Desert Conquest, A. M. Chisholm [best reads .TXT] 📗

there. The country was rolling, studded with clumps of cottonwoods. The moon, close to the full, touched the higher spots with silver, intensifying the blackness of the shadows.

Clyde peered ahead to the limit of her restricted area of vision, for the lights of a station or a town. There was none. Not even the lighted square of a ranch-house window broke the night. Five minutes passed, ten, and still the train remained motionless. Suddenly, at the forward end of the coach, appeared the porter. Followed the occupants of the smoking compartment, each with his hands on the shoulders of the man in front of him in impromptu lockstep. Behind them came an apparition which caused the passengers, after a first gasp of incredulity, to vent their feelings in masculine oaths and little feminine screams of alarm.

This intruder was a large man, powerfully built. His hat was shoved back from his forehead, but his face was concealed by a square of dark cloth, cut with eyeholes. In his right hand he dandled with easy familiarity an exceedingly long-barrelled revolver. His left hand rested upon the twin of it, in a holster at his thigh. At his shoulder was another man, similarly masked.

"Everybody sit quiet!" the first commanded crisply. "Gents will hook their fingers on top of their heads, and keep them there. No call to be frightened, ladies, 'long's the men show sense. My partner will pass along the contribution bag. No holding out, and no talk. And just remember I'll get the first man that makes a move."

Clyde had joined in the gasp of surprise, but she had not screamed. Nita was trembling with excitement.

"I wouldn't have missed it for worlds!" the girl whispered. "Oh, Clyde, isn't he a duck of a holdup? Will there be shooting? Haven't any of these men got any nerve?"

Clyde became aware that the man in the seat opposite was speaking to her out of the corner of his mouth, his hands prudently crossed on his pate.

"If you have anything of special value—rings, watch, that sort of stuff—get rid of it. Put it on the floor if you can, and kick it under the seat ahead. Don't cache it in your own seat. Give him what money you have—that's what he wants. Tell the kid next you to do the same. And don't be nervous. You're as safe as if you were at home."

Clyde wore no rings. The few articles of jewellery she had brought with her were already safely concealed beyond the masculine ken of any mere train robber. But her watch was suspended around her neck by a thin gold chain. The watch could be detached, but the chain itself must be lifted over the head; and that would attract attention. To leave the chain would be to admit the existence of the watch. Without an instant's hesitation she tugged sharply. The frail links broke. Lowering the watch to the floor of the car, she shoved it forward with her foot.

Meanwhile the second masked man was making swift progress down the aisle. In his left hand was a gunny sack, in his right a formidable six-shooter. He was a gentleman of humorous turn, and he indulged in jocose remarks as he went, which, however, fell on an unappreciative audience. Because time pressed he did not attempt to skin each victim clean. He took what he could get, and passed on to the next; but he took everything in sight, and, moreover, each man was forced to turn his pockets inside out. This brought to light several pocket-edition firearms, which likewise went into the bag. With infinite humour he declared his intention of taking them home to his children. They were toys, he explained, with which the darlings could not hurt themselves.

"Thank you, miss," was his acknowledgment of the roll of bills which Clyde handed him. "You're sure an example to a lot o' these tinhorn sports. I reckon you got some pretty stones cached somewheres too, but I won't force your hand, seein's you've acted like a little lady. Just get up till I look at the seat. Now, partner"—he turned on the man across the aisle—"it's you to sweeten!"

That individual produced a very attenuated roll. "Sorry I can't go to the centre any stronger, old-timer. You've got me at the wrong end between pay days."

"Huh!" The holdup eyed him suspiciously. "Keep your hands stric'ly away from your pockets for a minute." He slapped them in quick succession. "No gun," said he, "and that's lucky for both of us, maybe. Business is business, partner, but I hate to set an old-timer afoot complete. Keep out about ten for smokes and grub."

"Yours truly," responded the other. "When you land in the calaboose for this racket I'll keep you in tobacco. What name shall I ask for?"

"If I land there you can ask for a damfool—and I'll answer the first time," laughed the holdup over his shoulder. "Next gent! Here's the little bag. Lady, keep your weddin' ring. You fat sport, stand up till I see what you're sittin' on. Why, was you tryin' to hatch out that bunch of money? I'll surely do that incubatin' myself."

He levied tribute swiftly, in spite of his badinage, and the gunny sack sagged heavier and heavier. As he reached the end, his companion, who had dominated the passengers with his gun, abandoned his position and came down the aisle. At the rear door he turned.

"Keep your seats till the train moves," he ordered harshly. "I'm layin' for the first man that sticks his head out of this car."

Behind him the coach buzzed like a disturbed hive. Its occupants bewailed their losses, vowed vengeance on both holdups and railway. Women reproached men with cowardice. Men told each other what they would have done if—— But not one attempted to leave his seat.

Nita turned to Clyde with sparkling eyes. "And now I've been in a holdup!" she exclaimed. "Won't that be a thing to tell the girls? Were you frightened, Clyde? I wasn't."

"I don't think so," Clyde replied. "I'm glad we saved our watches." The words recalled the man across the aisle. He was leaning back, listening to odd bits of conversation, a smile of amusement on his face. Clyde leaned across.

"I want to thank you," she said. "We should never have thought of hiding our watches."

He nodded pleasantly. "No, not likely. I hope you didn't lose much money. He left me ten dollars. I don't want to be misunderstood, but that's very much at your service until you can get more."

"And what shall you do—till pay day?" she asked, obeying a sudden mischievous impulse.

"Oh, I'll worry along," he replied. His long arm stretched across, and a ten-dollar bill fell in her lap.

"No, no," she said, "I was joking. I have plenty——"

She stopped suddenly. Somewhere toward the head of the train a revolver barked, and barked again. Then came a staccato fusillade.

Swiftly the man across the aisle reached for his bundle, tore it open, and plucked from it a long-barrelled, flat-handled, venomous automatic pistol and a box of cartridges. He slid out the clip, snapped it back, and went down the car in long pantherlike bounds, bending half double.

Up forward the shooting, which had ceased, began again. Suddenly there broke into it the voice of another weapon, rapid and sustained as the roll of an alarm clock. Other guns chimed in. A miniature battle seemed to be in progress. And then it died. An occasional shot came from the distance. Silence ensued.

Men whose curiosity got the better of prudence left the car and returned. The train robbers were gone. It was thought that two or three were wounded. It was the express messenger who had started the shooting. He had got loose, somehow, in his rifled car, got a gun from a drawer, and opened fire. He was shot through the shoulder. A brave fellow, that. The company should do something for him. Two others of the train crew were hit.

Clyde awaited the return of the man across the aisle. The train began to move, gathered way, and thundered on. Still he did not return. The porter began to make up the berths. To him she applied for information. He knew nothing. The conductor was in equal ignorance. Inquiries throughout the train were fruitless. The man of the seat across the aisle was not forthcoming. His few belongings, which threw no light on his identity, were gathered up to await his appearance. It was suggested, to Clyde's indignation, that he was an accomplice of the robbers, but in what manner was not clear.

And so Clyde Burnaby went on to the coast with ten dollars which she did not in the least need. She neither saw nor heard more of their owner; but, though it was unlikely she should meet him again, she kept the identical bill. On her return she tucked it away in a drawer in her writing desk; and when occasionally she noticed it there it was merely to wonder, with some self-reproach, how its owner had fared until the next pay day.

CHAPTER II

In a secluded corner of a certain club billiard room two middle-aged gentlemen padded around and around a table, and poked at balls. Both appeared bored by the amusement. Their skill was little, and their luck was rather less, so that a ball rarely found a pocket. Between strokes they carried on a conversation having to do with such light and frivolous topics as bond issues, guarantees thereof, sinking funds, haulage rates, and legal decisions and pending legislation affecting transportation. Or it might be more accurate to say that one endeavoured to engage the other in conversation on these esoteric matters, at which the other repeatedly shied, evincing a preference for those of more general human interest.

Not that he was uninformed on these topics. Quite the reverse. He was a rotund, florid little man, with twinkling, humorous eyes, which could bore like augers on occasion, and a mouth as firm and close as a steel trap. His name was William Bates Rapp, and his specialty was corporation law. He was counsel for the Western Airline Railway, and just then he was pretending to play billiards with its president, Cromwell York.

York, who also was pretending to play billiards with Rapp, was a dogged gentleman who was accustomed to take his pound of flesh whenever he could not obtain, on some pretext, two pounds. His subordinates said that he worked twenty-five hours a day, which gives, if you consider it, an advantage of some fifteen days per annum. He was in the grip of his business, body and soul. It fascinated him, dominated him more and more as the years went on, as his own fortune and his interests increased. He was continually reaching out for more territory, and in so doing he came in hostile contact with other railway men, also gunning for the same game. Occasionally, therefore, they gunned for each other. When York was hit he took his medicine; when he hit the other fellow he chose as vital a spot as he could. Even as he played billiards his mind was elsewhere, which accounted in part for his poor success at the game.

"Speaking about Prairie Southern," said he, "we have about decided to take it over."

Rapp sighed. "I'm not a perpetual-motion legal machine, York. Won't that keep till to-morrow?"

"We pay you a big enough retainer," said York, with the frankness of years of intimacy. "What do you suppose we do it for?"

"Principally, I imagine, to keep you out of jail," Rapp retorted, with equal frankness. "I've done it so far, but——" He shook his head forebodingly. "Well, if you will talk, come and sit down. I'm tired of this. Now, then, about Prairie Southern: have they come to the end of their rope, or did you pull it in a little for them?"

"I didn't need to," said York. "They have tied themselves up in hard knots. We don't particularly want the road;