh left this other car standin' here cold an' +peaceful, Mr. Nolan," Casey, observed, after he also had stood +for a minute listening. "If they're follerin' they'll be here +darn' soon. If they ain't I've ditched 'em. Let's git t' bed an' +I'll tell yuh my tale uh woe." + +Without a word Nolan led the way into the cabin. In the dark +they undressed and got into the bed which was luckily wide enough +for two. + +"Had your supper?" Nolan asked belatedly when they were settled. + +"I did not," Casey grunted. "I will say, Mr. Nolan, there's few +times in my life when you'd see Casey Ryan missin' 'is supper +whilst layin' tracks away from a fight. But if it was light +enough you could gaze upon 'im now. And I must hand it t' the +Gallopin' Gussie yuh give me the loan of fer the trip. She brung +me home ahead of the sheriff--and you can ask anybody if Casey +Ryan himself can't be proud uh that!" + +"The sheriff?" Nolan's voice was puzzled. He seemed to be +considering something for a minute, before he spoke again. "You +could have explained to the sheriff, couldn't you, your reason +for having booze in the car?" + +Casey raised to one elbow. "When yuh told Casey Ryan 'twas not +many men you'd trust, and that you trusted me an' the business +was t' be secret--Mr. Nolan, you 'was talkin' t' CASEY RYAN!" He +lay down again as if that precluded further argument. + +"Good! I thought I hadn't made a mistake in my man," Nolan +approved, in a tone that gave Casey an inner glow of pride in +himself. "Let's have the story, old man. Did you see Bill +Masters?" + +"Bill Masters," said Casey grimly, "was not in Lund. His garage +is sold an, Bill's in Denver--which is a long drive for a Ford t' +git there an, back before Friday midnight. Yuh put a time limit +me, Mr. Nolan, an' nobody had Bill's address. I didn't foller +Bill t' Denver. I asked some others in Lund if they knowed a man +named Kenner, and they did not. So then I went huntin' booze +that I could git without the hull of Nevada knowin' it in fifteen +minutes. An' Casey's got this t' say: When yuh WANT hootch. it's +hard t' find as free gold in granite. When yuh DON'T want it, +it's forced on yuh at the point of a gun. This jug I +stole--seein' your business is private, Mr. Nolan. + +"I grabbed it off some fellers I knowed in Lund an' never had no +use for, anyway. They're mean enough when they're sober, an' +when they're jagged they're not t' be mentioned on a Sunday. I +mighta paid 'em for it, but money's no good t' them fellers an' +there's no call t' waste it. So they made a holler and I sets +the jug down an' licks them both, an' comes along home mindin' my +own business. + +"So I guess they 'phoned the sheriff in Vegas that here comes a +bootlegger and land 'im quick. Anyway, I was goin' t' stop there +an' take on a beefsteak an' a few cups uh coffee, but I never +done it. I was slowin' down in front uh Sam's Place when a +friend uh mine gives me the high sign t' put 'er in high an' keep +'er goin'. Which I done. + +"Down by Ladd's, Casey looks back an' here comes the sheriff's +car hell bent fer 'lection (anyway it looked like the sheriff's +car). An' I wanta say right here, Mr. Nolan, that's a darn' good +Ford yuh got! I was follered, and 'I was follered hard. But I'm +here an' they' ain't--an' you can ask anybody if that didn't take +some going'!" + +In the darkness of the cabin Casey turned over and heaved a great +sigh. On the heels of that came a chuckle. + +"I got t' hand it t' the L. A. traffic cops, Mr. Nolan. They +shore learned me a lot about dodgin'. So now yuh got the hull +story. If it was the sheriff behind me an' if he trails me here, +they got no evidence an' you can mebby square it with 'im. You'd +know what t' tell 'im--which is more'n what Casey Ryan can say." + +Casey fell asleep immediately afterward, but Mack Nolan lay for a +long while with his eyes wide open and his ears alert for strange +sounds in the gulch. He was a new man in this district, working +independently of sheriff's offices. Casey Ryan was the first man +he had confided in; all others were fair game for Nolan to prove +honest or dishonest with the government. The very nature of his +business made it so. For when whisky runners drove openly in +broad daylight through the country with their unlawful loads, +somewhere along the line officers of the law were sharing the +profits. Nolan knew none of them,--by sight. If he carried the +records of some safely memorized and pigeonholed for future use, +that was his own business. Mack Nolan's thoughts were his own and +he guarded them jealously and slept with his lips tightly closed. +He wanted no sheriff coming to him for explanation of his +movements. Wherefore he listened long, and when he slept his +slumber was light. + +At daylight he was up and abroad. Two hours after sunrise Casey +awoke with the smell of breakfast in his nostrils. He rolled +over and blinked at Mack Nolan standing with his hat on the back +of his head and a cigarette between his lips, calmly turning +three hot-cakes with a kitchen knife. Casey grinned +condescendingly. He himself turned his cakes by the simple +process of tossing them in the air a certain kind of flip, and +catching them dexterously as they came down. Right there he +decided that Mack Nolan was not after all a real outdoors man. + +"Well, the sheriff didn't arrive last night," Nolan observed +cheerfully, when he saw that Casey was awake. "I don't much look +for him, either. Your driving on past the turn to Juniper Wells +and coming up that other old road very likely threw him off the +track. You must have been close to the State line then and he +gave you up as a bad job." + +"It was a GOOD job!" Casey maintained reaching for his clothes. +"I made 'em think I was headed clean outa the country. If they +knowed who it was at all, they'd know I belong in L. A., and I +figured they'd guess I was headed there. They stopped for +something this side of Searchlight an' so I pulls away from 'em a +couple of miles. They never seen where I went to." + +While he washed for breakfast, Casey began to take stock of +certain minor injuries. + +"That darned Pete Gibson has got tushes in his mouth like a wild +hawg; the kind that sticks out," he grumbled, touching certain +skinned places on his knuckles. "Every time I landed on 'im +yesterday I run against them tushes uh his'n." But he added with +a grin, "They ain't so solid as they was when I met up with 'im. +I felt one of 'em give 'fore I got through." + +"Brings the price of moonshine up a bit, doesn't it?" Nolan +suggested drily. "I rather think you might better have paid the +men their price. A fight is well enough in its way--I'm Irish +myself. But as my agent, Ryan, the main idea is to let the law +fight for you. Our work is merely to give the law a chance. I +like your not wanting to explain to the sheriff. Prohibition +officers do not explain, as a rule. The law behind them does +that. + +"And since the price seems to be rather hard on the knuckles--" +He glanced down at Casey's hands and grinned"--I think it may +come cheaper to make the stuff ourselves. Licking two men for +three gallons, and getting the officers at your tail light into +the bargain, is all right as an experiment; but I don't believe, +Ryan, we ought to adopt that as a habit. + +Casey cocked an eye up at him. "Did yuh ever make White Mule, +Mr. Nolan? he asked grimly. + +Nolan laughed his easy little chuckle. "Why, no, Ryan, I never +did. Did you?" + +"Naw. I seen some made once, but I had too much of it inside me +at the time to learn the receipt for it. I'd rather steal it, if +it's all the same to you, Mr. Nolan." His hand went up to the +back of his head and moved forward, although there was no hat to +push. "I've lived honest all these years--an', dammit, it's kinda +tough to break out with stealin I what yuh don't want! Couldn't +we fill them bottles with somethin' that LOOKS like hootch? Cold +tea should get by, Mr. Nolan. It'd be a fine joke on Smilin' +Lou." + +"A good joke, maybe--but no evidence. It isn't against the law, +Ryan, to have cold tea in your possession. No, it's got to be +whisky, and there's got to be a load of it. Enough to look like +business and tempt him or any other member of the gang you happen +to meet. If they caught you with three gallons, Casey, they'd +probably run you in and feel very virtuous about it. Nothing for +it, I'm afraid. We'll have to become real moonshiners ourselves +for awhile." + +Casey ate with less appetite after that. Making moonshine did +not appeal to him at all. Given his choice, I think he would +even prefer drinking it, unhappy as the effect had been on him. + +"We'll need a still, and we'll need the stuff. I'm going to +leave you in charge of the camp, Ryan, while I make a trip to +Needles. I'll deputize you to assist me in cleaning up this +district. And this district, Ryan, touches salt water. So if +revenge looks good to you, you'll have a fine chance to get even +with the bootleggers. And in the meantime, just kill time around +camp here while I'm gone. If any one shows up, you're +prospecting." + +That day, doubt-devils took hold of Casey Ryan and plucked at his +belief. How did he know that Mack Nolan wasn't another +bootlegger, wanting to rope Casey in on a job for some fell +purpose of his own? He had Mack Nolan's word and nothing more. +For that matter, he had also had young Kenner's word. Kenner had +fooled him completely. Mack Nolan could also fool him--perhaps. + +"Well, anyhow, he never claimed to know Bill Masters, and that's +a point in 'is favor. And if it's some dirty work he's up to, he +coulda made it shorter than what he's doin'. An' if he's +double-crossin' Casey Ryan--well, anyway, Casey Ryan 'll be +present at the time an' place when he does it!" + +Upon that comforting thought, Casey decided to trust Mack Nolan +until he caught him playing crooked; and proceeded to kill time +as best he could. + + + +CHAPTER EIGHTEEN + +It was noon the next day when Nolan returned, and he did not +explain why he was eighteen hours overdue. Casey eyed him +expectantly, but Nolan's manner was brisk and preoccupied. + +"Help me unload this stuff, Ryan," he said, "and put it out of +sight in the cellar. We won't have to go through the process of +making moonshine, after all." + +Casey looked into the car, pulling aside the tarp. Four kegs he +counted, and lifted out one. + +"An' how many did YOU lick, Mr. Nolan?" he grinned over his +shoulder as he started for the door. + +Nolan laughed noncommittally. + +"Perhaps I'm luckier at picking my bootleggers," he retorted. "If +you carry the right brand of bluff, you can keep the skin on your +knuckles, Ryan. This beats making it, at any rate." + +That afternoon and the next day, Casey Ryan did what he never +dreamed was possible. With Mack Nolan to show him how, Casey +performed miracles. While he did not, literally change water +into wine, he did give forty-three gallons of White Mule a most +imposing pedigree. + +He turned kegs of crude, moonshine whisky into Canadian Club, +Garnkirk, Tom Pepper, Three Star Hennessey and Cognac--if you +were to believe the bottles, labels and government seals. Under +Mack Nolan's instruction and with his expert assistance, the +forgery was perfect. While the cellar reeked with the odor of +White Mule when they had finished, the bottled array on the table +whispered of sybaritic revelings to glisten the eyes of the most +dissipated man about town. + +"When it's as easy done as that, Mr. Nolan, the feller's a fool +that drinks it. You've learnt Casey Ryan somethin' that mighta +done 'im some good a few years back." He picked up a flat, pint +bottle and caressed its label with reminiscent finger tips. + +"Many's the time me an' old Tommy Pepper drove stage together," +he mused. "Throwed 'im at a bear once that I met in the trail +over in Colorado when I hadn't no gun on me. Busted a pint on +his nose--man! Then I never waited to see what happened. I was a +wild divil them days when me an' Tommy Pepper was side pardners. +But a yaller snake with a green head crawled out of a bottle of +'im once--and that there was where Casey Ryan says good-by to +booze. If I hadn't quit 'im then, I'd sure as hell quit 'im now. +After this performance, Mr. Nolan, Casey Ryan's goin' to look +twice into his coffee pot. I wouldn't believe in cow's milk, if +I done the milkin' myself!" + +"Most of the stuff that's peddled nowadays is doctored," Nolan +replied, with the air of one who knows. "When it isn't White +Mule, it's likely to be something worse. That's one of the chief +reasons why I'm fighting it. If they only peddled decent whisky +it wouldn't be so bad, Ryan. But it's rank poison. I've seen so +many go stone blind--or die--that it makes me pretty savage +sometimes. So now I'll coach you in the part you're to play as +hootch runner; and to-morrow you can start for Los Angeles." + +Casey did not answer. He felt absently for his pipe, filled and +lighted it and went out to sit on the doorstep in gloomy +meditation while he smoked. + +Returning to Los Angeles, even without a bootlegger's load, was +not a matter which Casey liked to contemplate. He would have to +face the Little Woman if he went back; either as a deliberate +liar, who lied to his wife to gain the freedom he might have had +without resorting to deceit, or as the victim once more of +crooks. Casey thought he would prefer the accusation of lying +deliberately to the Little Woman, though it made him squirm to +think of it. He wished she had not openly taunted him with +getting into trouble and needing her always to get him out. + +He would like to tell her that he was now working for the +government. The secrecy of his mission, the danger it involved, +would impress even her amused cynicism. But the very secrecy of +his mission in itself made it impossible for him to tell her +anything about it. Casey would not admit it, but it was a real +disappointment to him that he could not wear a star on his coat. + +All that day and evening he was glum, a strange mood for Casey +Ryan. But if Mack Nolan noticed his silence, he gave no sign. +Nolan himself was wholly absorbed by the business in hand. The +success of this plan meant a good deal to him, and he told Casey +so very frankly; which lightened Casey's gloom perceptibly. + +Casey was to drive to Los Angeles--even to San Diego if +necessary-- and return within a week, unless Nolan's hopes were +fulfilled and Casey was held up and highjacked. If he were +apprehended by officers who were honestly discharging their duty, +Casey was to do thus-and-so, and presently be free to drive on +with his load. If he were highjacked (Casey gritted his teeth +and said he hoped the highjacker would be Smiling Lou), he was to +permit himself to be robbed, worm himself as far as possible into +their confidence and return for further orders. + +If Mack Nolan should chance to be absent from the cabin, then +Casey was to wait until he returned. And Nolan intimated that +hereafter the making of moonshine might be a part of Casey's +duties. Then, without warning, Mack Nolan struck at the heart of +Casey's worry. + +"I don't want to dictate to any man in family affairs, Ryan. But +I've got to speak of one other matter," he said diffidently. "I +suppose naturally you'll want to go home and let your wife know +you're still alive, anyway. But if you can manage to keep your +present business a secret for the time being, I think you'd +better do it. You said you were planning to be away on a trip +for some time, I remember. If you can just let it go that way, +or say that you are prospecting over here, I wish you would. +Think you can manage that all right?" + +"I'd rather manage a six-horse team of bronk mules," Casey +admitted. "But after the way the missus thinks I lied to 'er +about takin' the next train home from Barstow, anything I say 'll +be used agin' me. My wife's got brains. She ain't put it down +that the trains have quit runnin'. Accordin' to her figures, +Casey's lied and he's in a hole again, an' it'll be up to her an' +Jack to run windlass an' pull 'im out. Don't matter what I say +she won't believe me anyhow --so Casey won't say nothin'. Can't +lie with your mouth shut, can yuh?" + +"Oh, yes, it's been done," Mack Nolan chuckled. "Now we'll set +down the serial numbers and the bank name of this 'jack',--and +here's your expense money separate. And if there's anything that +isn't clear to you, Ryan, speak up. You won't hear from me +again, probably, until you're back from this fishing trip." + +Casey thought that everything was perfectly clear, and rashly he +said so, as he started off. + +From Barstow to Victorville, from Victorville to Camp Cajon Casey +drove expectantly, hoping to meet Smiling Lou. He scanned each +car that approached and slowed for every meeting like a searching +party or a man who is lost and wishes to inquire the way. His +pace would have been law-abiding in Los Angeles at five o'clock +on Broadway between Fourth and Eighth streets. Goggled women +tourists eyed him curiously, and one car stopped full to see what +he wanted. But his "Tom Pepper" rode safe under the tarp behind +him, and the "Three Star Hennessey" beaded daintily with the +joggling it got, and Casey was neither halted nor questioned as +he passed. + +At Camp Cajon Casey stopped and cooked an early supper, because +the summer crowd was there and a real bootlegger would have +considered stopping rather unsafe. Casey boiled coffee over one +of the camp fireplaces and watched furtively the sunburned +holiday group nearest. He placed his supper on one of the round, +cement tables near the car, and every man who passed that way +Casey watched unblinkingly while he ate. + +He succeeded in making three different parties swallow their +supper in a hurry and pack up and leave, glancing back uneasily +at Casey as they drove away. But Casey himself was unmolested, +and no one asked about his load. + +From Camp Cajon to San Bernardino Casey drove furiously, +remembering young Kenner's desire for speed. He stopped there +for the night, and nearly had a fight with the garage man where +he put up, because he showed undue caution concerning the safety +of his car from prowlers during the night. + +He left the car there that day and returned furtively after dark, +asking the night man if he had seen any saps around his car. The +night man looked at him uncomprehendingly. + +"I dunno--nothin's been picked up since I come on at six. We +ain't responsible for lost articles, anyway. See that sign?" + +Casey grunted, cranked up and drove away, wondering whether the +night man was as innocent as he tried to act. + +From San Bernardino to Los Angeles Casey drove placidly as a load +of oranges in February. He put up at a cheap place on San Pedro +Street, with his car in the garage next door and a five-dollar +tip in the palm of a rat-faced mechanic with Casey's injunction +to clean 'er dingbats and keep other people away. + +He did not go out to see the Little Woman, after all. He had +sent her a wire from Goffs the day before, saying that he was +prospecting with a fellow and he hoped she was well. This, after +long pondering, had seemed to him the easiest way out of an +argument with the Little Woman. The wire had given no address +whereby she might reach him, but the omission was not the +oversight Casey hoped she would consider it. He wanted to be +reassuring without starting anything. + +Los Angeles with no Little Woman at his elbow was a dismal hole, +and Casey got out of it as soon as possible. As per +instructions, he drove down to San Diego, ventured perilously +close to the Mexico line, fooled around there for a day looking +for trouble, failed to find so much as a frown and drove back. + +He headed straight for San Bernardino, which was Smiling Lou's +headquarters. He killed time there and met the sheriff on the +street the day he arrived. The sheriff had a memory trained to +hold faces indefinitely. He smiled a little, made a polite +gesture in the general direction of his hat and passed on. Casey +swore to himself and resolved to duck guiltily around the nearest +corner if he saw the sheriff coming his way again. + +On the day when his time limit expired Casey drove up the gulch +to Nolan's camp. In the car behind him rode undisturbed his +Canadian Club, Garnkirk, Three-Star Hennessey, Cognac and Tom +Pepper; bottles, labels, government seals and all. Nolan was +walking over from the tunnel when Casey arrived. He smiled +inquiringly as he shook hands, --a ceremony to which Casey was +plainly unaccustomed. + +"What luck, Ryan? I beat you back by about two hours. Getting +things ready to begin making it. Did they catch you all right?" + +"Naw!" Casey spat disgustedly. "Never seen a booze peddler, +never seen a cop look my way. I went around actin' like I just +killed a man an' stole a lady's diamonds, and the sheriff at San +Berdoo TIPS 'IS HAT TO ME, by golly! Drove through L. A. +hella-whoopin' an' not a darned traffic cop knowed it was Casey +Ryan. You can ask anybody if I didn't do every thing possible to +git in bad or give bootleggers a tip I was one of 'em. + +"You can't git Casey Ryan up agin' the gang you're after, Mr. +Nolan. Only way Casey Ryan can git up agin' the law is to go +along peaceable tryin' to please the missus an' mindin' his own +business. I coulda peddled that damn' hootch on a hangin' tray +like circus lemonade. I coulda stood on the corner in any uh them +damned towns with the hull works piled out on a table in front of +me, an' I coulda hollered my damn' head off ; an' Smilin' Lou +woulda passed me by like I was sellin' chewin' gum and shoe +strings." + +Mack Nolan looked at Casey, turned and went into the cabin, sat +down on the edge of the bed and laughed until the tears dripped +over his lashes. Casey Ryan followed him, and sat on the edge of +the table with his arms folded. Whenever Mack Nolan lifted his +face from his palms and looked at Casey, Casey swore. Whereat +Mack Nolan would give another whoop. + +You can't wonder if relations were somewhat strained, between +them for the rest of that day. + + + +CHAPTER NINETEEN + +Nature had made Casey Ryan an optimist. The blood of Ireland had +made him pugnacious. And Mack Nolan had a way with him. +Wherefore, Casey Ryan once more came larruping down the grade to +Camp Cajon and turned in there with a dogged purpose in his eyes +and with his jaw set stubbornly. History has it that whenever +Casey Ryan gets that look in his face, the man underneath might +just as well holler and crawl out; because holler he must, before +Casey would ever let him up. + +Behind him, stowed under the bedding, grub and camp dishes, rode +his eight cases of bootlegger's bait, packed convincingly in the +sawdust, straw and cardboard of the wet old days when Uncle Sam +himself 0. K.'d the job. A chain of tiny beads at the top of +each bottle lied and said it was good liquor. The boxes +themselves said, "This side up"--when any side up would thrill +the soul of the man who owned a wet appetite and a dry throat. + +It was a good job Mack Nolan had made of the bottling. Uncle Sam +himself must needs polish his spectacles and take another look to +detect the fraud. It was a marvelous job of bottling,--and the +proof lay only in the drinking. "Tommy" Pepper rode in pint +flasks designed to slip safely into a man's coat pocket. Beside +him two cases of Canadian Club (if you were satisfied with the +evidence of your eyes) sat serene in round-shouldered +bottles--conventional, secure in its reputation. Cognac and +Garnkirk, a case for each, rode in tall, slim bottles with no +shoulders at all. Plumper than they, Three Star Hennessey sat +smugly waiting until the joke was turned upon its victim. A +tempting load it was, to men of certain minds and morals. Casey +grinned sardonically when he thought of it. + +Casey drove deep into the grove of sycamores and made camp there, +away from the chattering picnic parties at the cement tables. By +Mack Nolan's advice he was adopting a slightly different policy. +He no longer shunned his fellow men or glared suspiciously when +strangers approached. Instead he was very nearly the old Casey +Ryan, except that he failed to state his name and business to all +and sundry with the old Casey Ryan candor, but instead avoided +the subject altogether or evaded questions with vague +generalities. + +But as an understudy for Ananias, Casey Ryan would have been a +failure. In two hours or less he had made easy trail acquaintance +with six different men, and he had unconsciously managed to vary +his vague account of himself six different times. Wherefore he +was presently asked cautiously concerning his thirst. + +"They's times," said Casey, hopefully lowering an eyelid, "when a +feller dassent take a nip, no matter how thirsty he gits." + +The questioner stared at him for a minute and slowly nodded. +"You're darn' right," he assented. "I scursely ever touch +anything, myself." And he added vaguely, "Quite a lot of it +peddled out here in this camp, I guess. Tourists comin' through +are scared to pack it themselves--but they sure don't overlook +any chances to take a snort." + +"Yeah?" Casey cocked a knowing eye at the speaker. "They must +pay a pretty fair price fer it, too. Don't the cops bother folks +none?" + +"Some--I guess." + +Casey filled his pipe and offered his tobacco sack to the man. +The fellow took it, nodding listless thanks, and filled his own +pipe. The two sat down together on the knee of a deformed +sycamore and smoked in circumspect silence. + +"Arizona, I see." The man nodded toward the license plates on +Casey's car. + +"Uh-huh." Casey glanced that way. "Know a man name of Kenner?" +He asked abruptly. + +The fellow looked at Casey sidelong, without turning his head. + +"Some. Do you?" + +"Some." Casey felt that he was making headway, though it was a +good deal like playing checkers with the king row wide open and +only two crowned heads to defend his men. + +"Friend uh yours?" The fellow turned his head and looked +straight at Casey. + +Casey returned him a pale, straight-lidded stare. The man's +glance flickered and swung away. + +"Who wants to know?" Casey asked calmly. + +"Oh, you can call me Jim Cassidy. I just asked." He removed his +pipe from his mouth and inspected it apathetically. "He's a +friend of Bill Masters, garage man up at Lund. Know Bill?" + +"Any man says I don't, you can call 'im a liar." Casey also +inspected his pipe. "Bought that car off'n Kenner," Casey added +boldly. Getting into trouble, he discovered, carried almost the +thrill of trying to keep out of it. + +"Yeah?" The self-styled Jim Cassidy looked at the Ford more +attentively. "And contents?" + +Casey snorted. "What do you know about goats, if anything?" he +asked mysteriously. + +Jim Cassidy eyed Casey sidelong through a silence. Then he +brought his palm down flat on his thigh and laughed. + +"You pass," he stated, with a relieved sigh. "He's a dinger, +ain't he?" + +"You know 'im, all right." Casey also laughed and put out his +hand. "If you're a friend of Kenner's, shake hands with Casey +Ryan! He's damned glad to meet yuh--an' you can ask anybody if +that ain't the truth." + +After that the acquaintance progressed more smoothly. By the +time Casey spread his bed close alongside the car--he knew just +how much booze Jim Cassidy carried, just what Cassidy expected to +make off the load, and a good many other bits of information of +no particular use to Casey. + +A strange, inner excitement held Casey awake long after Jim +Cassidy was asleep snoring. He lay looking up into the leafy +branches of the sycamore beside him and watched a star slip +slowly across an open space between the branches. Farther up the +grove a hilarious group of young hikers sang snatches of songs to +the uncertain accompaniment of a ukelele. A hundred feet away on +his right, occasional cars went coasting past on the down grade, +coming in off the desert, or climbed more slowly with motors +working, on their way up from the valley below. The shifting +brilliance from their headlights flicked the grove capriciously +as they went by. Now and then a car stopped. One, a big, +high-powered car with one dazzling spotlight swung into the +narrow driveway and entered the grove. + +Casey lifted his head like a desert turtle and blinked curiously +at the car as it eased past him a few feet and stopped. A gloved +hand went out to the spotlight and turned it slowly, lighting the +grove foot by foot and pausing to dwell upon each silent, parked +car. Casey sat up in the blankets and waited. + +Luck, he told himself, was grinning at him from ear to ear. For +this was Smiling Lou himself, and none other. He was alone,--a +big, hungry, official fish searching the grove greedily. Casey +swallowed a grin and tried to look scared. The light was slowly +working around in his direction. + +I don't suppose Casey Ryan had ever looked really scared in his +life. His face simply refused to wear so foreign an expression. +Therefore, when the spotlight finally revealed him, Casey blinked +against it with a half-hearted grin, as if he had been caught at +something foolish. The light remained upon him, and Smiling Lou +got out of the car and came back to him slowly. + +Not even Casey thought of calling Smiling Lou a fool. He +couldn't be and play the game he was playing. Smiling Lou said +nothing whatever until he had looked the car over carefully +(giving the license number a second sharp glance) and had +regarded Casey fixedly while he made up his mind. + +"Hullo! Where's your pardner?" he demanded then. + +"I'm in pardnerships with myself this trip," Casey retorted. He +waited while Smiling Lou looked him over again, more carefully +this time. + +"Where did you get that car?" + +"From Kenner--for sixteen-hundred and seventeen dollars and five +cents." Casey fumbled in the blankets--Smiling Lou following his +movements suspiciously--and got out the makings of a cigarette. + +"Got any booze in that car?" Smiling Lou might have been a +traffic cop, for all the trace of humanity there was in his +voice. + +Casey cocked an eye up at him, sent a quick glance toward the +Ford, and looked back into Smiling Lou's face. He hunched his +shoulders and finished the making of his cigarette. + +"I wisht you wouldn't look," he said glumly. "I got half my +outfit in there an' I hate to have it tore up." + +Smiling Lou continued to look at him, seeming slightly puzzled. +But indecision was not one of his characteristics, evidently. He +stepped up to the car, pulled a flashlight from his pocket and +looked in. + +Casey was up and into his clothes by the time Smiling Lou had +uncovered a box or two. Smiling Lou turned toward him, his lips +twitching. + +"Lift this stuff out of here and put it in my car," he commanded, +elation creeping into his voice in spite of himself. "My Lord! +The chances you fellows take! Think a dab of paint is going to +cover up a brand burnt into the wood?" + +Casey looked startled, glancing down into the car to where +Smiling Lou pointed. + +"The boards is turned over on all the rest," he muttered +confidentially. "I dunno how that darned Canadian Club sign got +right side up." + +"What all have you got?" Smiling Lou lowered his voice when he +asked the question. Casey tried not to grin when he replied. +Smiling Lou gasped, + +"Well, get it into my car, and make it snappy." + +Casey made it as snappy as he could, and kept his face straight +until Smiling Lou spoke to him sharply. + +"I won't take you in to-night with me. I want that car. You +drive it into headquarters first thing in the morning. And don't +think you can beat it, either. I'll have the road posted. You +can knock a good deal off your sentence if you crank up and come +in right after breakfast. And make it an early breakfast, too." + +His manner was stern, his voice perfectly official. But Casey, +eyeing him grimly, saw distinctly the left eyelid lower and lift +again. + +"All right--I'm the goat," he surrendered and sat down again on +his canvas-covered bed. He did not immediately crawl between the +blankets, however, because interesting things were happening over +at Jim Cassidy's car. + +Casey watched Jim Cassidy go picking his way amongst the tree +roots and camp litter, his back straightened under the load of +hootch he was carrying to Smiling Lou's car. With Jim Cassidy +also, Smiling Lou was crisply official. When the last of the +hootch had been transferred, Casey heard Smiling Lou tell Jim +Cassidy to drive in to headquarters after breakfast next +morning--but he did not see Smiling Lou wink when he said it. + +After that, Smiling Lou started his motor and drove slowly up +through the grove, halting to scan each car as he passed. He +swung out through the upper driveway, turned sharply there and +came back down the highway speeding up on the downhill grade to +San Bernardino. + +Jim Cassidy came furtively over and settle down for a whispered +conference on Casey's bed. + +"How much did he get off'n YOU?" he asked inquisitively. "Did he +clean yuh out?" + +"Clean as a last year's bone in a kioty den," Casey declared, +hiding his satisfaction as best he could. "Never got my roll +though." + +"He wouldn't--not with you workin' on the inside. Guess it must +be kinda touchy around here right now. New officers, mebby. He +wouldn't a' cleaned us out if we'd a' been safe. He never came +into camp before--not when I've been here. Made that same play +to you, didn't he--about givin' yourself up in the morning? Uh +course yuh know what that means--DON'T!" + +"He shore is foxy, all right," Casey commented with absolute +sincerity. "You can ask anybody if he didn't pull it off like +the pleasure was all his'n. No L. A. traffic cop ever pinched me +an I looked like he enjoyed it more." + +"Oh, Lou's cute, all right. They don't any of 'em put anything +over on Lou. You must be new at the business, ain't yuh?" + +"Second trip," Casey informed him with an air of importance-- +which he really felt, by the way. "What Casey's studyin' on now, +is the next move. No use hangin' around here empty. What do YOU +figger on doin'?" + +"Well, Lou didn't give no tip--not to me, anyway. So I guess +it'll be safe to drive on in to the city and load up again. I +got a feller with me--he caught a ride in to San Berdoo; left +just before you drove in. Know where to go in the city? 'Cause +I can ride in with you, an' let him foller." + +"That'll suit me fine," Casey declared. And so they left it for +the time being, and Cassidy went back to bed. + +A great load had dropped from Casey's shoulders, and he was +asleep before Jim Cassidy had ceased to turn restlessly in his +blankets. Getting the White Mule out of his car and into the car +of Smiling Lou had been the task which Nolan had set for him. +What was to happen thereafter Casey could only guess, for Nolan +had not told him. And such was the Casey Ryan nature that he made +no attempt to solve the problems which Mack Nolan had calmly +reserved for himself. + +He did not dream, for instance, that Mack Nolan had watched him +load the stuff into Smiling Lou's car. He did know that an +unobtrusive Cadillac roadster was parked at the next campfire. +It had come in half an hour behind him, but the driver had not +made any move toward camping until after dark. Casey had glanced +his way when the car was parked and the driver got out and began +fussing around the car, but he had not been struck with any sense +of familiarity in the figure. + +There was no reason why he should. Thousands and thousands of +men are of Mack Nolan's height and general build. This man +looked like a doctor or a dentist perhaps. Beyond the matter of +size, similarity to Mack Nolan ceased. The Cadillac man wore a +vandyke beard and colored glasses, and a panama and light gray +business suit. Casey set him down in his mental catalog as "some +town feller" and assumed that they had nothing in common. + +Yet Mack Nolan heard nearly every word spoken by Smiling Lou, +Casey and Jim Cassidy. (Readers are so inquisitive about these +things that I felt I ought to tell you--else you'll be worrying +as hard as Casey Ryan did later on. I'm soft-hearted, myself; I +never like to worry a reader more than is absolutely necessary. +So I'm letting you in, hoping you'll get an added kick out of +Casey's further maneuvers). + +The Cadillac car, I should explain, was only one of Mack Nolan's +little secrets. There is a very good garage at Goffs, not many +miles from Juniper Wells. A matter of an hour's driving was +sufficient at any time for Mack Nolan to make the exchange. And +no man at Goffs would think it very strange that the owner of a +Cadillac should prefer to drive a Ford over rough, desert trails +to his prospect in the mountains. Mack Nolan, as I have told you +before, had a way with him. + + + +CHAPTER TWENTY + +With a load of booze in the car and Jim Cassidy by his side, +Casey Ryan drove down the long, eucalyptus-shaded avenue that +runs past the balloon school at Arcadia and turned into the +Foothill Boulevard. Half a mile farther on a Cadillac roadster +honked and slid past them, speeding away toward Monrovia. But +Casey Ryan was busy talking chummily with Jim Cassidy, and he +scarcely knew that a car had passed. + +The money he had been given for Smiling Lou had been used to pay +for this new load of whisky, and Casey found himself wishing that +he could get word of it to Mack Nolan. Still, Nolan's oversight +in the matter of arranging for communication between them did not +bother Casey much. He was doing his part; if Mack Nolan failed +to do his, that was no fault of Casey Ryan's. + +At Fontana, where young Kenner had stopped for gas on that +eventful first trip of Casey's, Casey slowed down also, for the +same purpose, half tempted to call up the Little Woman on long +distance while the gas tank was being filled. But presently the +matter went clean from his mind--and this was the reason: + +A speed cop whose motorcycle stood inconspicuously around the +corner of the garage, came forward and eyed the Ford sharply. He +drew his little book from his pocket, turned a few leaves, found +what he was looking for and eyed again the car. The garage man, +slowly turning the crank of the gasoline pump, looked at him +inquiringly; but the speed cop ignored the look and turned to Casey. + +"Where'd you get this car?" he demanded, in much the same tone +which Smiling Lou had used the night before. + +"Bought it," Casey told him gruffly. + +"Where did you buy it?" + +"Over at Goffs, just this side of Needles." + +"Got a bill of sale?" + +"You got Casey Ryan's word fer it," Casey retorted, with a +growing heat inside, where he kept his temper when he wasn't +using it. + +"Are you Casey Ryan?" The speed cop's eyes hardened just a bit. + +"Anybody says I ain't, you send 'em to me--an' then come around +in about ten minutes an' look 'em over." + +"What's YOUR name?" The officer turned to Jim Cassidy. + +"Tom Smith. I was just ketchin' a ride with this feller. Don't +go an' mix ME in--I ain't no ways concerned; just ketchin' a ride +is all. If I'd 'a' knowed--" + +"You can explain that to the judge. Get in there, you, and drive +in to San Berdoo. I'll be right with you, so you needn't forget +the road!" He stepped back to his motorcycle and pushed it +forward. + +"Hey! Don't I git paid fer my gas?" the garage man wailed, +pulling a dripping nozzle from Casey's gas tank. + +"Aw, go tahell!" Casey grunted, and threw a wadded bank note in +his direction. "Take that an' shut up. What yuh cryin' around +about a gallon uh gas, fer? YOU ain't pinched!" + +The money landed near the motorcycle and the officer picked it +up, smoothed out the bill, glanced at it and looked through +tightened lids at Casey. + +"Throwin' money around like a hootch-runner!" he sneered. "I +guess you birds need lookn' after, all right. Git goin'!" + +Casey "got going." Twice on the way in the officer spurted up +alongside and waved him down for speeding. Casey had not +intended to speed, either. He was merely keeping pace +unconsciously with his thoughts. + +He had been told just what he must do if he were arrested for +bootlegging, but he was not at all certain that his instructions +would cover an arrest for stealing an automobile. Nolan had +forgotten about that, he guessed. But Casey's optimism carried +him jauntily to jail in San Bernardino, and while he was secretly +a bit uneasy, he was not half so worried as Jim Cassidy appeared +to be. + +Casey was booked--along with "Tom Smith"--on two charges: theft +of one Ford car, motor number so-and-so, serial number +this-and-that, model, touring, year, whatever-it-was. And, +unlawful transportation of spirituous liquor. He tried to give +the judge the wink, but without any happy result. So he +eventually found himself locked in a cell with Jim Cassidy. + +Just at first, Casey Ryan was proud of the part he was playing. +He could look with righteous toleration upon the limpness of his +fellow prisoner. He could feel secure in the knowledge that he, +Casey Ryan, was an agent of the government engaged in helping to +uphold the laws of his country. + +He waited for an hour or two, listening with a superior kind of +patience to Jim Cassidy's panicky unbraidings of his luck. At +first Jim was inclined to blame Casey rather bitterly for the +plight he was in. But Casey soon stopped that. Young Kenner was +the responsible party in this mishap, as Casey very soon made +plain to Jim. + +"Well, I dunno but what you're right. It WAS kind of a dirty +trick --workin' a stole car off onto you. Why didn't he pick +some sucker on the outside? Don't line up with Kenner, somehow. +Well, I guess mebby Smilin' Lou can see us out uh this hole all +right--only I don't like that car-stealin' charge. Mebby Kenner +an' Lou can straighten it up, though." + +Casey wondered if they could. He wondered, too, how Nolan was +going to find out about Smiling Lou getting the camouflaged White +Mule. Nolan had not explained that to Casey--but Casey was not +worrying yet. His faith in Mack Nolan was firm. + +Came bedtime, however, with no sign of official favor toward +Casey Ryan. Casey began to wonder. But probably, he consoled +himself with thinking, they meant to wait until Jim Cassidy was +asleep before they turned Casey loose. He lay on the hard bunk +and waited hopefully, listening to the stertorous breathing of +Jim Cassidy, who had forgotten his troubles in sleep. + + + +CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE + +At noon the next day Casey was still waiting--but not hopefully. +"Patience on a monument" couldn't have resembled Casey Ryan in +any particular whatever. He was mad. By midnight he had begun +to wonder if he was not going to be made a goat again. By +daylight, he was positive that he was already a goat. By the +time the trusty brought his breakfast, Casey was applying to Mack +Nolan the identical words and phrases which he had applied to +young Kenner when he was the maddest. Don't ask me to tell you +what they were. + +Jim Cassidy still clung desperately to his faith in Smiling Lou; +but Casey's faith hadn't so much as a finger-hold on anything. +What kind of a government was it, he asked himself bitterly, that +would leave a trusted agent twenty-four hours shut up in a cell +with a whining crook like Jim Cassidy? If, he added +pessimistically, he were an agent of the government. Casey +doubted it. So far as he could see, Casey Ryan wasn't anything +but the goat. + +His chief desire now was to get out of there as soon as possible +so that he could hunt up Mack Nolan and lick the livin' tar wit +of him--or worse. He wanted bail and he wanted it immediately. +Not a soul bad come near him, save the trusty, in spite of +certain mysterious messages which Casey had sent to the office, +asking for an interview with the judge or somebody; Casey didn't +care who. Locked in a cell, how was he going to do any of the +things Nolan had told him to do if he happened to find himself +arrested by an honest officer? + +When they hauled him before the police judge, Casey hadn't been +given the chance to explain anything to anybody. Unless, of +course, he wanted to beller out his business before everybody; +and that, he told himself fiercely, was not Casey Ryan's idea of +the way to keep a secret. Moreover, that damned speed cop was +standing right there, just waiting for a chance to wind his +fingers in Casey's collar and choke him off if he tried to say a +word. And how the hell, Casey would like to know, was a man +going to explain himself when he couldn't get a word in edgeways? + +So Casey wanted bail. There were just two ways of getting it, +and it went against the grain of his pride to take either one. +That is why Casey waited until noon before his Irish stubbornness +yielded a bit and he decided to wire me to come. He had to slip +the wire out by the underground method--meaning the good will of +the trusty. It cost Casey ten dollars, but he didn't grudge +that. + +He spent that afternoon and most of the night mentally calling +the trusty a liar and a thief because there was no reply to the +message. As a matter of fact, the trusty sent the wire through as +quickly as possible and the fault was mine if any one's. I was +too busy hurrying to the rescue to think about sending Casey word +that I was coming. Casey said afterwards that my thoughtlessness +would be cured for life if I were ever locked in jail and waiting +for news. + +As it happened, I wired the Little Woman that Casey was in jail +again, and caught the first train to San "Berdoo"--coming down by +way of Barstow. I could save two or three hours that way, I +found, so I told the Little Woman to meet me there and bring all +the money she could get her hands on. Not knowing just what +Casey was in for this time, it seemed well to be prepared for a +good, stiff bail. She beat me by several hours, and between us +we had ten thousand dollars. + +At that it was a fool's errand. Casey was out of jail and gone +before either of us arrived. So there we were, holding the bag, +as you might say, and our ten thousand dollars' bail money. + +"It's no use asking questions, Jack," the Little Woman told me +pensively when we had finished our salad in the best cafe in +town, and were waiting for the fish. "I've asked questions of +every uniform in this town, from the district judge down to the +courthouse janitor. Nobody knows a thing. I DID find that Casey +was booked yesterday for having a stolen car and a load of booze +in his possession, but he isn't in jail--or if he is, they're +keeping him down in some dungeon and have thrown away the key. +It was hinted in the police court that he was dismissed for want +of evidence; but they wouldn't SAY anything, and so there you +are!" + +We finished our fish in a thoughtful silence. Then, when the +waiter had removed the plates, the Little Woman looked at me with +a twinkle in her eyes. + +"Well-sir, there's something I want to tell you, Jack. I believe +Casey has put this town on the run. They can't tell ME! +Something's happened, over around the courthouse. A lot of the +men I talked with had a scared look in their eyes, and they were +nervous when doors opened, and looked around when people came +walking along. I don't know what he's been doing--but Casey +Ryan's been up to something. You can't tell ME! I know how our +laundry boy looks when Casey's home." + +"And didn't you get any line at all on his whereabouts?" I asked +her. Given three hours the start of me, I knew perfectly well +that the Little Woman had found out all there was to know about +Casey. + +"Well-sir--I've got this to go on," the Little Woman drawled and +held a telegram across the table. "You'll notice that was sent +from Goffs. It's ten days old, but I've been getting ready ever +since it arrived. I've put Babe in a boarding-school, and I +leased the apartment house. I kept three dressmakers ruining +their eyes with nightwork, Jack, making up some nifty sports +clothes. If Casey's bound to stay in the desert--well, I'm his +wife--and Casey does kind of like to have me around. You can't +tell ME. + +"So I've got the twin-six packed with the niftiest camp outfit +you ever saw, Jack. I've got a yellow and red beach umbrella, +and two reclining chairs, and--well-sir, I'm going to rough it de +luxe. I don't expect to keep Casey in hand--I happen to know +him. But it's just possible, Jack, that I can keep him in +sight!" + +Of course I told her--as I've told her often enough before--that +she was a brick. I added that I would go along, if she liked; +which she did. Not even the Little Woman should ever attempt to +drive across the Mojave alone. + +We started out as soon as we had finished the meal. A Cadillac +roadster came up behind us and honked for clear passing as we +swung into the long, straight stretch that leads up the Cajon. +The Little Woman peered into the rear vision mirror and pressed +the toe of her white pump upon the accelerator. + +"There's only one man in the world that can pass ME on the road," +the Little Woman drawled, "and he doesn't wear a panama!" + +As we snapped around the turns of Cajon Grade, I looked back once +or twice. The Cadillac roadster was still following +pertinaciously, but it was too far back to honk at us. When we +slid down to the Victorville garage and stopped for gas, the +Cadillac slid by. The driver in the panama gave us one glance +through his colored glasses, but I felt, somehow, that the glance +was sufficiently comprehensive to fix us firmly in his memory. I +inquired at the garage concerning Casey Ryan, taking it for +granted he would be driving a Ford. A man of that description +had stopped at the garage for gas that forenoon, the boy told me. +About nine o'clock, I learned from further questioning. + +"Well-sir, that gives him five hours the start," the Little Woman +remarked, as she eased in the clutch and slid around the corner +into the highway to Barstow. "But you can't tell me I can't run +down a Ford with this car. I know to the last inch what a Jawn +Henry is good for. I drove one myself, remember. Now we'll +see." + + + +CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO + +At Dagget, the big, blue car with a lady driver sounded the +warning signal and passed Mack Nolan and the Cadillac roadster. +Like Casey Ryan, Nolan is rather proud of his driving, and with +sufficient reason. He was already hurrying, not to overhaul +Casey, but to arrive soon after him. + +Women drivers loved to pass other cars with a sudden spurt of +speed, he had found by experience. They were not, however, +consistently fast drivers. Mack Nolan was conscious of a slight +irritation when the twin-six took the lead. Somewhere +ahead--probably in one of the rough, sandy stretches--he would +either have to pass that car or lag behind. Your expert driver +likes a clear road ahead. + +So Mack Nolan drove a bit harder, and succeeded in getting most +of the dust kicked up by the big, blue car. He counted on +passing before they reached Ludlow, but he could never quite make +it. In that ungodly stretch of sand and rocks and chuck-holes +that lies between Ludlow and Amboy, Nolan was sure that the woman +driver would have to slow down. He swore a little, too, because +she would probably slow down just where passing was impossible. +They always did. + +They went through Amboy like one party, the big, blue car leading +by twenty-five yards. It was a long drive for a woman to make; a +hard drive to boot. He wondered if the two in the big car ever +ate. + +Five miles east of Amboy, when a red sunset was darkening to +starlight, the blue car, fifty yards in the lead, overhauled a +Ford in trouble. In the loose, sandy trail the big car slowed +and stopped abreast of the Ford. There was no passing now, +unless Mack Nolan wanted to risk smashing his crank-case on a +lava rock, millions of which peppered that particular portion of +the Mojave Desert. He stopped perforce. + +A pair of feet with legs attached to them, protruded from beneath +the running board of the Ford. The Little Woman in the big car +leaned over the side and studied the feet critically. + +"Casey Ryan, are those the best pair of shoes you own?" she +drawled at last. "If you wouldn't wear such rundown heels, you +know, you wouldn't look so bow-legged. I've told you and TOLD +you that your legs aren't so bad when you wear straight heels." + +Casey Ryan crawled out and looked up at her grinning sheepishly. + +"They was all right when I left home, ma'am," he defended his +shoes mildly. "Desert plays hell with shoe leather--you can ask +anybody." Then he added, "Hullo, Jack! What you two think you're +doin', anyway. Tryin' t' elope?" + +"Why, hello, Ryan!" Mack Nolan greeted, coming up from the +Cadillac. "Having trouble with your car?" Casey whirled and eyed +Nolan dubiously. + +"Naw. This ain't no trouble," he granted. "I only been here four +hours or so--this is pastime!" + +There was an awkward silence. We in the blue car wanted to know +(not at that time knowing) who was the man in the Cadillac +roadster, and how he happened to know Casey so well. Nolan, no +doubt, wanted to know who we were. And there was so much that +Casey wanted to know and needed to know that he couldn't seem to +think of anything. However, Casey was the hardest to down. He +came up to the side of the blue car, reached in with his hands +all greasy black, and took the Little Woman's hand from the wheel +and kissed it. The Little Woman made a caressing sound and +leaned out to him--and Nolan and I felt that we mustn't look. So +our eyes met. + +He came around to my side of the car and put out his hand. + +"I'm pretty good at guessing," he smiled. "I guess you're Jack +Gleason. Casey has talked of you to me. I'm right glad to meet +you, too. My name is Mack Nolan, and I'm Irish. I'm Casey +Ryan's partner. We have a good--prospect." + +Casey looked past the Little Woman and me, straight into Mack +Nolan's eyes. I felt something of an electric quality in the air +while their gaze held. + +"I'm just getting back from a trip down in the valley," Nolan +observed easily. "You never did see me in town duds, did you, +Casey?" His eyes went to the Little Woman's face and then to me. +"I suppose you know what this wild Irishman has just pulled off +back there," he said, tilting his head toward San Bernardino, +many a mile away to the southwest. "You wouldn't think it to +look at him, but he surely has thrown a monkey wrench into as +pretty a bootlegging machine as there is in the country. It's +such confidential stuff, of course, that you may call it +absolutely secret. But for once I'm telling the truth about it. + +"Your husband, Mrs. Casey Ryan, holds a commission from +headquarters as a prohibition officer. A deputy, it is +true,--but commissioned nevertheless. He's just getting back +from a very pretty piece of work. A crooked officer named +Smiling Lou was arrested last night. He had all kinds of liquor +cached away in his house. Casey can tell you sometime how he +trapped him. + +"Of course, I'm just an amateur mining expert on a vacation, +myself." His eyes met Casey's straight. "I wasn't with him when +he pulled the deal, but I heard about it afterwards, and I knew +he was planning something of the sort when he left camp. How I +happened to know about the commission," he added, reaching into +his pocket, "is because he left it with me for safe keeping. I'm +going to let you look at it-- just in case he's too proud to let +it out of his hands once I give it back. + +"Now, of course, I'm talking like an old woman and telling all +Casey's secrets--and you'll probably see a real Irish fight when +he gets in reach of me. But I knew he hadn't told you exactly +what he's doing, and--I personally feel that his wife and his +best friend are entitled to know as much as his partner knows +about him." + +The Little Woman nodded absently her thanks. She was holding +Casey's commission under the dash-light to read it. + +I saw Casey gulp once or twice while he stared across the car at +Mack Nolan. He pushed his dusty, black hat forward over one +eyebrow and reached into his pocket. + +"Aw, hell," he grunted, grinning queerly. "You come around here +oncet, Mr. Nolan, where I can git my hands on yuh!" + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg Etext of The Trail of the White Mule, by Bower + |