The Lone Star Ranger

Z >> Zane Grey >> The Lone Star Ranger

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Panhandle Smith carried pots and pans into the cabin, and
cheerfully called out: "If you gents air hungry fer grub, don't
look fer me to feed you with a spoon."

The outlaws piled inside, made a great bustle and clatter as
they sat to their meal. Like hungry men, they talked little.

Duane waited there awhile, then guardedly got up and crept
round to the other side of the cabin. After he became used to
the dark again he ventured to steal along the wall to the
window and peeped in. The outlaws were in the first room and
could not be seen.

Duane waited. The moments dragged endlessly. His heart pounded.
Longstreth entered, turned up the light, and, taking a box of
cigars from the table, he carried it out.

"Here, you fellows, go outside and smoke," he said. "Knell,
come on in now. Let's get it over."

He returned, sat down, and lighted a cigar for himself. He put
his booted feet on the table.

Duane saw that the room was comfortably, even luxuriously
furnished. There must have been a good trail, he thought, else
how could all that stuff have been packed in there. Most
assuredly it could not have come over the trail he had
traveled. Presently he heard the men go outside, and their
voices became indistinct. Then Knell came in and seated himself
without any of his chief's ease. He seemed preoccupied and, as
always, cold.

"What's wrong, Knell? Why didn't you get here sooner?" queried
Longstreth.

"Poggin, damn him! We're on the outs again."

"What for?"

"Aw, he needn't have got sore. He's breakin' a new hoss over at
Faraway, an you know him where a hoss 's concerned. That kept
him, I reckon, more than anythin'."

"What else? Get it out of your system so we can go on to the
new job."

"Well, it begins back a ways. I don't know how long ago--
weeks--a stranger rode into Ord an' got down easy-like as if he
owned the place. He seemed familiar to me. But I wasn't sure.
We looked him over, an' I left, tryin' to place him in my
mind."

"What'd he look like?"

"Rangy, powerful man, white hair over his temples, still, hard
face, eyes like knives. The way he packed his guns, the way he
walked an' stood an' swung his right hand showed me what he
was. You can't fool me on the gun-sharp. An' he had a grand
horse, a big black."

"I've met your man," said Longstreth.

"No!" exclaimed Knell. It was wonderful to hear surprise
expressed by this man that did not in the least show it in his
strange physiognomy. Knell laughed a short, grim, hollow laugh.
"Boss, this here big gent drifts into Ord again an' makes up to
Jim Fletcher. Jim, you know, is easy led. He likes men. An'
when a posse come along trailin' a blind lead, huntin' the
wrong way for the man who held up No. 6, why, Jim--he up an'
takes this stranger to be the fly road-agent an' cottons to
him. Got money out of him sure. An' that's what stumps me more.
What's this man's game? I happen to know, boss, that he
couldn't have held up No. 6."

"How do you know?" demanded Longstreth.

"Because I did the job myself."

A dark and stormy passion clouded the chief's face.

"Damn you, Knell! You're incorrigible. You're unreliable.
Another break like that queers you with me. Did you tell
Poggin?"

"Yes. That's one reason we fell out. He raved. I thought he was
goin' to kill me."

"Why did you tackle such a risky job without help or plan?"

"It offered, that's all. An' it was easy. But it was a mistake.
I got the country an' the railroad hollerin' for nothin'. I
just couldn't help it. You know what idleness means to one of
us. You know also that this very life breeds fatality. It's
wrong--that's why. I was born of good parents, an' I know
what's right. We're wrong, an' we can't beat the end, that's
all. An' for my part I don't care a damn when that comes."

"Fine wise talk from you, Knell," said Longstreth, scornfully.
"Go on with your story."

"As I said, Jim cottons to the pretender, an' they get chummy.
They're together all the time. You can gamble Jim told all he
knew an' then some. A little liquor loosens his tongue. Several
of the boys rode over from Ord, an' one of them went to Poggin
an' says Jim Fletcher has a new man for the gang. Poggin, you
know, is always ready for any new man. He says if one doesn't
turn out good he can be shut off easy. He rather liked the way
this new part of Jim's was boosted. Jim an' Poggin always hit
it up together. So until I got on the deal Jim's pard was
already in the gang, without Poggin or you ever seein' him.
Then I got to figurin' hard. Just where had I ever seen that
chap? As it turned out, I never had seen him, which accounts
for my bein' doubtful. I'd never forget any man I'd seen. I dug
up a lot of old papers from my kit an' went over them. Letters,
pictures, clippin's, an' all that. I guess I had a pretty good
notion what I was lookin' for an' who I wanted to make sure of.
At last I found it. An' I knew my man. But I didn't spring it
on Poggin. Oh no! I want to have some fun with him when the
time comes. He'll be wilder than a trapped wolf. I sent Blossom
over to Ord to get word from Jim, an' when he verified all this
talk I sent Blossom again with a message calculated to make Jim
hump. Poggin got sore, said he'd wait for Jim, an' I could come
over here to see you about the new job. He'd meet me in Ord."

Knell had spoken hurriedly and low, now and then with passion.
His pale eyes glinted like fire in ice, and now his voice fell
to a whisper.

"Who do you think Fletcher's new man is?"

"Who?" demanded Longstreth.

"BUCK DUANE!"

Down came Longstreth's boots with a crash, then his body grew
rigid.

"That Nueces outlaw? That two-shot ace-of-spades gun-thrower
who killed Bland, Alloway--?"

"An' Hardin." Knell whispered this last name with more feeling
than the apparent circumstance demanded.

"Yes; and Hardin, the best one of the Rim Rock fellows--Buck
Duane!"

Longstreth was so ghastly white now that his black mustache
seemed outlined against chalk. He eyed his grim lieutenant.
They understood each other without more words. It was enough
that Buck Duane was there in the Big Bend. Longstreth rose
presently and reached for a flask, from which he drank, then
offered it to Knell. He waved it aside.

"Knell," began the chief, slowly, as he wiped his lips, "I
gathered you have some grudge against this Buck Duane."

"Yes."

"Well, don't be a fool now and do what Poggin or almost any of
you men would--don't meet this Buck Duane. I've reason to
believe he's a Texas Ranger now."

"The hell you say!" exclaimed Knell.

"Yes. Go to Ord and give Jim Fletcher a hunch. He'll get
Poggin, and they'll fix even Buck Duane."

"All right. I'll do my best. But if I run into Duane--"

"Don't run into him!" Longstreth's voice fairly rang with the
force of its passion and command. He wiped his face, drank
again from the flask, sat down, resumed his smoking, and,
drawing a paper from his vest pocket he began to study it.

"Well, I'm glad that's settled," he said, evidently referring
to the Duane matter. "Now for the new job. This is October the
eighteenth. On or before the twenty-fifth there will be a
shipment of gold reach the Rancher's Bank of Val Verde. After
you return to Ord give Poggin these orders. Keep the gang
quiet. You, Poggin, Kane, Fletcher, Panhandle Smith, and Boldt
to be in on the secret and the job. Nobody else. You'll leave
Ord on the twenty-third, ride across country by the trail till
you get within sight of Mercer. It's a hundred miles from
Bradford to Val Verde--about the same from Ord. Time your
travel to get you near Val Verde on the morning of the
twenty-sixth. You won't have to more than trot your horses. At
two o'clock in the afternoon, sharp, ride into town and up to
the Rancher's Bank. Val Verde's a pretty big town. Never been
any holdups there. Town feels safe. Make it a clean, fast,
daylight job. That's all. Have you got the details?"

Knell did not even ask for the dates again.

"Suppose Poggin or me might be detained?" he asked.

Longstreth bent a dark glance upon his lieutenant.

"You never can tell what'll come off," continued Knell. "I'll
do my best."

"The minute you see Poggin tell him. A job on hand steadies
him. And I say again--look to it that nothing happens. Either
you or Poggin carry the job through. But I want both of you in
it. Break for the hills, and when you get up in the rocks where
you can hide your tracks head for Mount Ord. When all's quiet
again I'll join you here. That's all. Call in the boys."

Like a swift shadow and as noiseless Duane stole across the
level toward the dark wall of rock. Every nerve was a strung
wire. For a little while his mind was cluttered and clogged
with whirling thoughts, from which, like a flashing scroll,
unrolled the long, baffling order of action. The game was now
in his hands. He must cross Mount Ord at night. The feat was
improbable, but it might be done. He must ride into Bradford,
forty miles from the foothills before eight o'clock next
morning. He must telegraph MacNelly to be in Val Verde on the
twenty-fifth. He must ride back to Ord, to intercept Knell,
face him be denounced, kill him, and while the iron was hot
strike hard to win Poggin's half-won interest as he had wholly
won Fletcher's. Failing that last, he must let the outlaws
alone to bide their time in Ord, to be free to ride on to their
new job in Val Verde. In the mean time he must plan to arrest
Longstreth. It was a magnificent outline, incredible, alluring,
unfathomable in its nameless certainty. He felt like fate. He
seemed to be the iron consequences falling upon these doomed
outlaws.

Under the wall the shadows were black, only the tips of trees
and crags showing, yet he went straight to the trail. It was
merely a grayness between borders of black. He climbed and
never stopped. It did not seem steep. His feet might have had
eyes. He surmounted the wall, and, looking down into the ebony
gulf pierced by one point of light, he lifted a menacing arm
and shook it. Then he strode on and did not falter till he
reached the huge shelving cliffs. Here he lost the trail; there
was none; but he remembered the shapes, the points, the notches
of rock above. Before he reached the ruins of splintered
ramparts and jumbles of broken walls the moon topped the
eastern slope of the mountain, and the mystifying blackness he
had dreaded changed to magic silver light. It seemed as light
as day, only soft, mellow, and the air held a transparent
sheen. He ran up the bare ridges and down the smooth slopes,
and, like a goat, jumped from rock to rock. In this light he
knew his way and lost no time looking for a trail. He crossed
the divide and then had all downhill before him. Swiftly he
descended, almost always sure of his memory of the landmarks.
He did not remember having studied them in the ascent, yet here
they were, even in changed light, familiar to his sight. What
he had once seen was pictured on his mind. And, true as a deer
striking for home, he reached the canon where he had left his
horse.

Bullet was quickly and easily found. Duane threw on the saddle
and pack, cinched them tight, and resumed his descent. The
worst was now to come. Bare downward steps in rock, sliding,
weathered slopes, narrow black gullies, a thousand openings in
a maze of broken stone--these Duane had to descend in fast
time, leading a giant of a horse. Bullet cracked the loose
fragments, sent them rolling, slid on the scaly slopes, plunged
down the steps, followed like a faithful dog at Duane's heels.

Hours passed as moments. Duane was equal to his great
opportunity. But he could not quell that self in him which
reached back over the lapse of lonely, searing years and found
the boy in him. He who had been worse than dead was now
grasping at the skirts of life--which meant victory, honor,
happiness. Duane knew he was not just right in part of his
mind. Small wonder that he was not insane, he thought! He
tramped on downward, his marvelous faculty for covering rough
ground and holding to the true course never before even in
flight so keen and acute. Yet all the time a spirit was keeping
step with him. Thought of Ray Longstreth as he had left her
made him weak. But now, with the game clear to its end, with
the trap to spring, with success strangely haunting him, Duane
could not dispel memory of her. He saw her white face, with its
sweet sad lips and the dark eyes so tender and tragic. And time
and distance and risk and toil were nothing.

The moon sloped to the west. Shadows of trees and crags now
crossed to the other side of him. The stars dimmed. Then he was
out of the rocks, with the dim trail pale at his feet. Mounting
Bullet, he made short work of the long slope and the foothills
and the rolling land leading down to Ord. The little outlaw
camp, with its shacks and cabins and row of houses, lay silent
and dark under the paling moon. Duane passed by on the lower
trail, headed into the road, and put Bullet to a gallop. He
watched the dying moon, the waning stars, and the east. He had
time to spare, so he saved the horse. Knell would be leaving
the rendezvous about the time Duane turned back toward Ord.
Between noon and sunset they would meet.

The night wore on. The moon sank behind low mountains in the
west. The stars brightened for a while, then faded. Gray gloom
enveloped the world, thickened, lay like smoke over the road.
Then shade by shade it lightened, until through the transparent
obscurity shone a dim light.

Duane reached Bradford before dawn. He dismounted some distance
from the tracks, tied his horse, and then crossed over to the
station. He heard the clicking of the telegraph instrument, and
it thrilled him. An operator sat inside reading. When Duane
tapped on the window he looked up with startled glance, then
went swiftly to unlock the door.

"Hello. Give me paper and pencil. Quick," whispered Duane.

With trembling hands the operator complied. Duane wrote out the
message he had carefully composed.

"Send this--repeat it to make sure--then keep mum. I'll see you
again. Good-by."

The operator stared, but did not speak a word.

Duane left as stealthily and swiftly as he had come. He walked
his horse a couple miles back on the road and then rested him
till break of day. The east began to redden, Duane turned
grimly in the direction of Ord.

When Duane swung into the wide, grassy square on the outskirts
of Ord he saw a bunch of saddled horses hitched in front of the
tavern. He knew what that meant. Luck still favored him. If it
would only hold! But he could ask no more. The rest was a
matter of how greatly he could make his power felt. An open
conflict against odds lay in the balance. That would be fatal
to him, and to avoid it he had to trust to his name and a
presence he must make terrible. He knew outlaws. He knew what
qualities held them. He knew what to exaggerate.

There was not an outlaw in sight. The dusty horses had covered
distance that morning. As Duane dismounted he heard loud, angry
voices inside the tavern. He removed coat and vest, hung them
over the pommel. He packed two guns, one belted high on the
left hip, the other swinging low on the right side. He neither
looked nor listened, but boldly pushed the door and stepped
inside.

The big room was full of men, and every face pivoted toward
him. Knell's pale face flashed into Duane's swift sight; then
Boldt's, then Blossom Kane's, then Panhandle Smith's, then
Fletcher's, then others that were familiar, and last that of
Poggin. Though Duane had never seen Poggin or heard him
described, he knew him. For he saw a face that was a record of
great and evil deeds.

There was absolute silence. The outlaws were lined back of a
long table upon which were papers, stacks of silver coin, a
bundle of bills, and a huge gold-mounted gun.

"Are you gents lookin' for me?" asked Duane. He gave his voice
all the ringing force and power of which he was capable. And he
stepped back, free of anything, with the outlaws all before
him.

Knell stood quivering, but his face might have been a mask. The
other outlaws looked from him to Duane. Jim Fletcher flung up
his hands.

"My Gawd, Dodge, what'd you bust in here fer?" he said,
plaintively, and slowly stepped forward. His action was that of
a man true to himself. He meant he had been sponsor for Duane
and now he would stand by him.

"Back, Fletcher!" called Duane, and his voice made the outlaw
jump.

"Hold on, Dodge, an' you-all, everybody," said Fletcher. "Let
me talk, seein' I'm in wrong here."

His persuasions did not ease the strain.

"Go ahead. Talk," said Poggin.

Fletcher turned to Duane. "Pard, I'm takin' it on myself thet
you meet enemies here when I swore you'd meet friends. It's my
fault. I'll stand by you if you let me."

"No, Jim," replied Duane.

"But what'd you come fer without the signal?" burst out
Fletcher, in distress. He saw nothing but catastrophe in this
meeting.

"Jim, I ain't pressin' my company none. But when I'm wanted
bad--"

Fletcher stopped him with a raised hand. Then he turned to
Poggin with a rude dignity.

"Poggy, he's my pard, an' he's riled. I never told him a word
thet'd make him sore. I only said Knell hadn't no more use fer
him than fer me. Now, what you say goes in this gang. I never
failed you in my life. Here's my pard. I vouch fer him. Will
you stand fer me? There's goin' to be hell if you don't. An' us
with a big job on hand!"

While Fletcher toiled over his slow, earnest persuasion Duane
had his gaze riveted upon Poggin. There was something leonine
about Poggin. He was tawny. He blazed. He seemed beautiful as
fire was beautiful. But looked at closer, with glance seeing
the physical man, instead of that thing which shone from him,
he was of perfect build, with muscles that swelled and rippled,
bulging his clothes, with the magnificent head and face of the
cruel, fierce, tawny-eyed jaguar.

Looking at this strange Poggin, instinctively divining his
abnormal and hideous power, Duane had for the first time in his
life the inward quaking fear of a man. It was like a
cold-tongued bell ringing within him and numbing his heart. The
old instinctive firing of blood followed, but did not drive
away that fear. He knew. He felt something here deeper than
thought could go. And he hated Poggin.

That individual had been considering Fletcher's appeal.

"Jim, I ante up," he said, "an' if Phil doesn't raise us out
with a big hand--why, he'll get called, an' your pard can set
in the game."

Every eye shifted to Knell. He was dead white. He laughed, and
any one hearing that laugh would have realized his intense
anger equally with an assurance which made him master of the
situation.

"Poggin, you're a gambler, you are--the ace-high,
straight-flush hand of the Big Bend," he said, with stinging
scorn. "I'll bet you my roll to a greaser peso that I can deal
you a hand you'll be afraid to play."

"Phil, you're talkin' wild," growled Poggin, with both advice
and menace in his tone.

"If there's anythin' you hate it's a man who pretends to be
somebody else when he's not. Thet so?"

Poggin nodded in slow-gathering wrath.

"Well, Jim's new pard--this man Dodge--he's not who he seems.
Oh-ho! He's a hell of a lot different. But _I__ know him. An'
when I spring his name on you, Poggin, you'll freeze to your
gizzard. Do you get me? You'll freeze, an' your hand'll be
stiff when it ought to be lightnin'--All because you'll realize
you've been standin' there five minutes--five minutes ALIVE
before him!"

If not hate, then assuredly great passion toward Poggin
manifested itself in Knell's scornful, fiery address, in the
shaking hand he thrust before Poggin's face. In the ensuing
silent pause Knell's panting could be plainly heard. The other
men were pale, watchful, cautiously edging either way to the
wall, leaving the principals and Duane in the center of the
room.

"Spring his name, then, you--" said Poggin, violently, with a
curse.

Strangely Knell did not even look at the man he was about to
denounce. He leaned toward Poggin, his hands, his body, his
long head all somewhat expressive of what his face disguised.

"BUCK DUANE!" he yelled, suddenly.

The name did not make any great difference in Poggin. But
Knell's passionate, swift utterance carried the suggestion that
the name ought to bring Poggin to quick action. It was
possible, too, that Knell's manner, the import of his
denunciation the meaning back of all his passion held Poggin
bound more than the surprise. For the outlaw certainly was
surprised, perhaps staggered at the idea that he, Poggin, had
been about to stand sponsor with Fletcher for a famous outlaw
hated and feared by all outlaws.

Knell waited a long moment, and then his face broke its cold
immobility in an extraordinary expression of devilish glee. He
had hounded the great Poggin into something that gave him
vicious, monstrous joy.

"BUCK DUANE! Yes," he broke out, hotly. "The Nueces gunman!
That two-shot, ace-of-spades lone wolf! You an' I--we've heard
a thousand times of him--talked about him often. An' here he IN
FRONT of you! Poggin, you were backin' Fletcher's new pard,
Buck Duane. An' he'd fooled you both but for me. But _I_ know
him. An' I know why he drifted in here. To flash a gun on
Cheseldine--on you--on me! Bah! Don't tell me he wanted to join
the gang. You know a gunman, for you're one yourself. Don't you
always want to kill another man? An' don't you always want to
meet a real man, not a four-flush? It's the madness of the
gunman, an' I know it. Well, Duane faced you--called you! An'
when I sprung his name, what ought you have done? What would
the boss--anybody--have expected of Poggin? Did you throw your
gun, swift, like you have so often? Naw; you froze. An' why?
Because here's a man with the kind of nerve you'd love to have.
Because he's great--meetin' us here alone. Because you know
he's a wonder with a gun an' you love life. Because you an' I
an' every damned man here had to take his front, each to
himself. If we all drew we'd kill him. Sure! But who's goin' to
lead? Who was goin' to be first? Who was goin' to make him
draw? Not you, Poggin! You leave that for a lesser
man--me--who've lived to see you a coward. It comes once to
every gunman. You've met your match in Buck Duane. An', by God,
I'm glad! Here's once I show you up!"

The hoarse, taunting voice failed. Knell stepped back from the
comrade he hated. He was wet, shaking, haggard, but
magnificent.

"Buck Duane, do you remember Hardin?" he asked, in scarcely
audible voice.

"Yes," replied Duane, and a flash of insight made clear Knell's
attitude.

"You met him--forced him to draw--killed him?"

"Yes."

"Hardin was the best pard I ever had."

His teeth clicked together tight, and his lips set in a thin
line.

The room grew still. Even breathing ceased. The time for words
had passed. In that long moment of suspense Knell's body
gradually stiffened, and at last the quivering ceased. He
crouched. His eyes had a soul-piercing fire.

Duane watched them. He waited. He caught the thought--the
breaking of Knell's muscle-bound rigidity. Then he drew.

Through the smoke of his gun he saw two red spurts of flame.
Knell's bullets thudded into the ceiling. He fell with a scream
like a wild thing in agony.

Duane did not see Knell die. He watched Poggin. And Poggin,
like a stricken and astounded man, looked down upon his
prostrate comrade.

Fletcher ran at Duane with hands aloft.

"Hit the trail, you liar, or you'll hev to kill me!" he yelled.

With hands still up, he shouldered and bodied Duane out of the
room.

Duane leaped on his horse, spurred, and plunged away.

CHAPTER XXIII

Duane returned to Fairdale and camped in the mesquite till the
twenty-third of the month. The few days seemed endless. All he
could think of was that the hour in which he must disgrace Ray
Longstreth was slowly but inexorably coming. In that waiting
time he learned what love was and also duty. When the day at
last dawned he rode like one possessed down the rough slope,
hurdling the stones and crashing through the brush, with a
sound in his ears that was not all the rush of the wind.
Something dragged at him.

Apparently one side of his mind was unalterably fixed, while
the other was a hurrying conglomeration of flashes of thought,
reception of sensations. He could not get calmness. By and by,
almost involuntarily, he hurried faster on. Action seemed to
make his state less oppressive; it eased the weight. But the
farther he went on the harder it was to continue. Had he turned
his back upon love, happiness, perhaps on life itself?

There seemed no use to go on farther until he was absolutely
sure of himself. Duane received a clear warning thought that
such work as seemed haunting and driving him could never be
carried out in the mood under which he labored. He hung on to
that thought. Several times he slowed up, then stopped, only to
go on again. At length, as he mounted a low ridge, Fairdale lay
bright and green before him not far away, and the sight was a
conclusive check. There were mesquites on the ridge, and Duane
sought the shade beneath them. It was the noon-hour, with hot,
glary sun and no wind. Here Duane had to have out his fight.
Duane was utterly unlike himself; he could not bring the old
self back; he was not the same man he once had been. But he
could understand why. It was because of Ray Longstreth.
Temptation assailed him. To have her his wife! It was
impossible. The thought was insidiously alluring. Duane
pictured a home. He saw himself riding through the cotton and
rice and cane, home to a stately old mansion, where long-eared
hounds bayed him welcome, and a woman looked for him and met
him with happy and beautiful smile. There might--there would be
children. And something new, strange, confounding with its
emotion, came to life deep in Duane's heart. There would be
children! Ray their mother! The kind of life a lonely outcast
always yearned for and never had! He saw it all, felt it all.

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