The Killer Part 30

Probably twenty miles of clear s.p.a.ce lay on either flank of that rock.

Nevertheless, our right front wheel hit it square in the middle. The car leaped straight up, the rock popped sidewise, and the tire went off with a mighty bang. Bill put on the brakes, deliberately uncoiled himself, and descended.

"Seems like tires don't last no time at all in this country," he remarked, sadly. He walked around the car and began to examine the four wrecks he carried as spares. After some inspection of their respective merits, he selected one. "I just somehow kain't git over the notion she ought to sidestep them little rocks and holes of her own accord," he exclaimed. "A hoss is a plumb, narrow-minded critter, but he knows enough for that."

While he changed the tire--which incidentally involved patching one of half a dozen over-worn tubes--I looked her over more in detail. The customary frame, strut rods, and torsion rods had been supplemented by the most extraordinary criss-cross of angle-iron braces it has ever been my fortune to behold. They ran from anywhere to everywhere beneath that car. I began to comprehend her cohesiveness.

"Jim Coles, blacksmith at the O T, puts them braces in all our cars,"

explained Bill. "He's got her down to a system."

The repair finished and the radiator refilled we resumed the journey. It was now just eleven o'clock. The odometer reading was 29,276. The temperature was well up toward 100 degrees. But beneath the disreputable top, and while in motion, the heat was not noticeable. Nevertheless, the brief stop had brought back poignantly certain old days--choking dust, thirst, the heat of a heavy sun, the long day that led one nowhere----

The noon mirages were taking shape, throwing stately and slow their vast illusions across the horizon. Lakes glimmered; distant ranges took on the forms of phantasm, rising higher, flattening, reaching across s.p.a.ce the arches of their spans, rendering unreal a world of beauty and dread.

That in the old days was the deliberate fas.h.i.+on the desert had of searing men's souls with her majesty. Slowly, slowly, the changes melted one into the other; ma.s.sively, deliberately the face of the world was altered; so that at last the poor plodding human being, hot, dry, blinded, thirsty, felt himself a nothing in the presence of eternities.

Well I knew that old spell of the desert. But now! Honestly, after a few minutes I began to feel sorry for the poor old desert! Its spells didn't work for the simple reason that _we didn't give it time!_ We charged down on its phantom lakes and disproved them and forgot them. We broke right in on the dignified and deliberate scene s.h.i.+fting of mountains and _mesas_, showed them up for the brittle, dry hills they were, and left them behind. It was pitiful! It was as though a revered tragedian should overnight find that his vogue had departed; that he was no longer getting over; that an irreverent upstart, breaking in on his most sonorous periods, was getting laughs with slang. We had lots of water; the dust we left behind; it wasn't even hot in the wind of our going!

In the shallow crease of hills a s.h.i.+mmer of white soon changed to evident houses. We drew into a straggling desert town.

It was typical--thirty miles from the railroad, a distributing point for the cattle country. Four broad buildings with peeled, sunburned faces, a wooden house or so, and a dozen flat-roofed adobe huts hung pleasingly with long strips of red peppers. Of course one of the wooden buildings was labelled General Store; and another, smaller, contained a barber shop and postoffice combined. The third was barred and unoccupied. The fourth had been a livery stable but was now a garage. Six saddle horses and six Fords stood outside the General Store, which was a fair division.

Bill slowed down.

"Have a drink," I observed, hospitably.

"Arizona's a dry state," Bill reminded me; but nevertheless stopped and uncoiled. That unbelievable phenomenon had escaped my memory. In the old days I used to shut my eyes and project my soul into what I imagined was the future. I saw Arizona, embottled, dying in the last-wet ditch, while all the rest of the world, even including Milwaukee, bore down on her carrying the banners of Prohibition. So much for prophecy. I voiced a thought.

"There must be an awful lot of old timers died this spring. You can't cut them off short and hope to save them."

Bill grunted.

We entered the store. It smelled good, as such stores always do--soap, leather, ground coffee, bacon, cheese--all sorts of things. On the right ran a counter and shelves of dry goods and clothing; on the left groceries, cigars, and provisions generally. Down the middle saddles, ropes, spurs, pack outfits, harness, hardware. In the rear a gla.s.s cubby-hole with a desk inside. All that was customary, right and proper.

But I noticed also a gla.s.s case with spark plugs and accessories; a rack full of tires; and a barrel of lubricating oil. I did not notice any body polish. By the front door stood a paper-basket whose purport I understood not at all.

Bill led me at once past two or three lounging cow persons to the cubbyhole, where arose a typical old timer.

"Mr. White, meet Mr. Billings," he said.

The old timer grasped me firmly by the right hand and held tight while he demanded, as usual, "What name?" We informed him together. He allowed he was pleased. I allowed the same.

"I want to buy a yard of calico," said Bill.

The old timer reached beneath the counter and produced a strip of cloth.

It was already cut, and looked to be about a yard long. Also it showed the marks of loving but brutal and soiled hands.

"Wrap it up?" inquired Mr. Billings.

"Nope," said Bill, and handed out three silver dollars. Evidently calico was high in these parts. We turned away.

"By the way, Bill," Mr. Billings called after us, "I got a little present here for you. Some friends sent her in to me the other day. Let me know what you think of it."

We turned. Mr. Billings held in his hand a sealed quart bottle with a familiar and famous label.

"Why, that's kind of you," said Bill, gravely. He took the proffered bottle, turned it upside down, glanced at the bottom, and handed it back. "But I don't believe I'd wish for none of that particular breed.

It never did agree with my stummick."

Without a flicker of the eye the storekeeper produced a second sealed bottle, identical in appearance and label with the first.

"Try it," he urged. "Here's one from a different case. Some of these yere vintages is better than others."

"So I've noticed," replied Bill, dryly. He glanced at the bottom and slipped it into his pocket.

We went out. As we pa.s.sed the door Bill, un.o.bserved, dropped into the heretofore unexplained waste-basket the yard of calico he had just purchased.

"Don't believe I like the pattern for my boudoir," he told me, gravely.

We clambered aboard and shot our derisive exhaust at the diminis.h.i.+ng town.

"Thought Arizona was a dry state," I suggested.

"She is. You cain't sell a drop. But you can keep stuff for personal use. There ain't nothing more personal than givin' it away to your friends."

"The price of calico is high down here."

"And goin' up," agreed Bill, gloomily. He drove ten miles in silence while I, knowing my type, waited.

"That old Billings ought to be drug out and buried," he remarked at last. "We rode together on the Chiracahua range. He ought to know better than to try to put it onto me."

"???" said I.

"You saw that first bottle? Just plain forty-rod dog poison--and me payin' three good round dollars!"

"For calico," I reminded.

"Sh.o.r.e. That's why he done it. He had me--if I hadn't called him."

"But that first bottle was identically the same as the one you have in your pocket," I stated.

"Sh.o.r.e?"

"Why, yes--at least--that is, the bottle and label were the same, and I particularly noticed the cork seal looked intact."

"It was," agreed Bill. "That cap hasn't never been disturbed. You're right."

"Then what objection----"

"It's one of them wonders of modern science that spoils the simple life next to Nature's heart," said Bill, unexpectedly. "You hitch a big hollow needle onto an electric light current. When she gets hot enough you punch a hole with her in the bottom of the bottle. Then you throw the switch and let the needle cool off. When she's cool you pour out the real thing for your own use--mebbe. Then you stick in your forty-cent-a-gallon squirrel poison. Heat up your needle again. Draw her out very slow so the gla.s.s will close up behind her. Simple, neat, effective, honest enough for down here. Cork still there, seal still there, label still there. Bottle still there, except for a little bit of a wart-lookin' bubble in the bottom."

It was now in the noon hour. Knowing cowboys of old I expected no lunch.

We racketed along, and our dust tried to catch us, and sleepy, accustomed jack rabbits made two perfunctory hops as we turned on them the battery of our exhaust.