CHAPTER IX
BATTLE LIGHT
O'Brien pressed close to Barry.
"Partner," he said rapidly, "you're clear now--you're clear of more hellthat you ever dream. Now climb that hoss of yours and feed him leathertill you get clear of Brownsville--and if I was you I'd never comewithin a day's ride of the Three B's again."
The mild, brown eyes widened.
"I don't like crowds," murmured Barry.
"You're wise, kid," grinned the bartender--"a hell of a lot wiser thanyou know right now. On your way!"
And he turned to follow the crowd into the saloon. But Jerry Strannstood at the swinging doors, watching, and he saw Barry linger behind.
"Are you coming?" he called.
"I got an engagement," answered the meek voice.
"You got another engagement here," mocked Strann. "Understand?"
The other hesitated for an instant, and then sighed deeply. "I supposeI'll stay," he murmured, and walked into the bar. Jerry Strann wassmiling in the way that showed his teeth. As Barry passed he saidsoftly: "I see we ain't going to have no trouble, you and me!" and hemoved to clap his strong hand on the shoulder of the smaller man. Oddlyenough, the hand missed, for Barry swerved from beneath it as a wolfswerves from the shadow of a falling branch. No perceptible effort--nosudden start of tensed muscles, but a movement so smooth that it wasalmost unnoticeable. But the hand of Strann fell through thin air.
"You're quick," he said. "If you was as quick with your hands as you arewith your feet----"
Barry paused and the melancholy brown eyes dwelt on the face of Strann.
"Oh, hell!" snorted the other, and turned on his heel to the bar. "Drinkup!" he commanded.
A shout and a snarl from the further end of the room.
"A wolf, by God!" yelled one of the men.
The owner of the animal made his way with unobtrusive swiftness thelength of the room and stood between the dog and a man who fingered thebutt of his gun nervously.
"He won't hurt you none," murmured that softly assuring voice.
"The hell he won't!" responded the other. "He took a pass at my leg justnow and dam' near took it off. Got teeth like the blades of apocket-knife!"
"You're on a cold trail, Sam," broke in one of the others. "That ain'tany wolf. Look at him now!"
The big, shaggy animal had slunk to the feet of his master and withhead abased stared furtively up into Barry's face. A gesture served assufficient command, and he slipped shadow-like into the corner andcrouched with his head on his paws and the incandescent green of hiseyes glimmering; Barry sat down in a chair nearby.
O'Brien was happily spinning bottles and glasses the length of the bar;there was the chiming of glass and the rumble of contented voices.
"Red-eye all 'round," said the loud voice of Jerry Strann, "but there'sone out. Who's out? Oh, it's _him_. Hey O'Brien, lemonade for the lady."
It brought a laugh, a deep, good-natured laugh, and then a chorus ofmockery; but Barry stepped unconfused to the bar, accepted the glass oflemonade, and when the others downed their fire-water, he sipped hisdrink thoughtfully. Outside, the wind had risen, and it shook the hoteland carried a score of faint voices as it whirred around corners andthrough cracks. Perhaps it was one of those voices which made the bigdog lift its head from its paws and whine softly! surely it wassomething he heard which caused Barry to straighten at the bar and canthis head slightly to one side--but, as certainly, no one else in thebarroom heard it. Barry set down his glass.
"Mr. Strann?" he called.
And the gentle voice carried faintly down through the uproar of the bar.
"Sister wants to speak to you," suggested O'Brien to Strann.
"Well?" roared the latter, "what d'you want?"
The others were silent to listen; and they smiled in anticipation.
"If you don't mind, much," said the musical voice, "I think I'll bemoving along."
There is an obscure little devil living in all of us. It makes the childbreak his own toys; it makes the husband strike the helpless wife; itmakes the man beat the cringing, whining dog. The greatest of Americanwriters has called it the Imp of the Perverse. And that devil came inJerry Strann and made his heart small and cold. If he had been by naturethe bully and the ruffian there would have been no point in all thatfollowed, but the heart of Jerry Strann was ordinarily as warm as theyellow sunshine itself; and it was a common saying in the Three B's thatJerry Strann would take from a child what he would not endure from amountain-lion. Women loved Jerry Strann, and children would crowd abouthis knees, but this day the small demon was in him.
"You want to be moving along" mimicked the devil in Jerry Strann. "Well,you wait a while. I ain't through with you yet. Maybe--" he paused andsearched his mind. "You've given me a fall, and maybe you can give therest of us--a laugh!"
The chuckle of appreciation went up the bar and down it again.
"I want to ask you," went on the devil in Jerry Strann, "where you gotyour hoss?"
"He was running wild," came the gentle answer. "So I took a walk, oneday, and brought him in."
A pause.
"Maybe," grinned the big man, "you creased him?"
For it is one of the most difficult things in the world to capture awild horse, and some hunters, in their desperation at seeing thewonderful animals escape, have tried to "crease" them. That is, theystrive to shoot so that the bullet will barely graze the top of theanimal's vertebrae, just behind the ears, stunning the horse and makingit helpless for the capture. But necessarily such shots are made from adistance, and little short of a miracle is needed to make the bulletstrike true--for a fraction of an inch too low means death. So anotherlaugh of appreciation ran around the barroom at the mention of creasing.
"No," answered Barry, "I went out with a halter and after a while Satangot used to me and followed me home."
They waited only long enough to draw deep breath; then came a long yellof delight. But the obscure devil was growing stronger and stronger inStrann. He beat on the bar until he got silence. Then he leaned over tomeet the eyes of Barry.
"That," he remarked through his teeth, "is a damned--lie!"
There is only one way of answering that word in the mountain-desert, andBarry did not take it. The melancholy brown eyes widened; he sighed, andraising his glass of lemonade sipped it slowly. Came a sick silence inthe barroom. Men turned their eyes towards each other and then flashedthem away again. It is not good that one who has the eyes and the tongueof a man should take water from another--even from a Jerry Strann. Andeven Jerry Strann withdrew his eyes slowly from his prey, and shuddered;the sight of the most grisly death is not so horrible as cowardice.
And the devil which was still strong in Strann made him look about for anew target; Barry was removed from all danger by an incredible barrier.He found that new target at once, for his glance reached to the cornerof the room and found there the greenish, glimmering eyes of the dog. Hesmote upon the bar.
"Is this a damned kennel?" he shouted. "Do I got to drink in a barnyard?What's the dog doin' here?"
And he caught up the heavy little whiskey glass and hurled it at thecrouching dog. It thudded heavily, but it brought no yelp of pain;instead, a black thunderbolt leaped from the corner and lunged down theroom. It was the silence of the attack that made it terrible, and Stranncursed and pulled his gun. He could never have used it. He was a wholehalf second too late, but before the dog sprang a voice cut in: "Bart!"
It checked the animal in its very leap; it landed on the floor and slidon stiffly extended legs to the feet of Strann.
"Bart!" rang the voice again.
And the beast, flattening to the floor, crawled backwards, inch by inch;it was slavering, and there was a ravening madness in its eyes.
"Look at it!" cried Strann. "By God, it's mad!"
And he raised his gun to draw the bead.
"Wait!" called the same voice which had checked the spring of the dog.Surely it could not have come from the lips of Barry
. It held aresonance of chiming metal; it was not loud, but it carried like abrazen bell. "Don't do it, Strann!"
And it came to every man in the barroom that it was unhealthy to standbetween the two men at that instant; a sudden path opened from Barry toStrann.
"Bart!" came the command again. "Heel!"
The dog obeyed with a slinking swiftness; Jerry Strann put up his gunand smiled.
"I don't take a start on no man," he announced quite pleasantly. "Idon't need to. But--you yaller hearted houn'--get out from between. WhenI make my draw I'm goin' to kill that damn wolf."
Now, the fighting face of Jerry Strann was well known in the Three B's,and it was something for men to remember until they died in a peacefulbed. Yet there was not a glance, from the bystanders, for Strann. Theystood back against the wall, flattening themselves, and they stared,fascinated, at the slender stranger. Not that his face had grown ugly bya sudden metamorphosis. It was more beautiful than ever, for the man wassmiling. It was his eyes which held them. Behind the brown a light wasgrowing, a yellow and unearthly glimmer which one felt might be seen onthe darkest night.
There was none of the coward in Jerry Strann. He looked full into thatyellow, glimmering, changing light--he looked steadily--and a strangefeeling swept over him. No, it was not fear. Long experience had taughthim that there was not another man in the Three B's, with the exceptionof his own terrible brother, who could get a gun out of the leatherfaster than he, but now it seemed to Jerry Strann that he was facingsomething more than mortal speed and human strength and surety. He couldnot tell in what the feeling was based. But it was a giant, dimforeboding holding dominion over other men's lives, and it sent a trainof chilly-weakness through his blood.
"It's a habit of mine," said Jerry Strann, "to kill mad dogs when I see'em." And he smiled again.
They stood for another long instant, facing each other. It was plainthat every muscle in Strann's body was growing tense; the very smile wasfrozen on his lips. When he moved, at last, it was a convulsive jerk ofhis arm, and it was said, afterward, that his gun was all clear of theleather before the calm stranger stirred. No eye followed what happened.Can the eye follow such speed as the cracking lash of a whip?
There was only one report. The forefinger of Strann did not touch histrigger, but the gun slipped down and dangled loosely from his hand. Hemade a pace forward with his smile grown to an idiotic thing and apatch of red sprang out in the centre of his breast. Then he lurchedheadlong to the floor.