The Ridin' Kid from Powder River Part 21

"What's it to you?" snarled Gary, and he stepped back. Gary's very att.i.tude was a challenge. Pete knew that he could not drop his rope and pull his own gun quick enough to save himself. He saw Gary's hand move almost imperceptibly toward his holster.

"I reckon I made a mistake," said Pete slowly--and he let the rope slip from his hand as though utterly unnerved. "I--I talked kind o' quick,"

he stammered.

"Well, you won't make no more mistakes," sneered Gary, and he dropped his hand to his gun. "You want to know who plugged that old hoss-thief, Annersley, eh? Well, what you goin' to say when I tell you it was me?"

Pete saw that Gary was working himself up to the pitch when he would kill. And Pete knew that he had but one chance in a thousand of breaking even with the killer. He would not have time to draw--but Montoya had taught him the trick of shooting through the open holster . . . Cotton heard Pete's hand strike the b.u.t.t of his gun as the holster tilted up. Pete fired twice. Staring as though hypnotized, Gary clutched at his s.h.i.+rt over his chest with his free hand. He gave at the knees and his body wilted and settled down--even as he threw a desperate shot at Pete in a last venomous effort to kill.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Cotton heard Pete's hand strike the b.u.t.t of his gun as the holster tilted up.]

"You seen it was an even break," said Pete, turning to Cotton, who immediately sank to his knees and implored Pete not to kill him.

"But I reckon you'd lie, anyhow," continued Pete, paying no attention to the other's mouthings. "Hunt your cayuse--and git a-movin'."

Cotton understood that. Glancing over his shoulder at Gary he turned and ran toward the timber. Pete stepped to the crumpled figure and gazed at the bubbling hole in the chest. Then he stepped hack and mechanically holstered his gun which he had pulled as he spoke to Cotton. "They'll git me for this," he whispered to himself. "It was an even break--but they'll git me." Pete fought back his fear with a peculiar pride--the pride that scorned to appear frightened before his chum, Andy White. The quarrel had occurred so unexpectedly and terminated so suddenly, that Pete could not yet realize the full extent of the tragedy. While quite conscious of what he was doing and intended to do, he felt as though he were walking in a horrible dream from which he would never awaken. His instincts were as keen as ever--for he was already planning his next move--but his sensibilities had suffered a blunt shock--were numb to all external influence. He knew that the sun was s.h.i.+ning, yet he did not feel its warmth. He was walking toward the cabin, and toward Andy. He stumbled as he walked, taking no account of the irregularities of the ground. He could hardly believe that he had killed Gary. To convince himself against his own will he mechanically drew his gun and glanced at the two empty sh.e.l.ls.

"Three and two is five," he muttered. "I shot twict." He did not realize that Gary had shot at him--that a shred of his flannel s.h.i.+rt was dangling from his sleeve where Gary's bullet had cut it. "Wonder if Andy heard?" he kept asking himself. "I got to tell Andy."

Almost before he realized it he was standing under the cedar and Andy was speaking. "Thought I heard some one shoot, over toward the woods."

As Pete did not answer, Andy thought that the horse had got away from him. "Did you get him?" he queried.

Pete nodded dully. "I got him. He's over there--in the brush."

"Why didn't you fetch him in? Did he get the best of you? You look like he give you a tussle."

"I got him--twict," said Pete.

"Twict? Say, Pete, are you loco? What's ailin' you, anyhow?"

"Nothin'. Me and Gary just had it out. He's over there--in the brush."

"Gary!"

"Yes. I reckon I got him."

"h.e.l.l!" The ruddy color sank from Andy's face. He had supposed that Gary and Cotton were by this time tracking the strayed horses toward the T-Bar-T. "Where's Cotton?" he asked.

"I told him to fan it."

"But, Pete--!"

"I know. They's no use talkin', Andy. I come back to tell you--and to git your rope. Mine's over by Gary."

"What you goin' to do, Pete?"

"Me? Why, I'm goin' to drift as soon as I can git a saddle on Blue.

Cotton he seen the shootin'--but that don't do me no good. He'll swear that I pulled first. He'd say 'most anything--he was too scared to know what come off. Gary's hand was on his gun when I let him have it--twict."

Andy noticed then Pete's torn sleeve. "I reckon that's right. Look at that!"

Pete turned his head and glanced at his sleeve. "Never knowed he shot--it was all done so quick." He seemed to awaken suddenly to the significance of his position. "I'll take your rope and go git Smoke.

Then I'm goin' to drift."

"But where?"

"You're my pardner, Andy, but I ain't sayin'. Then you won't have to lie. You'll have to tell Jim--and tell him it was like I said--_if Gary come at me, that would be different_. I'm leavin' it to you to square me with Jim Bailey." Pete picked up the rope and started toward the spring.

"I'm goin' with you," said White, "and ketch my hoss. I aim to see you through with this."

In an hour they were back at the cabin with the horses. Andy White glanced at his watch. "Cotton is afoot--for I seen his hoss over there. But he can make it to the T-Bar-T in three hours. That'll give us a start of two hours, anyhow. I don't know which way you aim to ride, but--"

"I'm playin' this hand alone," stated Pete as he saddled Blue Smoke.

"No use your gittin' in bad."

White made no comment, but cinched up his pony. Pete stepped to him and held out his hand. "So-long, Andy. You been a mighty square pardner."

"Nothin' doin'!" exclaimed Andy. "I'm with you to the finish."

"Nope, Andy. If we was both to light out, you'd be in it as bad as me."

"Then what do you say if we both ride down to Concho and report to the sheriff?"

"I tried that onct--when they killed Pop Annersley. I know how that would work."

"But what you goin' to do?"

"I'm ridin'," and Pete swung to his horse. Blue Smoke pitched across the clearing under the spur and rein that finally turned him toward the south. Pete's sombrero flew off as he headed for the timber. Andy, reining 'round his horse, that fretted to follow, swung down and caught up Pete's hat on the run. Pete had pulled up near the edge of the timber. Andy, as he was about to give Pete his hat, suddenly changed it for his own. "For luck!" he cried, as Pete slackened rein and Blue Smoke shot down the dim forest trail.

Pete, perhaps influenced by Montoya's example, always wore a high-crowned black sombrero. Andy's hat was the usual gray. In the excitement of leaving, Pete had not thought of that; but as he rode, he suspected Andy's motive, and glanced back. But Andy was not following, or if he were, he was riding slowly.

Meanwhile Andy cheerfully put himself in the way of a.s.sisting Pete to escape. He knew the country and thought he knew where Pete was headed for. Before nightfall a posse would be riding the high country hunting the slayer of Gary. They would look for a cowboy wearing a black sombrero. Realizing the risk that he ran, and yet as careless of that risk as though he rode to a fiesta, Young Andy deliberately turned back to where Gary lay--he had not yet been to that spot--and, dismounting, picked up Pete's rope. He glanced at Gary, s.h.i.+vered, and swung to his horse. Riding so that his trail would be easy to read he set off toward the open country, east. The fact that he had no food with him, and that the country was arid and that water was scarce, did not trouble him. All he hoped for was to delay or mislead the posse long enough to enable Pete to reach the southern desert. There Pete might have one chance in twenty of making his final escape. Perhaps it was a foolish thing to do, but Andy White, inspired by a motive of which there is no finer, did not stop to reason about it. "He that giveth his life for a friend . . ." Andy knew nothing of such a quotation.

He was riding into the desert, quite conscious of the natural hazards of the trail, and keen to the possibilities that might follow in the form of an excited posse not too discriminating, in their eagerness to capture an outlaw, yet he rode with a light heart. After all, Pete was not guilty of murder. He had but defended his own life. Andy's heart was light because of the tang of adventure, and a certain appreciation of what a disappointed posse might feel and express--and because Romance ran lightly beside him, heartening him on his way; Romance, whose ears are deaf to all moral considerations and whose eyes see only the true adventurer, be he priest or pirate; Romance whose eyes are blind to those who fear to dare.

CHAPTER XVII

A FALSE TRAIL

"Sure he's dead!" reiterated Cotton. "Didn't I see them two holes plumb through him and the blood soakin' his s.h.i.+rt when I turned him over? If I'd 'a' had my gun on me that Young Pete would be right side of Steve, right now! But I couldn't do nothin' without a gun. Pete Annersley was plumb scared. That's why he killed Steve. Jest you gimme a gun and watch me ride him down! I aim to settle with that Jay."

Cotton was talking to Houck of the T-Bar-T, blending fact and fiction in a bl.u.s.tering attempt to make himself believe he had played the man.

During his long, foot-weary journey to the ranch he had roughly invented this speech and tried to memorize it. Through repet.i.tion he came to believe that he was telling the truth. Incidentally he had not paused to catch up his horse, which was a slight oversight, considering the trail from the Blue to his home ranch.

"What's the matter with the gun you're packin'?" asked Houck.

Cotton had forgotten his own gun.