Children of the Desert Part 13

she said again; and her eyes were swimming, so that at the last she did not see him go, and did not know that he had kept that look of placid courage to the end.

It was a little early for the usual Sunday morning loiterers to be about as Harboro entered the town. For a moment he believed there was no one about at all. The little town, with its main street and its secondary thoroughfares bordered by low structures, might have been regarded as the habitation of lesser creatures than human beings, as it stood there musing after the departed night, in the midst of limitless wastes of sand. That group of houses might have been likened to some kind of larger birds, hugging the earth in trepidation, ready to take flight at any moment.

Yet Harboro had been mistaken in supposing that no one was as yet astir.

Two men stood out in the street, at the entrance to the Maverick bar, near a hitching-post to which a small horse carrying a big saddle was tethered.

One of the men was about to mount. As Harboro approached he untied his horse and lifted one foot to its stirrup, and stood an instant longer to finish what he was saying, or perhaps to hear the other out.

The other man was in his s.h.i.+rt-sleeves. He carried a blue-serge sack-coat over his arm. He stood facing Harboro as the latter approached; and the expression in his eyes seemed to change in a peculiar way at sight of the big, swarthy man who stepped off the sidewalk, down into the street, and seemed to be headed directly toward him.

The two men had never met before; but Harboro, taking in that compact, muscular figure, found himself musing with a.s.surance: "That is Fectnor."

Nothing in his face or carriage betrayed his purpose, and the man with the blue-serge garment on his arm kept his ground complacently. The man with the horse mounted and rode away.

Harboro advanced easily until he was within arm's length of the other man in the street. "You're Fectnor, aren't you?" he asked.

"I am," replied the other crisply.

Harboro regarded him searchingly. At length he remarked: "Fectnor, I see you've got a gun on you."

"I have," was the steely response. Fectnor's narrow blue eyes became, suddenly, the most alert thing about a body which was all alertness.

"So have I," said Harboro.

The other's narrow eyes seemed to twinkle. His response sounded like: "The L you say!"

"Yes," said Harboro. He added: "My wife was the woman you trapped in Little's house last night."

Fectnor's mind went swiftly to the weapon in his holster; and something more than his mind, surely, since Harboro knew. Yet the man's hand had barely moved. However, he casually threw the coat he carried over his left arm, leaving his right hand free. If he had thought of reaching for his weapon he had probably realized that he must first get out of reach of Harboro's arm. "You might put that a little different," he said lightly.

"You might say--the woman I met in Little's house."

Harboro took in the insinuated insult. He remained unmoved. He could see that Fectnor was not a coward, no matter what else he was; and he realized that this man would seek to enrage him further, so that his eyes would be blinded, so that his hands would tremble.

"I'm going to kill you, Fectnor," Harboro continued. "But I'm going to give you a chance for your life. I want you to turn and walk down the street twelve paces. Then turn and draw. I'll not draw until you turn unless you try to play a trick on me. Your best chance lies in your doing just as I tell you to."

Fectnor regarded him shrewdly with his peering, merry eyes. He rather liked Harboro, so far as first impressions went. Yet his lips were set in a straight line. "All right," he drawled amiably. His voice was pitched high--almost to a falsetto.

"Remember, you'd better not draw until you've turned around," advised Harboro. "You'll be more likely to get your bearings right that way. You see, I want to give you an even break. If I'd wanted to murder you I could have slipped up from behind. You see that, of course."

"Clear as a whistle," said Fectnor. He gave Harboro a final searching look and then turned about unflinchingly. He proceeded a few steps, his hands held before him as if he were practising a crude cake-walk. The serge garment depended from one arm. He was thinking with lightning-like rapidity. Harboro had courage enough--that he could tell--but he didn't behave like a man who knew very many tricks with a gun. Nevertheless he, Fectnor, would be under a disadvantage in this test of skill which was being forced upon him. When he turned he would need just a second to get a perfect balance, to be quite sure of his footing, to get his bearings. And that one second might make all the difference in the outcome of the affair. Moreover, there was one other point in Harboro's favor, Fectnor realized. His was the stronger determination of the two. Fectnor had not flinched, but he knew that his heart was not in this fight. He could see that Harboro was a good deal of a man. A fool, perhaps, but still a decent fellow.

These were conclusions which had come in flashes, while Fectnor took less than half a dozen steps. Then he turned his head partly, and flung back almost amiably: "Wait until I get rid of my coat!"

"Drop it!" cried Harboro sharply.

But Fectnor plainly had another idea. He turned a little out of his course, still with his hands well in front of him. It was evident, then, that he meant to fling his coat on the sidewalk.

Harboro held him with eyes which were keen as knives, yet still a little dubious. He was puzzled by the man's good humor; he was watchful for sudden stratagems. His own hands were at his sides, the right within a few inches of his hip.

Yet, after all, he was unprepared for what happened. Fectnor leaned forward as if to deposit his coat on the sidewalk. Then he seemed to stumble, and in two swift leaps he had gained the inner side of the walk and had darted into the inset of the saloon. He was out of sight in a flash.

As if by some feat in legerdemain Harboro's weapon was in his hand; but it was a hand that trembled slightly. He had allowed Fectnor to gain an advantage.

He stared fixedly at that place where Fectnor had disappeared. His right hand was held in the position of a runner's, and the burnished steel of the weapon in it caught the light of the sun. He had acquired the trick of firing while his weapon was being elevated--not as he lowered it; with a movement like the pointing of a finger. He was ready for Fectnor, who would doubtless try to take him by surprise.

Then he realized that the level rays of the sun made the whole entrance to the saloon, with its several facets of gla.s.s, a thing of dazzling opaqueness. He could not see Fectnor until the latter stepped forth from his ambush; yet it seemed probable that Fectnor might be able to see him easily enough through the gla.s.s barricade behind which he had taken refuge. He might expect to hear the report of a weapon and the crash of gla.s.s at any instant.

At this realization he had an ugly sensation at the roots of his hair--as if his scalp had gone to sleep. Yet he could only stand and wait. It would be madness to advance.

So he stood, almost single-mindedly. He had a disagreeable duty to perform, and he must perform it. Yet the lesser cells of his brain spoke to him, too, and he realized that he must present a shocking sight to law-abiding, happy people, if any should appear. He was glad that the street was still deserted, and that he might reasonably hope to be unseen.

Then his hand shot forward with the fierceness of a tiger's claw: there had been a movement in the saloon entrance. Only by the fraction of a second was the finger on the trigger stayed.

It was not Fectnor who appeared. Dunwoodie stepped into sight casually and looked in Harboro's direction. The expression of amused curiosity in his eyes swiftly gave place to almost comical amazement when he took in that spasmodic movement of Harboro's.

"What's up?" he inquired. He approached Harboro leisurely.

"Stand aside, Dunwoodie," commanded Harboro harshly.

"Well, wait a minute," insisted Dunwoodie. "Calm yourself, man. I want to talk to you. Fectnor's not in the saloon. He went on through and out the back way."

Harboro wheeled with an almost despairing expression in his eyes. He seemed to look at nothing, now--like a bird-dog that senses the nearness of the invisible quarry. The thought came to him: "Fectnor may appear at any point, behind me!" The man might have run back along the line of buildings, seeking his own place to emerge again.

But Dunwoodie went on rea.s.suringly. He had guessed the thought in Harboro's mind. "No, he's quite gone. I watched him go. He's probably in Mexico by this time--or well on his way, at least."

Harboro drew a deep breath. "You watched him go?"

"When he came into the saloon, like a rock out of a sling, he stopped just long enough to grin, and fling out this--to me--'If you want to see a funny sight, go out front.' Fectnor never did like me, anyway. Then he scuttled back and out. I followed to see what was the matter. He made straight for the bridge road. He was sprinting. He's gone."

Harboro's gun had disappeared. He was frowning; and then he realized that Dunwoodie was looking at him with a quizzical expression.

He made no explanation, however.

"I must be getting along home," he said shortly. He was thinking of Sylvia.

CHAPTER XVI.

Dunwoodie was not given to talkativeness; moreover, he was a considerate man, and he respected Harboro. Therefore it may be doubted if he ever said anything about that unexplained drama which occurred on the main street of Eagle Pa.s.s on a Sunday morning, before the town was astir. But there was the bartender at the Maverick--and besides, it would scarcely have been possible for any man to do what Harboro had done without being seen by numbers of persons looking out upon the street through discreetly closed windows.

At any rate, there was talk in the town. By sundown everybody knew there had been trouble between Harboro and Fectnor, and men who dropped into the Maverick for a game of high-five or poker had their attention called to an unclaimed blue-serge coat hanging from the ice-box.

"He got away with his skin," was the way the bartender put the case, "but he left his coat."

There was a voice from one of the card-tables: "Well, any man that gets Fectnor's coat is no slouch."

There were a good many expressions of undisguised wonder at Fectnor's behavior; and n.o.body could have guessed that perhaps some sediment of manhood which had remained after all the other decent standards had disappeared had convinced Fectnor that he did not want to kill a man whom he had injured so greatly. And from the popular att.i.tude toward Fectnor's conduct there grew a greatly increased respect for Harboro.

That, indeed, was the main outcome of the episode, so far as the town as a whole was concerned. Harboro became a somewhat looming figure. But with Sylvia ... well, with Sylvia it was different.