Silvertip's Search (8 page)

Buck swallowed, then he licked his dry lips and continued to run his eager eyes over and over the body of Brender.

“But would it be wise?” said Barry Christian. “You must remember that as long as we hold Rap in our hands, Silvertip is drawing closer and closer to us. He is searching for his vanished friend. He is combing the desert, on that matchless horse of his, like a hawk in the air, hunting, hunting, never at rest. Such a man as Silver, you know, will never give up, so long as sacred friendship is in his mind, so long as a sacred obligation remains to be discharged. No, he'll continue hunting until he finds Rap Brender, and when he finds Rap, then, lads, we close our hands over the most interesting man in this entire world; we close our hands over Silver himself.”

He stood up suddenly. His thoughts for an instant struck through the profound mask of his hypocrisy like white fire through a storm cloud. And the keen, penetrating light shot from his eyes.

Stew and Buck looked at their chief, aghast.

“He had the world before him. He could wander where he pleased,” said Christian. “But he chose to interfere with me — and therefore, he is dead! He is a ghost already. He throws no shadow on the sand!”

The passion faded suddenly out of his eyes.

“To catch this priceless Silver,” said the chief, “would be more than our united talents might be able to accomplish, my friends. But now, on account of Mr. Brender, we don't need to plan and scheme and wear out our horses pursuing him. We may simply wait here until the profound mind of Silver has solved the problem and located the man. We then pull the trigger, and the trap falls, and Silver is ours, taken like an eagle out of the sky.”

He dropped an affectionate hand on the shoulder of Stew.

“And after that happens, Stew,” he said, “after that happens, we may perhaps be able to do something about Rap Brender himself. Because I know what you have in mind, Stew, and I have such an affection for you that it would pain me to disappoint you.”

He smiled at Stew, at Buck, and, last of all, and most lingeringly and tenderly, on Rap Brender himself.

So that Rap, bowing his head suddenly, felt the ice of despair slipping like a bitter steel edge into his heart.

Higgins's Barroom

T
HERE
was only one part of his estate where Tom Higgins was perfectly at home. When he walked through the green of his flourishing fields and groves, he always felt a little incredulous of his good fortune; when he wandered through his house, he could not believe that Tom Higgins had built it, but when he worked as bartender in his own saloon, he was thoroughly content.

He had furnished the place carefully. The bar itself was a ponderous structure with a good, heavy brass rail running in front of it to uphold the boots of customers, and no matter what other work was performed on the place each day, that brass rod had to be burnished until it shone like a flame.

Across the wall behind the bar ran a great mirror, in three neatly joined sections, and in front of that mirror stood three ranks of parti-colored bottles. They had been collected for their colors, in fact, rather than for their contents. They all contained liquor of one sort or another, but even Tom Higgins had forgotten what was in most of them. What delighted him was the number and the variety of the host.

He was swabbing off the surface of his bar, on this day, not because it needed swabbing, but because out of his youth he retained mental pictures of competent bartenders swabbing off their bars with a fine, broad flourish of the arm. Besides, he liked to throw a little water on the bar and then polish it off, because he felt that the red-brown of the surface came up with a smoother polish, that reflected the window lights more deeply and clearly, as well as the dim golden lettering that ran across the mirror behind him.

Tom Higgins would have been glad to chat, but there was in the room only the tall and military form of the big Mexican, Alonso Santos. The other Mexican, the real leader of the strange party, Murcio, had just been called out of the saloon by Barry Christian.

It was while Tom was rubbing up his bar that a flash of gold gleamed beyond his swinging doors. And a moment later, when the doors were pushed open, he saw what was in fact a golden stallion, stockinged in black to the knees and the hocks.

There was only a flash of the horse, but that glimpse made the heart of Tom Higgins jump. Then he took heed of the man who was entering. For he was worth a look. He might be twenty-five. He might be thirty. But plainly he was in the very prime of life. The face was brown, deeply sun-tanned, and aggressive in cut of features, and yet with a comfortable solidity about the bony frame that suggested that this man could endure a battering. But, above all, the watchful Tom Higgins was delighted with the fellow's build. For about the neck and arms and shoulders there was the weight of luxurious power, and then the rest of the body ran away to the lean, stringy hips of the perfect athlete. Merely to watch the man walk was a thing to light the eyes, there was such a rising on the toes, such suggestion of speed and grace and strength combined.

The stranger paused just inside the door and knocked from his clothes some of the desert dust that had accumulated in every wrinkle. He took off his sombrero and dusted that, also, exposing at the same time the massive size of his head, and two singular markings of gray above the temples, ridiculously like incipient horns about to break through the hair. That suggestion of horns was perhaps the thing that made the man seem formidable, crafty, full of devices.

Had not Tom Higgins heard of such a man, not long before? The gray spots in the hair — and a golden stallion?

“Glad to see you, brother,” said Tom Higgins.

“How's things?” responded the other, coming to rest at the bar with his left elbow on it, and a shoulder slumping as one foot was fitted upon the brass rail beneath.

“Pretty fair — pretty fair,” said Higgins.

“Beer, please,” the stranger ordered.

“You'll find it cold, too,” said Higgins. “Same cold as spring water. I got a pipe running here from deep in the spring, and that water it flows around the beer bottles day and night and never stops cooling 'em off.”

“Have some with me,” suggested the stranger.

Higgins pursed his lips. There was no room in his small face for more than one large feature, and this was the mouth, wide and thick as the lips of a Negro. When Higgins laughed, one could see of him no more than the gaping mouth, the teeth, and a few wrinkles around the margin of the picture.

“It ain't my time of day for beer,” he asserted. “But I'll have a shot of red-eye with you. Real rye, boy, and ten years old.”

He dumped a finger of the rye into the bottom of a whisky glass and raised it with one hand, while with the other he poured the frothing beer into a tall glass for his client and approved with his eye of the dew that gathered on the sides of the glass.

“And here's how,” said the stranger.

“How!” said Higgins.

He tossed off his drink, and then grinned as he saw the big fellow slowly draining the contents of his glass until he put it down half empty, and sighed with pleasure.

“Who's been through here lately?” asked the stranger.

“Why, just the ordinary string of folks that cross the desert and wanta stop over,” said Tom Higgins, instantly cautious. “Know many folks around this part of the world?”

“Not many,” said the stranger. “There's a fellow called Rap Brender, though.”

Tom Higgins started. He looked suddenly down, as though he might betray something with his face.

“Brender,” he said. “Lemme see. Youngish, sort of. Dark and mighty good-looking.”

“That's it.”

“Well,” said Tom Higgins, “he's been here, all right. Matter of fact, he was here the other day. And matter of fact, he's coming back!”

“When?”

“Why, I dunno. I think he said in a day or so. Maybe this evening.”

“Well,” said the stranger, “I'll take another bottle of beer into your back room and sit there in the cool for a moment, if you don't mind.”

“Help yourself,” answered Higgins.

He went as far as the door and made a hospitable gesture.

“Just make yourself at home,” said Higgins.

He saw the other seated, and then went back to the bar.

He found that the big head of the Mexican was nodding at him.

“That's the man!” said Santos, very softly. “That must be the man that Mr. Christian wants and that we're all to look out for. That must be Silvertip!”

“It's him!” whispered Higgins.

Silvertip, in the meantime, sat in the back room of the saloon, by no means free from apprehension. He was by force of long-endured dangers about as suspicious as a hunting wolf, or a fleeing moose, and he had not failed to notice the start with which the bartender had heard the mention of the name of Rap Brender.

Silver tried to diagnose the case as he sat in the dimness of the little room. Huge, round-headed trees covered the field before his eyes. Between the trunks, he could see the sunset colors begin to tarnish the bright edge of the sky. And back and forth under the trees two men were walking, one tall, with a pale face and long black hair, and the other short, stodgy, with tightly puffed cheeks and a bristling little mustache.

Silver noted them as they wandered here and there, conversing busily. The short man was arguing with fierce heat. The tall man spoke in conciliatory tones, in a gentle voice, with graceful and soothing gestures. Yet his companion refused to be soothed.

But there was the problem of the bartender to be solved for Silver himself. The man knew Rap Brender. And why the start? Well, perhaps the bartender might think that he was an officer of the law, pursuing Brender. Or perhaps it was simply that the man was afraid of Rap.

In any case, it was strange that such a direct inquiry had received such a direct answer. People who knew an outlaw like Rap Brender were more apt to fence for a time before they admitted their acquaintance. But the bartender had spoken as though he were stuttering through a memorized piece.

That was the thing on which the suspicions of Silver centered. The peculiarity of voice and manner, the total lack of normalcy, the sudden change from a hearty bartender to the stuttering hulk of a man that had to look down to the floor, utterly embarrassed.

It was a small thing perhaps, but Silver knew that the greatest causes might be wrecked by a failure to explore just such small reefs as this seemed to be.

Slowly, carefully, he recalled every feature of the conversation. His mind reverted to the big, dignified Mexican who had been sitting at the side table. There was probably a story worth the telling behind that fellow, too, with his military bearing, and his costly clothes, and his air of command. He was no random prospector or cow-puncher or cattle dealer who had made the short cut across the desert and stopped off at this oasis.

In fact, an air of guilty mystery began to gather about the place, in Silver's mind, and he slid his hand quickly up under his coat, to enjoy the reassuring touch of his fingers against the rough butt of the weapon.

His thoughts were taken from his own position and Brender by the approach of the tall man and the fellow with the brown, puffed cheeks. When they got nearer, Silver knew what he had suspected before — the tall one was Barry Christian!

The little fellow was saying: “This is the end of the argument — señor, it is the end! The point of it is — what I have done, I have done without you. That is true, no? Until last night you gave me a little help!”

“Ah, Murcio,” said the other, in his wonderfully gentle, rather sad voice. “Ah, Murcio, will you tell me that it was nothing? Only a
little
help when you were about to lose your prize, when it was about to slip away?”

“They could not have gone far,” argued Murcio. “They could have been tracked. Not even the desert could have swallowed them. I should have found them again!”

“Stubborn fellow — stubborn Murcio,” said the tall man gently. And he laid his hand lightly on the shoulder of the Mexican.

“A woman could not have ridden very far — not through the heat of the desert. She would have failed. We would have recaptured her!”

“Ah, but she's a strong little thing,” said the other. “Full of strings and fibers of strength. She would endure like a mustang. Never trust to her weakness, or you'll be sadly surprised. No, never trust to that! But what I ask from you, Murcio, I ask against my will. It is simply that I am a business man.”

“A business man? Do you call it business? Blackmail!” exclaimed Murcio.

“A business man,” said the soft, steady voice of the American. “A business man, like yourself, eh?”

Murcio stuck his hands together above his head and groaned.

“But for a reward — yes, yes, I shall pay you the reward — a good, fat sum. But you are asking for a fortune!”

“She has a great fortune. I'm asking only for a bit of it,” said the American. “You must understand that. She is very rich. You won't need all of that money for yourself.”

“I never meant to take it all!” groaned Murcio. “There must be something left for her!”

“For her?” said the tall man. “Ah, Murcio, what is her need of money? With her sweet face and her charming smile, she cannot help but find an easy way through the world. All the more delightful if she knows that men are not hunting her down for her money.”

“Still you have words — still you argue!” said Murcio, staring suddenly up at his companion. “What a terrible man you are, Señor — ”

Before the name was spoken, the forefinger of the tall man was lifted in a warning gesture, and Murcio snapped his teeth on the unspoken word, while the American glanced suddenly around him, and over his shoulder, straight at the open window behind which Silver was sitting.

The tall man moved away with Murcio, their voices again heard, but not distinctly, while around the corner of the building came the colossal bulk of Tom Higgins, the skirts of his great white apron fluttering as he strode along.

He made gestures as he approached.

Presently he had withdrawn a bit to the side with Christian, and they spoke earnestly together.

What Higgins said, Silver could in no way make out, but the words were sufficient to make the pale-faced man turn suddenly toward the building. And again it seemed to Silver that a gun had been leveled at him.

He stood up and went through the barroom.

“Not leaving us, señor?” asked the big Mexican with a sudden strange access of courtesy.

“Only taking a ride around the place before it's dark,” said Silver. “I'll be back, thank you.”

Parade swept his master rapidly through the green of the oasis. Glancing back, Silver saw Alonso Santos stroll out from the saloon and stare after him, shading his eyes against the red flare of the western sky.

There were other horses tied in front of the saloon, but none of them was mounted. For that matter, who would dream of pursuing the rider of Parade except with many reliefs of horses along the way?

No, if there were danger in the oasis, he was winging safely away from it now. The long and heavy rhythm of the beating hoofs of the stallion made a Mexican woman turn to stare as he passed the little village of the laborers. She was hanging out clothes on a wash line, and she left a picture in the mind of Silver as he swept by. There were half a dozen of the little white-washed huts where the Mexicans lived. They were the men who had charge of the irrigation, because their race had been familiar with the handling of water for many hundreds of years before the Spaniards rode into Old Mexico. And now Tom Higgins kept enough of them to care for all the soil of his land.

The flashing, wet washing and the gleaming white houses swept behind Silver. He passed the last of the trees. And presently the great stride of the stallion was carrying Silver out into the desert.

He went straight on until the oasis drew into a dark patch behind him. Then he slowed Parade to a walk. There was no need for hurry. The twilight would soon cover him from any prying eyes, and at the slower pace he could put his thoughts in order more easily.