“I’ll wait for a long time if I wait for Gordon to issue the writ,” he remarked. “Seeing that he’s dead.”
“Dead! You’re a liar, you sneaking cur; you can’t bluff me. And when I’m loose, if I don’t fill you full of lead it will be because–––”
But Burkhardt’s explanation was never finished on that point, for Madden whipped the rolled handkerchief over his mouth and quickly knotted it behind, shutting off the flow of seething vituperative speech. If looks could slay, those he received from the prisoner’s bloodshot maddened eyes would have dropped the sheriff in his tracks; as it was, they fell harmless against the law officer’s person.
“Things have changed sort of sudden, haven’t they, Burkhardt?” Madden stated, sardonically. “Never can tell what’s going to happen between supper and breakfast. Here I go out to serve a warrant on Weir, and instead I’m bringing you in for trying a low I.W.W. trick. Surprising cards a fellow sometimes gets on the draw.” With which he went back to the other car.
Counting on quickness for the safe delivery of his men in jail, Madden did not attempt to approach the court house by a side street. On the contrary he drove fast down the main way, with the other two cars following close, passing without pause through the crowd of Mexicans drawn forth in wonder at the booming report of the explosion that had sounded from the dam.
One could see that excitement was at a high pitch. With the rumors that all day had been in circulation, with later vague tales of the great debauch proceeding at the old ’dobe house half way up the road to camp, with the thunder-clap that had burst from the base of the mountains coming on top of all, every man, woman and child had run to the main street, where those in the 265 automobiles could see by wagging tongues and gesticulating hands that speculation was rife and curiosity afire.
“The talk this evening when I set out for your camp was that I expected to bring you in and hang you,” Madden said dryly, to the engineer. “Quite a crowd had come to town. Plain to see now that Burkhardt and his bunch had started the talk. I shouldn’t be surprised if there had been trouble had I arrested and locked you up. There are a few bad Mexicans around these parts that would do anything for money, and it’s evident from what’s happened that Sorenson’s gang was ready to go the limit. What I’m trying to figure out is where these fellows Burkhardt had with him up yonder came from.”
“I can tell you. From across the line. I’ve seen plenty just like them down there,” Weir affirmed. “Look at their hats and clothes––but you’ll be able to make them talk after a while. However, you won’t find any of them speaking English. Offer one of them some money and a trip home and he’ll give you the story quick enough, especially after you’ve thrown a scare into him. We can afford to let one go to get the facts.”
“You better keep out of sight after we have the men in the jail. Slip behind the jail to the rear of the yard, and when I’ve locked them up and told Atkinson what to do about keeping the people away from the building, I’ll join you there.”
“I understand,” Weir stated.
“And we can slip off and grab Vorse if he’s in his saloon and then Sorenson before any one knows what’s happening.”
“That’s right; don’t want the game spoiled now. Here we are.”
The cars had arrived at the gate before the courthouse. 266 Here, too, however, the crowd was densest, having gathered at the spot as if the roar of powder from the camp was an overture to Weir’s arrest and appearance. It had proved a prelude to his appearance, at any rate. The crowd perceived him with Madden and it believed him a prisoner even if not handcuffed and marched with a pistol at his head.
A profound silence at first greeted the party as it alighted. Madden, assisting Burkhardt to alight, pulled the man’s broad-brimmed hat low over his eyes to conceal his face from the revealing moonlight. A short struggle again ensued, but Burkhardt finally yielded to the pressure exerted by his companion guards.
A murmur of astonishment ran over the surrounding throng, each instant being augmented by the voices of others running to the place. Not only did it appear that the engineer was under arrest, but likewise others,––a handcuffed, gagged man and two sullen Mexicans, strangers to the community. Yet a number of the onlookers, possibly men with Vorse’s or Sorenson’s money in their pockets, shouted as the new-comers moved through the press:
“Killer, murderer! Hang him, shoot him!” And more voices began to join in the cry.
Clearly the intent was to stir up feeling in the crowd to a point where action against Weir would seem a spontaneous outbreak. Even women joined in the cry; curses followed; fists were shaken.
“Open up the way,” Madden ordered, as a surge of the crowd threatened to surround him and his party. In his hand, as if to emphasize his command, a six-shooter swung into view, sweeping to and fro and menacing the press of people.
The frightened men directly before the party struggled 267 to get out of line of the weapon, yielding suddenly a clear passage.
“Quick! Around the courthouse and back to the jail,” Madden exclaimed to those with him.
Pushing forward from the moonlight into the shade cast by the cottonwoods, they dragged their prisoners past the first building towards the low stout stone structure at the rear, half-illuminated and half-concealed by the patches of light and shade falling from the trees.
A minute later Madden whipped out his keys.
“Two men remain here at the door and don’t be afraid to show your rifles to that bunch,” he said. “In with you, Burkhardt; there’s a nice soft stone floor to sleep on. Keep those Mexican camp-burners covered, Atkinson, till I get the cells open. You, Weir, slip on back there in the shadow and wait for me.”
The engineer had taken but three steps into the gloom along the outside jail wall, glancing about to avoid any curious straggler of the crowd already hurrying around the court house towards the jail, when he heard a call. In the advance was a slim well-dressed Mexican, full in the moonlight and very important of bearing. The call was directed not at Weir but at Madden.
“You got him all right, sheriff?” he said.
“Yes. He came in with me,” was the answer.
“But who are these others?”
“Step inside and I’ll tell you, Lucerio.”
The county attorney joined the sheriff, peered inside the doorway and hesitated. It was dark within; no light showed except a patch of moonlight at the far side of the building that fell through a barred window.
“Go right in,” Madden exclaimed. And laying hand on the other’s shoulder he forced him ahead. The door 268 closed after the pair. Before the doorway there remained, however, the pair of young engineers, rifle in hand, whose threatening bearing and glistening gun-barrels were apparent even in the patchy light dropping through the boughs. At a distance of about ten feet off the crowd of people halted, staring eagerly at the jail building, showing their white teeth as they carried on low talk in Spanish and awaiting with impatience the return of Madden and Lucerio that they might flood them with questions.
Weir remained to see no more, for the increasing crowd pushed out further and further on the flanks, a circumstance that would eventually result in his discovery. So slipping to the rear of the jail and keeping well in the shadows he gained the fence. This he leaped and, lighting a cigarette, examined his pistol, then proceeded to smoke calmly until Madden arrived.
“Hurry; slip away,” the latter said. “They wondered what the devil I dodged back here for and are coming, curious as cats.”
The two men glided away, keeping well in shadows until they gained the side street and thence passed to the main thoroughfare.
“What if Sorenson and Vorse are somewhere in that crowd?” Madden asked. “They’re likely to be, expecting your arrest.”
“Then we’ll have to wait till they leave it. But I don’t believe they’re there. They won’t want to show their hand even by being on the scene.”
“Probably they’ve found out Gordon is dead.”
“Probably. But on the other side, they suppose now that the dam has been destroyed and that I’m locked up,” Weir said. “Still, I’ll guess that if they’ve learned Pollock and Martinez and I were at Gordon’s all the 269 afternoon, and he committed suicide, they’ll be worrying some just the same.”
Madden glanced at his companion.
“I don’t believe we’ll bring Vorse in––alive,” he said.
“That’s the way I want him, and Sorenson, too. I want to see them go up for life, but if not that then hanged. But a life term for both, along with Burkhardt, is my choice. I want them to suffer as my father suffered. Only worse. Dying’s too easy for them. Let them have hell here for awhile before they get it on the other side. Let the iron bars and stone walls kill them. I hope they live for twenty years to gnaw out their hearts every day and every night behind steel doors. That wouldn’t half pay what they owe. But if they finish in prison, knowing there’s no hope, knowing I’ve put them there for what they did to my father and Jim Dent, knowing that all the money and cattle they stole had slipped through their fingers, that they’ve lost all they gained and more, that their curses and crimes are crushing their own heads, why, that will help. And Sorenson––Sorenson there every day knowing his son lies a helpless cripple, without the money that has been piled up for him! I couldn’t invent a worse hell for him. And that’s the hell he’s going to have!”
Though a man not easy to move, Madden at Weir’s cold implacable expression of hatred shivered slightly. Sorenson and his accomplices would be lucky indeed if they died by the rope.
Across the main street the two men walked, wearing their hats low and making no answer to shouted questions of those hurrying to the courthouse yard. Already the grounds about the court house and the street in front were jammed with eager, excited Mexicans, thrilled with an expectation of something to happen, though they knew not exactly what. The murderer, the killer, they have taken the killer, was the constant statement tossed from mouth to mouth.
“But not the killer they think,” Madden said, in a low aside to Weir as they moved ahead on their errand.
The pair were now advancing toward the saloon, along the opposite side of the street where a slight shadow afforded them concealment. By the time they came opposite the building they had escaped altogether from the crowd, though looking thither over shoulder they could see the black press of people in the moonlight at the public building; and here the street was empty except for a few belated women and children running toward the assemblage.
Madden’s hand suddenly gripped the engineer’s arm as they were about to step forth from the shadow to cross the street to the saloon.
“There he is,” the sheriff whispered.
Vorse had pushed open the slatted door of his place and stepped outside. In the moonlight his figure and 271 face were clearly visible: his thin whip-cord body and predatory face, and bald head as shiny and hard as a fish-scale. He wore no coat, while his vest hung unbuttoned and open as usual. About his waist was an ammunition belt carrying a holster, as if he were prepared for action.
Thus he stood for a time, hands on hips, motionless, his cruel hatchet-like face directed towards the scene further along the street. Presently a man came running to him, Miguel, his bartender, who had been one of the two men serving out whiskey to the workmen at the old adobe house and who at the break-up of the spree had hastened back to town to report to his employer. Now, it seemed, he had fresher news to give.
“Yes, it is the engineer, for a certainty,” he exclaimed panting, as he stopped before Vorse. “The sheriff arrested him and he now lies in jail there. It is said he fought and tried to shoot Madden, but that the sheriff was too quick and shot the gun out of his hand. It is said also that the dam is blown into a million little stones, but men are riding there on horses to see for themselves. They will soon return. Anyway a fight there was up there undoubtedly, for Madden brought in not only the engineer but three other men, bound and handcuffed and struggling furiously, trying to strike and bite the crowd like mad dogs. From time to time the sheriff had to beat them on the heads with his pistol, especially the engineer, who is the worst. I did not see them, but those who did said their faces were streaming with blood.”
“All right. Go find José Molina and ‘Silver’ Leon.”
“Are they not up in the hills with their bands of sheep?”
“No. They are here. Look around till you find them; then send them to me.”
“That means something lively to happen, eh?” Miguel said with a laugh.
He did not wait, however, for an answer, but set off at once for the court house.
“I hope Meyers shows up soon with more men,” Madden said to Weir. “Those two sheepherders of Vorse’s are a pair of snakes; he always hires that kind; and they probably have some fellows with them like themselves.”
“Meyers is on the way with twenty men or so by this time. They had to come in wagons, as we had the cars. Atkinson ought to be able to stand off the crowd with the half dozen boys he has until the others arrive.”
While they had conducted this brief exchange of opinions they had kept their gaze on the saloon-keeper, who continued to stand before his door. The cold and merciless character of the man was never more revealed than now as he waited for his hired assassins to come to receive orders. Possessing already a full knowledge of the plot, Weir and Madden were able to guess what culmination was now contemplated and measure the true depth of the conspirators’ infamy. The sheriff especially boiled with inward wrath that they should expect to make him not only a dupe but a tool in their crime.
“It’s clear they never intended you should come to trial when arrested,” he said to his companion.
“Certainly not. That isn’t the way they play the game. And I suppose Vorse there imagines the cards are all falling his way at this moment.”
“He’s going in.”
“Good. Now then!”
Weir struck off across the street, striding forward at a pace Madden found it difficult to keep. As they neared the door, Weir loosened the gun in his holster.
In this action the sheriff imitated him and then changing his mind drew the weapon itself. Plain man that he was, he was an instinctive judge of character; he had encountered men of Vorse’s type before, less shrewd but equally savage; their nature was to fight, not surrender; their way was to kill or be killed in the final issue. He anticipated no arrest.
He felt no necessity, however, to express this view to the engineer, who had proved himself in the time he had been at San Mateo wholly competent to deal with any situation that arose. Moreover, while Vorse had had a reputation of being a quick shot in the past, he was confident Weir was his master.
With a quiet movement the engineer pushed open the door and stepped into the saloon. Madden following him had allowed the slatted door to swing shut again and the sound of its hinges caused Vorse, who was just starting away from the bar, to turn about. In his hand was a tray holding a bottle of whiskey, a bottle of mineral water and glasses, which apparently he had just lifted up.
For a space of ten seconds or so he remained unmoving, the tray in his hand and his eyes regarding the visitors fixedly. Behind him in the rear of the saloon a second man had sprung up from the table where he sat, but after that first startled action he, too, had not stirred. The man was Sorenson.
With Madden at his side and with a grim smile on his lips Weir walked slowly towards Vorse. In his tread there was something of the quality of a tiger’s, the light, deliberate, poised advance, the easy and dangerous movement 274 of body, the effortless glide of a powerful animal ready to spring and strike. His hands swung idly at his sides, but that did not mean they would not be swift once they responded to the call of the brain that controlled them.
“You gentlemen were just about to celebrate my downfall, I perceive, by pouring a libation,” Weir said. “Don’t let me interrupt. Only I must request you to conduct the proceedings there where you’re standing, Vorse, instead of at the rear of the room: Madden and I wish a good view of the ceremony. If Mr. Sorenson will be so agreeable as to step forward, you may go ahead.”
Sorenson did not join Vorse, but instead he spoke.
“Why haven’t you locked up your prisoner, Madden?” he demanded harshly. “And you’re letting him keep his gun. Don’t you know enough to disarm a murderer and throw him into jail when you arrest him?”
“I haven’t arrested him yet,” was the sheriff’s answer.
“Well, do it then. You have the warrant for the scoundrel. Perhaps you haven’t heard he almost killed my boy Ed last night––and you’re allowing him to walk around with you as if he were a bosom friend. Do your duty, or we’ll get a sheriff who will.”
“That’s why I’m here, to do my duty.”
“You didn’t have to bring this man here to do it.”
“I decided to bring him, however.”
From Vorse had come not a word. Only his gleaming evil eyes continued to rest on the two men without wink or change. For him explanations were unnecessary; he had divined instantly that somewhere, somehow the plotters’ plans had gone awry.
“Did you know that Gordon is dead?” Weir asked, all at once.
Vorse lowered the tray to the bar and ran the tip of his tongue over his lips.
“No,” said he, “we didn’t know it.”
“He deeded his property over this evening and then swallowed poison,” the engineer stated. “He saw the game was up.”
“You can’t make me believe your lies,” came sneering from Sorenson. “And you shall pay, you and that girl, for every broken bone in my boy’s body. I’ll spend my last dollar for that if necessary. Madden, do your duty and lock him up.”
The sheriff said nothing, but lifted his gun a little. Vorse by a slight movement of his body had edged from the bar as if to gain freedom for action.
“The game’s up for you men too,” Weir said. “You’ve murdered and robbed and swindled in this country long enough; I’ve got the proof and I’m going to remove you from this community. It’s not I who will be arrested. You killed Jim Dent after cleaning him out at cards and then made my father believe he was guilty of the crime. All I fear is that the court will hang you instead of sending you up for life; that would be too good for you. I want your crooked souls to die a thousand deaths within stone walls before you die in body. The game’s up, I say. I’ve Saurez’ deposition and I’ve the man who was the boy looking in the back door there that day thirty years ago and saw you shoot Dent, and he’ll go on the stand against you.”
A stillness so profound that one could hear the tiny insects hovering about the lamps succeeded this statement. If words had not been enough, Weir’s cold, harsh face would have removed the men’s last hope, for on it was not a single trace of relenting. A stone could have been no flintier.
“Well?” Vorse inquired softly.
His arched bony nose appeared thinner and more hawk-like. His lips were compressed in a white scornful smile, while his eyelids now drooped until but slits of light showed from the orbs.
“And you may be interested to know Burkhardt and some of the Mexicans he hired are now locked up in jail; the rest, or nearly all, are dead,” Weir continued, with slow distinctness. “Your little scheme to blow up the dam and burn the camp failed. We caught Burkhardt at the spot leading the gang. Your plot to make the workmen drunk and leave the dam unprotected worked well enough so far as that part was concerned, but a keg of powder dropped on your bunch of imported bandits ended that part of the show. And we have Burkhardt! You gentlemen are going to join him in the jail, where we shall give you all the care and attention you deserve.”
Vorse turned his head about towards Sorenson.
“Do you hear?” he asked.
“Madden, you’ve too much sense to believe all this trumped-up libel!” Sorenson exclaimed furiously. “About us, respected leaders of this town! Arrest the blackguard!”
Even facing assured proof of his complicity and guilt, the cattleman still believed in the power of his wealth and influence, in his ability to browbeat opponents, to command the man he had elected to office, to dominate and ruthlessly crush by sheer will power all resistance, as he had done for years.
“I take no orders from you,” the sheriff replied.
“Well, I suppose I can empty the till and lock the safe before going?” Vorse questioned.
“No. Keep in front of the bar where you are,” the sheriff commanded.
“And have everything stolen.”
“Your bar-keeper will be back presently. He will look after things for you.”
“You say Burkhardt is locked up?”
“Yes.”
“That will hurt his pride,” Vorse laughed. “He always swore that no one should put him behind bars. He wouldn’t have minded so much finishing in a gun-fight, but to serve a term in prison would surely go against the grain with Burk. Though I think with Sorenson–––”
Weir’s eyes had never left the speaker. Through the other’s inconsequential talk and apparently careless acceptance of the fact of arrest the engineer had noted the tense gathering of the man’s body.
“Put your hands up,” he interrupted at this point.
Vorse had uttered no following word after speaking Sorenson’s name; his voice terminated abruptly. At the same instant his right hand flew to his holster and whipped out his gun. It was the advantageous time for which he had waited, for Madden’s look which had been moving back and forth from Vorse to Sorenson so as to cover both had passed to the latter. And Weir’s weapon was undrawn.
But if Vorse drew fast, the engineer’s motion was like a flash of light. His weapon leaped on a level with the other’s breast. The report sounded a second before that of Vorse’s and three before Madden’s, who also had fired.
Then, if ever, Steele Weir had displayed his amazing speed in beating an enemy to his gun, for Vorse had indeed been quick, keyed by a knowledge that for him this meant imprisonment or freedom, a slow death or liberty.
For a minute he stood half crouching as he had been at the instant of shooting, his eyes glaring balefully at his enemy and the thin cruel smile on his lips, while the two men in front stood warily waiting with weapons extended. Then Vorse clutched at his breast, muttered thickly and toppled over full length on the floor.
The sharp pungent smell of powder smoke mingled with the reek of liquor.
“He’s dead,” Madden said.
“Yes.”
“Are you hit?”
“No. His bullet went past my hip; he never got his gun up.”
Madden glanced about towards the rear of the room. A command for Sorenson to stop broke from his lips. Next he fired. And Weir swinging his look that way saw Sorenson’s form, untouched by the bullet, vanishing through the rear door into the night. Using the minute that the two men’s surveillance had been lifted he had escaped.
“Hard luck when we had him,” Weir growled.
“He can’t get away.”
“I’m not so sure. And he’s armed.”
“He’ll strike for home to get his car.”
“Or to the office for money,” Weir exclaimed.
A last look Steele Weir had at the dead man on the floor before he turned to go in search of Sorenson. Not so astute or crafty as Judge Gordon, nor so intelligent as Sorenson, nor so belligerent as Burkhardt, he had been as rapacious and infinitely more cool-minded than any of the three. If anything, he was the one of them all to proceed to a crime, whether fraud or murder, in sheer cold blood and by natural craving. No uneasy conscience would have ever disturbed his rest: no remorse or pity ever stirred in his breast. He was the human counterpart of a bird of prey.
Well, he was dead now. Three of the quartette who had been joined by avarice and lawless actions were taken care of––Burkhardt a prisoner, Gordon dead by self-administered poison, Vorse by bullets. Almost did Steele Weir feel himself an embodiment of Fate, clipping the strands of these men’s power and lives as with shears. Sorenson alone remained to be dealt with and his freedom should be short.
Beckoning Madden, he went swiftly through the door where the cattleman had leaped into the shadows. Where the gloom ceased and the space behind the row of store buildings was clear in the moonlight, nothing was to be seen. Naturally the man had kept within black shade in his flight.
When they reached the rear of the cattle company’s 280 office building, they peered in through its barred back windows, but all was dark inside the structure so far as they could determine. To all appearance Sorenson had not stopped here: it was quiet, gloomy, untenanted.
“We’ll have to try his home now,” the sheriff stated. “If we don’t find him there, we’ll set the telephones going to warn all the ranches and towns around to be on the lookout and either to stop or report him if he shows up. He hasn’t start enough to get away now.”
They hastened on along the line of buildings until they reached a side street. But when they had proceeded a short way, Weir stopped.
“I’m not satisfied about the office,” said he. “Suppose you go on to his house and I’ll return for a look inside from the front. If you fail to find him join me at Martinez’ office, where no one is likely to be around and we can then lay further plans.”
“That suits,” Madden responded, and set off alone.
Weir’s alert brain had been turning over the possibilities of Sorenson’s course. Rather by pursuing what would be the man’s line of reasoning than by depending on chance, he had come to the quick decision to turn back once again to the office. Sorenson would so act as would best serve his immediate escape and that of the future.
Would he expect the sheriff and the engineer to look for him to flee by the speediest means, an automobile, and to the natural avenue of escape, the railroad? Yes. Therefore on that expectation he would adopt another way to throw off pursuit. And perilous as a delay would be in getting away from San Mateo, yet he must risk the few minutes necessary to get money. For to fly with pockets empty meant eventual, certain capture. Money a fugitive from justice must possess above everything 281 in order to possess wings; and no one would know that better than Sorenson.
Though Madden and he had seen no light in the office building, the cattleman nevertheless might have been within. If he had been in the vault, he could safely have lighted a candle without their perceiving its beams; and though the safe was modern it probably had no time lock. Sorenson could unlock it with a few twirls of the combination, stuff his pockets with currency and negotiable paper to the amount of thousands and then slip away.
Fortunately the moonlight was to Weir’s advantage. He quickened his steps, passed round the corner into the main street and moved towards the building. For him the crowd at the court house at that moment had no interest; one person, and one person alone, commanded his thoughts.
How correct had been his logic––logic not unmixed with intuition, perhaps––appeared when he was yet some fifty yards away from the door he sought. A tall bulky figure suddenly stepped forth from the building and instantly ran across the street and lost itself in the shifting, jostling crowd that was half-disclosed, half-concealed by the broken shadows of the moonlit trees.
Steele Weir proceeded to a spot near the office and halted. His first impulse to rush after Sorenson had been promptly suppressed, as cooler judgment ruled. To seek his quarry in that throng would be labor wasted, while to reveal his identity would be to court a disastrous interference with the business at hand. From where he stood he should much better be able to see Sorenson when he did emerge, unless he chose to remain in the crowd or steal away at the rear of the court house yard, a chance Weir must take.
Five minutes passed. The restless, talkative Mexicans 282 continued to swarm and buzz with excitement, ceaselessly moving about, forming and reforming in groups, agitatedly repeating newer and wilder rumors concerning events. Despite Weir’s intent watch for Sorenson, the engineer could not but observe the mob’s manifestations, observe them with sardonic humor. For their ebullition of the present would be nothing to what it would be if they learned he stood across the street, uncaged, unfettered, free and armed, a “gun-man” loose instead of a “gun-man” in jail.
All at once Weir noted out of the tail of his eye a slight stir among a number of horses standing with reins a-trail before a store a little way down the street. The horses were partly in the light, partly in the shadow, so that all he could see was that one or two of them had jerked aside quickly, then resumed their listless postures.
He was about to withdraw his eyes when he saw a man swing upon the back of one of them and start off at an easy canter. Weir sprang towards the spot at a run. That big figure could only be Sorenson’s, for no Mexican he had ever seen in San Mateo could match it. And the plan of escape showed the other’s craft in an emergency; gradually working his way through the crowd he had at last gained the protective shadow of the building on that side of the street and slipped along in it until he reached the horses.
Doubtless the man had conceived the plan at the instant he had stepped from his office, sweeping the street by one gauging look. With the whole town assembled at the court house, his departure was little likely to be noted by the Mexicans, while Madden and Weir would never suspect him of riding off on a horse, or suspect too late. Indeed, he rode at first as if in no great haste, 283 but as he turned his mount into a narrow by-way, more a lane than a street that disappeared between two mud walls, Weir saw him strike his heels into the pony’s flanks.
But for the startled movement of the nearby horses when Sorenson took stirrup, Weir would not have looked that way. He might possibly have seen the horseman start off, but that is not certain. He unquestionably would have supposed him an ordinary rider if he had not noticed the man until he reached the mouth of the lane.
Meantime the engineer had made his best speed to the line of waiting horses. Slowing to a walk so as not to scare them, though as he discovered on examination most of them looked too bony and spiritless for that, he approached and carefully inspected the bunch. He took his time in the selection: the more haste in choosing a mount might prove less speed in the end. He tightened the saddle-girths and ran a finger along the head straps of the bridle of the horse picked to judge their fit, receiving a snap from the pony’s teeth, which gave him satisfaction. Not only was this animal a wiry, tough-looking little beast, but he had life.
Up into the saddle Weir went, followed Sorenson’s line to the lane, down which he swung. Coming out into the next street, he pursued it to an intersecting street, and there galloped for the edge of town without trying to guess the way taken by his enemy. Once he reached the open fields he would quickly get sight of the man racing away somewhere on the mesa.
Evidently the quarry he pursued had not taken so direct a course as Weir, for when the latter at length came forth where he could have a wide view he perceived the horseman a quarter of a mile off and further east, galloping south. The engineer at once raced thither to 284 gain the same road and turning into it made for Sorenson.
Thus the two men sped away from San Mateo. The wire fences and the adobe houses of Mexicans owning little farms adjoining soon ceased. The wide mesa lay on either side. Though a quarter of a mile had separated the men when Weir first observed the other, the distance between had been increased while the engineer was gaining the road, until now the interval was almost twice as great.
Weir guessed the fleeing man’s plan. Instead of seeking the railroad for the present, he would disappear in the mountains, where with the assistance of some loyal employee, cowman or sheepherder, he would lie hid until the first fury of the hunt had subsided. Possibly his bold brain even conceived the idea of again returning to San Mateo some dark night soon and further looting the office, vigilance being relaxed.
In any case, he would expect to remain safe from pursuit in a mountain fastness until either on horseback or by automobile he could work his way out of the country. With what he had unquestionably carried off he would not be a poor man. In some spot far away he could assume a new name, start in business and later be joined by his wife and crippled son.
Alas, for those plans, arising like mushrooms on the ruins of his life! Behind him followed the same inexorable antagonist who so swiftly had brought everything crashing about his head. Possibly Sorenson once out of the town had failed to look back; possibly looking back he had been unable to distinguish against the blur of houses and trees the horseman galloping in the moonlight along the same road.
But all at once when they were two miles away from 285 San Mateo he discovered Weir, who had been gradually cutting down the space between until now again he was within a quarter of a mile of his quarry. Sorenson had been riding rapidly but not hard; he now beat his horse to a furious gallop,––a good pony, too, from its speed, showing that the banker as well as Weir had picked his mount with care.
Weir did not urge his horse to a similar pace, only maintaining a fast steady gallop that kept the other in sight though the space between again widened. Apparently Sorenson realized the folly of attempting to outrun, his pursuer at once, for he soon dropped back into a regular, mile-eating gallop. Gradually in turn Weir crept up to his old position.
To each the only sound was that of drumming hoof-beats. In front rode the fleeing man––dethroned leader and criminal and murderer. Behind relentlessly came his Nemesis, the son of the man whom he had deceived and damned to mental suffering. All about them as they flew along was the silent, moonlit, sage-covered mesa. At their right towered the misty, unchanging peaks, as if watching unmoved this strange race of two human beings. A strange race, in truth,––a race where vengeance rode.
Ten miles the two men had gone when Sorenson’s horse began to fail. The rider’s weight was proving too much for the sturdy little animal and though he strove to maintain his speed the strain told on lungs and legs. Weir had reduced the distance first to three hundred yards, then to two hundred, and at last but a hundred separated him from the man and horse ahead.
The hard chase indeed was beginning to tell on his own mount. Flecks of foam flew from its lips; its neck was wet with sweat; the whistle of its breath was audible to the engineer at every stride. For as both men had realized that now the end could not be far off, they had pushed their horses to faster and faster galloping.
On a sudden Sorenson swung his animal into a dim trail leading from the main road skirting the mountain range to the base of the mountains themselves. The first slopes were but a mile away, covered with a scattering growth of pinyon pines. Just in front, too, for which the trail seemed pointing, was a dark ravine filled with brush that rose to the denser timber above. This was the fugitive’s goal. Once he could fling himself from the saddle and plunge into the undergrowth he would be safe from his pursuer.
The two ponies struggled on with exhausted leaps. Weir had reduced the interval to seventy-five yards by the time half the distance was covered and to fifty as 287 they drew near the mouth of the ravine. He measured his gain and the remaining two hundred yards or so with savage eyes, then drew his revolver. He desired to take Sorenson unharmed. But rather than that the man should escape he would kill him.
Sorenson’s horse stumbled, but a jerk of the reins saved him and kept him moving on. The engineer struck his own pony fiercely on the flank, which produced a tremendous effort in the striving beast that brought it within thirty paces or so of Sorenson. That, however, was the best it could do, labor as it would. Its knees were trembling at every stride, its head swinging heavily.
Sorenson’s horse suddenly went to its knees. But the man leaping clear took the ground on his feet and instantly set off at a run for the line of brush in the draw some seventy or eighty paces away. A last spurt Weir’s pony made, bringing his rider to within thirty yards of the cattleman, who glancing over his shoulder halted, swung about, fired a shot and again started to run.
The pony under Weir came to an abrupt stop, shaking. He was done, whether from exhaustion or the bullet the engineer did not wait to see. Flinging himself out the saddle he raced after his man, taking the rough trail leading up the slope in swift strides. On foot Sorenson was no match for him. But the latter had the start; he was now almost within reach of the thick screen of bushes; and he bent every energy to make the ambuscade.
Still running, Weir flung up his gun and fired. Close the shot must have gone to Sorenson, so close as to inject into the man’s mind recollection of his pursuer’s accuracy and a fear of a bullet in his back, for when within twenty feet of the bushes he dropped behind a 288 small bowlder, whence he fired twice at Weir but without striking his mark.
Neither man after the furious ride and the concluding run on foot was fit for sure marksmanship. This Weir realized, so stopped where he was some forty feet off from Sorenson’s stone in order to regain his breath and calm his nerves. Of the cattleman he could see nothing; the man crouched low out of sight, perhaps reloading his weapon, perhaps steeling himself for a dash across that small moonlit space that separated him from safety, or perhaps preparing for a quick upward spring and a fresh volley directed at his foe.
It may be questioned if in his heart Sorenson was not almost disposed to fight the matter out. He was no coward; his original hatred for the engineer had by recent events been swelled to a diabolical desire to kill; and now even if he, Sorenson, succeeded in slipping away, his whereabouts would be known unless he destroyed the man. Safety demanded that he not only escape but escape without this witness.
Weir had not sought cover. He stood upright, his revolver ready, trusting to have an advantage in his speed when it came to an exchange of shots. Then he began an advance, a slow noiseless circling advance that at the same time of taking him closer to his enemy brought him round on his flank.
Sorenson’s hand and pistol appeared and half his face while three shots rattled from his gun, two at the spot where Weir had been and one at him in his new position, which the hiding man had immediately located. The last shot ticked the engineer’s sleeve. In return Weir fired twice, the first bullet striking the rock and ricocheting off with a loud whine, while the second struck the pistol from Sorenson’s hand.
Instantly Weir sprang forward.
“Show yourself,” he ordered. And the kneeling fugitive, disarmed, gripping his bleeding hand, sullenly arose to his feet. “You’ve led me a chase, but I have you at last,” the engineer continued. “Now you’re going back to San Mateo and jail. Walk towards the horses.”
Sorenson cast one bitter glance at the thicket in the ravine; by only the little matter of a few yards he had failed to gain liberty. For Weir his visage when he looked around again was never more hard, hostile, full of undying hatred. Though balked, he was not submissive, and was the kind who kept his animosity to the end. Then he started off towards the horses, his own which had staggered to its feet again and Weir’s, both standing with hanging heads and heaving, quivering sides.
All at once the cattleman halted and faced about.
“Most men have a price, and I suppose you have yours,” he said, with forced calmness. “I’m ready to pay it.”
“You’re going to pay it,” was the answer.
“How much will you ask to let me go?”
“If you offered me ten million, which you haven’t got, I wouldn’t accept it,” Weir said, harshly. “There isn’t enough money in the world to buy your liberty. You’re going back to San Mateo, and from there to the penitentiary or to the gallows, one or the other.”
“It will be neither,” Sorenson stated.
“You’re mistaken, but I shall not argue the matter with you. Keep walking towards the horses.”
Sorenson’s lips became compressed. He glanced down at his bleeding hand, shook the blood from his fingers.
“I stay here,” said he.
Weir went a step nearer and thrust his face forward, jaw set, eyes smoldering.