Alcatraz, Max Brand [scary books to read .TXT] 📗

along. I'll give the place another look."

As a matter of fact, he merely wished to be alone, and he was dimly pleased as they sauntered off through the trees, their voices coming more and more vaguely back to him, until the far-off rattle of hoofs began. The last he heard of them was a high-pitched laugh. It irritated Hervey. It floated back to him thin and small, like mockery. And indeed he had failed miserably. How great was his failure he could hardly estimate in a moment and he needed quiet to sum up his losses.

First of all, he had hopelessly alienated the girl and while offending her he had failed to serve the rancher. For Red Jim Perris, driven by force from the ranch, would surely return again to exact payment in full for the treatment he had received. The whole affair was a hopeless muddle. He had staked everything on his ability to trap Perris and destroy him, thereby piling upon the shoulders of Oliver Jordan a burden of gratitude which the rancher could never repay. But now that Perris was footloose he became a danger imperilling not only Jordan but Hervey himself. The trap had closed and closed on nothing. The future presented to Hervey stark ruin.

So enthralling was the gloom of these thoughts that the foreman did not hear the thudding hoofs of a horse which trotted up through the trees. Not until horse and rider appeared in the clearing was Hervey roused and then in the first glance by the size and the tossing head of the approaching pony, he recognized the horse of Red Perris!

CHAPTER XXI THE BATTLE

He had time to burst from the hut and race across the clearing through the darkness which would surely shelter him from the snap-shot of even such an expert as Red Jim, but in mind and body Hervey was too paralyzed by the appearance of his enemy to stir until he saw Perris slip from his horse, slumping to the earth after the fashion of a weary man, and drag off the saddle. He paid no attention to tethering his pony, but started towards the shack, down-headed, heavy of foot.

Hervey had gained the door of the shack in the interim, and there he crouched at watch, terrified at the thought of staying till the other entered, still more terrified at the idea of bolting across the open clearing. He could see Perris clearly, in outline, for just behind him there was a rift in the circle of trees which fenced the clearing and Red Jim was thrown into somewhat bold relief against the blue-black of the night sky far beyond. He could even make out that a bandage circled the head of Perris and with that sight a new thought leaped into the brain of the foreman. The bandage, the stumbling walk, the downward head, were all signs of a badly injured and exhausted man. Suppose he were to attack Perris, single-handed and destroy him? The entire problem would be solved! The respect of his men, the deathless gratitude of Jordan were in the grip of his hand.

His fingers locked around the butt of his gun and yet he hesitated to draw. One could never be sure. How fast, how lightning fast his mind plunged through thought after thought, image after flocking image, while Red Jim made the last dragging steps towards the door of the shack! If he drew, Perris, despite his bent head might catch the glimmer of steel and draw and fire at the glance of the gun. There were tales of gun experts doing more remarkable feats. Wild Bill, in his prime, from the corner of his eye saw a man draw a white hankerchief, thought it a gun, whirled on his heel, and killed a harmless stranger.

He who stops to think can rarely act. It was true of Hervey. Then Perris, at the very door of the hut, dropped the flopping saddle to the ground and the foreman saw that no holster swung at the hip of his man. Joy leaped in him. There was no thought for the cruel cowardice of his act but only overmastering gratitude that the enemy should be thus delivered helpless into his hand. Through the split part of a second that thrill passed tingling through and through him, then he shouted: "Perris!" and at the same instant whipped out the gun and fired pointblank.

A snake will rattle before it strikes and a dog will snarl before it bares its teeth: instinct forced Hervey to that exulting cry and even as the gun came into his hand he saw Perris spin sideways. He fired and the figure at the door lunged down at him. The shoulder struck Hervey in the upturned face and smashed him backwards so that his hand flew out to break the force of the fall, knocked on the floor, and the revolver shot from the unnerved fingers.

If he had any hope that his bullet had gone home and that this was the fall of a dying man, it was instantly removed. Lean arms, amazingly swift, amazingly strong, coiled round him. Hands gripped at him with a clutch so powerful that the fingers burned into his flesh. And, most horrible of all, Red Jim fought in utter silence, as a bull-terrier fights when it goes for the throat.

The impetus of that unexpected attack, half-stunned Lew Hervey. Then the spur of terror gave him hysterical strength.

A hand caught at his throat and got a choking hold. He whirled his heavy body with all his might, tore lose, and broke to his feet. Staggering back to the wall, he saw Red Perris crouch in the door and then spring in again. Hervey struck out with all his might but felt the blow glance and then the coiling arms were around him again. Once again, in the crashing fall to the floor, the hold of Perris was broken and Hervey leaped away for the door yelling: "Perris—it's a mistake—for God's sake——"

The catlike body sprang out of the corner into which it had been flung by Hervey as the foreman rose from the floor. As well attempt to elude a panther by flight! Lew whirled with a sobbing breath of despair and smashed out again with clubbed fist. But the lithe shadow swerved as a leaf whirls from a beating hand and again their bodies crashed together.

But was it a dream that there was less power in the arms of Perris now? Had the foreman seen Red Jim lying prostrate and senseless after his battle with Alcatraz on that day, he would have understood this sudden failing of energy, but as it was he dared not trust his senses. He only knew that it was possible to tear the twining grip away, to spring back till he crashed against the side of the shanty, still pleading in a fear-maddened voice: "Perris, d'you hear? I didn't mean—"

As well appeal to a thunder-bolt. The shadowy form came again but now, surely, it was less swift and resistless. He was able to leap from the path but in dodging his legs entangled in a chair and he tumbled headlong. It was well for Hervey then that his panic was not blind, but with the surety that the end was come he whirled to his knees with the chair which had felled him gripped in both hands and straight at the lunging Perris he hurled it with all his strength. The missile went home with a crash and Red Jim slumped into a formless shadow on the floor.

Only now that a chance for flight was open to him did the strength of Hervey desert him. A nightmare weakness was in his knees so that he could hardly reel to his feet and he moved with outstretched hands towards the door until his toe clicked against his fallen revolver. He paused to scoop it up and turning back through the door, he realized suddenly that Red Jim had not moved. The body lay spilled out where it had fallen, strangely flat, strangely still.

With stumbling fingers, the foreman lighted a match and by that wobbling light he saw Perris lying on his face with his arms thrown out, as a man lies when he is knocked senseless—as a man lies when he is struck dead! Yet Hervey stood drinking in the sight until his match burned his fingers.

The old nightmare fear descended on him the moment the darkness closed about him again. He seemed to see the limp form collect itself and prepare to rise. But he fought this fancy away. He would stay and make light enough to examine the extent of his victory.

He remembered having seen paper and wood lying beside the stove. Now he scooped it up, threw off the covers of the stove, and in a moment white smoke was pouring up from the paper, then flickering bursts of flame every one of which made the body of Perris seem shuddering back to life. But presently the fire rose and Hervey could clearly see the cabin, sadly wrecked by the struggle, and the figure of Perris still moveless.

Even now he went with gingerly steps, the gun thrust out before him. It seemed a miracle that this tigerish fighter should have been suddenly reduced to the helplessness of a child. Holding the gun ready, he slipped his left hand under the fallen man and after a moment, faintly but unmistakably, he felt the beating of the heart. Let it be ended, then!

He pressed the muzzle of the revolver into the back of Perris but his finger refused to tighten around the trigger. No, the powder-burn would prove he had shot his man from behind, and that meant hanging. A tug of his left hand flopped the limp body over, but then his hands were more effectually tied than ever for the face of the unconscious man worked strangely on him.

"It's him now," thought Hervey, "or me later on."

But still he could not shoot. "Helpless as a child"—why had that comparison entered his mind? He studied the features, very pale beneath the bloody bandage which Perris had improvised when he recovered from his battle with the stallion. He was very young—terribly young. Hervey was unnerved. But suppose he let Perris come back to his senses, wakened those insolent blue eyes, started that sharp tongue to life—then it would be a very much easier matter to shoot.

So Lew went to the door, took the rope from Red Jim's saddle, and with it bound the arms of Perris to his side. Then he lifted the hanging body—how light a weight it was!—and placed it in a chair, where it doubled over, limp as a loosely stuffed scarecrow. Hervey tossed more wood on the fire and when he turned again, Perris was showing the first signs of returning consciousness, a twitching of his fingers.

After that his senses returned with astonishing speed. In the space of a moment or two he had straightened in the chair, opened dead eyes, groaned faintly, and then tugged against his bonds. It seemed that that biting of the rope into his arm-muscles cleared his mind. All in an instant he was staring straight into the eyes and into the thoughts of Hervey with full understanding.

"I see," said Perris, "it was the chair that turned the trick. You're lucky, Hervey."

It seemed to Hervey a wonderful thing that the red-headed man could be so quiet about it, and most wonderful of all that Perris could look at anything in the world rather than the big Colt which hung in the hand of the victor. And then, realizing that it was his own comparative cowardice that made this seem strange, the foreman gritted his teeth. Shame softens the heart sometimes, but more often it hardens the spirit. It hardened the conqueror against his victim, now, and made it possible for him to look down on Red Jim with a cruel satisfaction.

"Well?" he said, and the volume of his voice added to this determination.

"Well?" said Perris, as calm as ever. "Waiting for me to whine?"

Hervey blinked.

"Who licked you?" he asked, forced to change his thoughts. "Who licked you—before I got at you?"

Perris smiled, and there was something about the smile that made
Hervey flush to the roots of his grey hair.

"Alcatraz had the first innings," said Perris. "He cleaned me up. And that, Hervey, was tolerably lucky for you."

"Was it?" sneered the victor. "You'd of done me up quick, maybe, if
Alcatraz hadn't wore you out?"

He waited hungrily for a reply that might give him some basis on which to act, for after all, it was not going to be easy