Silvertip's Strike (12 page)

“Yeah, you do, and you get away with it,” said Red, nodding his head.

He began to look with open eyes at Delgas, a sign that his mind was as open as a summer's day, also.

“It's better to kick than to be kicked,” said Red.

“Ain't it, though?” agreed Delgas.

“Listen!” said Red.

Over the edge of the hill, Farrel heard the clank of an iron-shod hoof against a stone.

“He's comin' closer,” said Delgas. “Listen, kid. This is the greatest chance that you ever had in your life.”

“You mean you ain't goin' to take a try at him?” asked Red quickly.

“Sure I'm goin' to take a try at him. We're both goin' to take a try,” said Delgas. “But there's enough glory in bumping off Silver to spread thick on two slices, lemme tell you. We're goin' to be known, from now on, as the birds that killed Silvertip. People are goin' to say: ‘There goes the birds that bumped off Jim Silver. Those are the ones that killed Arizona Jim.' We're goin' to be pointed out. Understand?”

“Yeah. Sure,” said Red. “But he ain't dead yet.”

“He's goin' to be dead. Now listen to me. When we sneak up to the edge of the hill, yonder, poke your head over dead easy. Understand? And have your rifle out in front of you. And what you shoot at is the hoss.”

“Parade?” said Red. “Morrie, you wouldn't take and kill the finest hoss in the world, would you?”

“Shut up and don't argue,” said Delgas, drawing out a pair of Colts from which the sights and triggers had been filed away. “I know best. The job that we got is to bring him down and kill him. And the first stir of anything, that stallion is goin' to jump twenty feet sideways. He's that way. The reason that Silver has got through so many tight holes is mostly that Parade is eyes and ears for him, and a jumpin' fool of a jack-in-the-box, besides. He can smell trouble a mile off down wind, too.

“No, kill that stallion, and Silver is half dead right then. You use your rifle. Make sure. Shoot straight. I'm goin' to use a Colt because I'm sort of more used to it, and if I miss at a cinch of a target like that, call me an old woman and slap my face for me!”

He put down his left-hand gun not far from the feet of Dan Farrel and began to do something to his other Colt.

“It's time!” said Red.

“Wait a minute,” commanded Delgas. “Don't rush it. We wanta get there to the ledge just at the right second. I'll tell you when to start. My ears are measurin' the sound and the distance like a tape. I'll tell you when.”

He went on: “You gotta learn to fan a gun, kid, and I'm goin' to teach you. It turns loose the bullets like drops of water out of a hose. Now shut up and don't talk. He's too near. And the stallion can hear like a telephone receiver.”

So they crouched there, hushed.

Dan Farrel, tied, gagged so that he could hardly breathe, listened to the frantic bumping of his heart. He was wet with sweat. It trickled from his forehead and ran into his helpless eyes. But he saw neither of the men before him clearly; rather he was seeing the big head and shoulders of Silver, swaying a little against the moonlight as Parade carried him lightly up the slope — a perfect target black against the moonlight! One uproar of guns and one thudding of bullets, and that would be the end of him.

It seemed to Farrel like the fall of mountains. He thought of Parade and the death of the great horse was even more impossible than the death of the man. But life can be let out by the prick of a pin. Somewhere he had found that — in a church or in a book.

He wondered if, by a great effort, he could make around the gag some sort of a strangling noise that might be a sufficient warning for Silver. But he knew that he could not manage it. His will was right. He felt that he was willing to die if he could send the message to the man who rode so helplessly into ambush. But he could do nothing.

He twisted in agony, and one foot touched the Colt which had been laid on the ground by Delgas. The electric spark of an idea leaped instantly through his brain. For the hair-trigger weapon was set so that the merest flick of the thumb on the hammer would discharge it, and if he could get his toe on the hammer for an instant — ”

Vaguely he saw Red begin to crawl forward, easing the rifle along the ground, moving like a great hunting beast. And over the edge of the hill he distinctly heard the clattering fall of a stone which Parade had dislodged.

The rider was close now. Soon he would be looming above the ledge.

“Now!” whispered Delgas to Red, and reached a hand for the Colt he had put down.

Farrel could not be sure that he would accomplish his purpose. He could only reach out rather blindly and flick back his toe. He felt no resistance more than a mere scratch against the sole of his boot, but a deep explosion boomed instantly in his ear. He had touched the hammer by the grace of chance!

He saw Delgas turn on him like a tiger; he heard the startled snort and plunge of the horse that could not be seen. Then Red had risen to his feet and run forward. On the verge of the ledge, big against the moonlight sky, Red leveled his rifle from the shoulder and fired.

Delgas was instantly beside him, turning loose a stream of bullets.

Both stopped shooting. To look at the dead bodies tumbling down the slope? — wondered Farrel. No, for Delgas was exclaiming:

“Wait — when he comes out from behind the rock — steady — get your bead to the right. I'll watch the left — now — now!”

And again the guns boomed.

Delgas began to spring up and down, cursing. He threw his empty gun on the ground. His yells of rage were like the howling of a beast. But Red, rifle at the ready, was still peering at the distance, trying to get in a final shot.

Farrel took a great breath. Death would be easy to face, he felt, for he had done enough to make his life worthwhile.

Then Delgas turned and rushed snarling back at him.

Delgas meant murder. The moon was behind his head, but enough of his features showed to let Farrel see the twist and stretch of them, and the catfish gape of his grin. The big fellow took Farrel by the throat. He could not even curse. He could only gasp with the completeness of his rage. With the butt of a revolver he offered to beat Farrel over the head, then to bash in his face.

He could not make a choice when the rifle of Red cracked again and Delgas dropped Farrel flat and ran back to see what had happened.

“I've got him!” yelled Red. “I've got him! Oh, no, he's gone! He's gone. He's made of moonshine, Delgas. Bullets just slide right through him and don't do no harm.”

“He'll moonshine you when he lays his hands on you!” said Morris Delgas. “He'll show you what moonshine can do, you flathead! What you got a rifle for? What you good for, you four-flusher, you fake of a wooden Injun?”

Red gradually straightened under the pouring of the abuse. At last he said: “That's about enough out of your trap, Delgas.”

“It's enough, is it?” shouted Delgas. “I'll show you what's enough! I'm goin' to see what's inside you! I'm goin' to take a look at your lining!”

He put his great grasp on Red, who slid one hand behind him as if to get at a knife. For a moment, they faced each other. Then Delgas cursed and took his hands away from Red.

“I oughta eat your heart,” he vowed, “but it'd be that much the better for the skunk that's lyin' yonder laughin' at us! It'd be fine for him if we choked each other and rolled down the slope here and bashed our heads in. Wouldn't that be slick for him?”

“I done the best shootin' I could,” said Red. “But that hoss was maneuverin' all the time like a snipe flyin' down wind. There wasn't no regularity about nothin' he did. He didn't keep to no straight lines, the fool. You seen that for yourself, Delgas. You had a pretty close shot at him, but you couldn't hit him.”

“It was Farrel that give him a couple of winks of head start,” argued Delgas. “The shootin' off of the gun was what started that hawk flyin', and two flaps takes a bird like that a long ways. Red, I'm sorry I started in to manhandle you. It wasn't your fault. But for a second, all I could think of was that Jim Silver had been inside our hands — and that we let him slip!”

“I know,” said Red. “I know how you feel. Don't I feel the same way, though? It's hell, is all that it is!”

They went back to Farrel and stood over him. The hands of Morris Delgas worked at his sides. They looked to Farrel like the jaws of two fish biting at the air. He kicked Farrel in the ribs.

“Get up!” he commanded.

The pain of the bruised flesh sickened Farrel. The weight of the blow made it difficult for him to breathe, but he got slowly to his feet. He realized that the least hesitation might hasten his time of dying.

So he stood and confronted the pair of them. And suddenly, Delgas reached out and removed the bandanna that gagged Farrel.

“You done the noble thing, didn't you?” asked Delgas. “Hey? It was noble, wasn't it?”

Farrel said nothing.

“Answer me!” shouted Delgas. “You was being noble, wasn't you?”

Farrel said nothing. He saw Delgas swing back a fist and how the punch traveled right at his head. He had an idea that he might be able to duck the blow, but if he avoided it, he was reasonably sure that he would be murdered. It was what Delgas wanted — the least additional excuse so that he would not be killing a helpless man in cold blood. So Farrel stood still and let the fist strike him in the face.

Once he had been struck down when the massive shoulder of a hay wagon nudged him. The fist of Delgas was like that. It seemed to be faced with brass and to have a ton of driving weight behind it. It took him right off his feet and slammed him down on the back of his head. He could hear the whack of the fist against his flesh as though two hands had been clapped together. Afterward, he heard his head pound solidly against the rock.

When his wits cleared, a second later, the left side of his face was numb, with liquid trickling over the skin, tickling it. Then he realized that his cheek bone had been laid open and the blood was running down from that.

Big Morris Delgas got him by the hair of his head and jerked him to a sitting posture. He swung back his other fist.

“I asked you, was you being noble?” shouted Delgas. “I asked you was you a dirty hound that was being noble, shooting a gun by a kick of your foot, giving Jim Silver warning. I asked you was you a dirty rat, a dirty noble rat? Was you?”

He kept jerking the head of Farrel back and forth, and his right hand oscillated with terrible eagerness to beat again into the face of the prisoner.

Red broke in suddenly: “Aw, back up, Delgas. Let him be.”

Delgas dropped Dan Farrel and whirled about.

“You want something?” he yelled.

Red had backed up a little. He had his hand behind him again, and Farrel could see how the fingers were looped over the handle of a knife. He seemed to mean business, though he kept on backing up, slowly, before the truculent advance of Delgas.

“I won't take water from you, Delgas,” he said.

“You're butting in, you fool!” shouted Delgas, wavering with the wind of his fury. “You're butting in and you're tryin' to tell me what's what. I'm goin' to smash you!”

Red kept on backing up, more and more slowly.

“I won't take water from nobody,” he said.

He stood still, suddenly.

“I won't take water from you, Delgas,” he said.

His hand came around from the small of his back. The moonlight winked along the blade of the sharpened steel.

Delgas strode close and measured himself against Red. He was so big that he had only to throw out his arms in order to embrace the smaller man. The whole body of Delgas worked in his passion, just as the entire body of a vast cat might work, as it sharpens its claws.

“You poor fool,” said Delgas, “d'you think your toad sticker can stop me?”

“I don't think nothing,” said Red. “I just think that I won't take water from nobody.”

“I got a mind to bash your head in,” said Delgas.

“All right. I guess you're big enough to bash me,” said Red, “but you gotta prove it. I ain't taking water from nobody.”

“What's the matter with you, kid?” demanded Delgas. “Are you nutty or something? What you butting in for?”

“I don't care about him,” said Red. “You can take and drill him through the head, for all I care, or open him up with a knife, and it's Jake with me. But I hate you to be beating up a bird that can't lift his hands.”

“What's the matter with you? You ain't takin' the socks, are you?” asked Delgas.

“I dunno. It sort of makes me sick,” said Red.

Delgas laughed. “You are funny,” he said. “That is what you are. You're just a funny hombre. I bang him in the mug and you take and get sick. You're just a funny hombre, is what you are, Red.”

“All right,” said Red. “I can't help it.”

“Sure you can't help it, if you're built that way,” said Delgas. “Besides, I dunno that it's a good idea to smear up this gent too much. Maybe it's better to wait till Harry Rutherford has a look at him. Harry might have some ideas about the way to handle him, I guess.”

“Sure he might,” agreed Red. “Now you're talking, old son. We'll get him back to Rutherford, down yonder, and see what Harry has to say about him.”

Delgas nodded. He concluded the argument on which the life of Farrel had depended by saying: “He thought he was being noble, was what made me sore. Reaching out and shooting the gun to warn his friend — you know, kind of being noble and giving himself away to the Injuns for the sake of his partner — you know, regular story stuff. That was what made me sick, him playing noble, like that. That's why I asked him was he trying to be noble. If he'd said yes, I would ‘a' bashed him to a pulp!”