Gunman\'s Reckoning - Max Brand
GUNMAN'S RECKONING
By
Max Brand
1921
GUNMAN'S RECKONING
1
The fifty empty freights danced and rolled and rattled on the rough road
bed and filled Jericho Pass with thunder; the big engine was laboring
and grunting at the grade, but five cars back the noise of the
locomotive was lost. Yet there is a way to talk above the noise of a
freight train just as there is a way to whistle into the teeth of a
stiff wind. This freight-car talk is pitched just above the ordinary
tone--it is an overtone of conversation, one might say--and it is
distinctly nasal. The brakie could talk above the racket, and so, of
course, could Lefty Joe. They sat about in the center of the train, on
the forward end of one of the cars. No matter how the train lurched and
staggered over that fearful road bed, these two swayed in their places
as easily and as safely as birds on swinging perches. The brakie had
touched Lefty Joe for two dollars; he had secured fifty cents; and since
the vigor of Lefty's oaths had convinced him that this was all the money
the tramp had, the two now sat elbow to elbow and killed the distance
with their talk.
"It's like old times to have you here," said the brakie. "You used to
play this line when you jumped from coast to coast."
"Sure," said Lefty Joe, and he scowled at the mountains on either side
of the pass. The train was gathering speed, and the peaks lurched
eastward in a confused, ragged procession. "And a durned hard ride it's
been many a time."
"Kind of queer to see you," continued the brakie. "Heard you was rising
in the world."
He caught the face of the other with a rapid side glance, but Lefty Joe
was sufficiently concealed by the dark.
"Heard you were the main guy with a whole crowd behind you," went on the
brakie.
"Yeh?"
"Sure. Heard you was riding the cushions, and all that."
"Yeh?"
"But I guess it was all bunk; here you are back again, anyway."
"Yep," agreed Lefty.
The brakie scratched his head, for the silence of the tramp convinced
him that there had been, after all, a good deal of truth in the rumor.
He ran back on another tack and slipped about Lefty.
"I never laid much on what they said," he averred. "I know you, Lefty;
you can do a lot, but when it comes to leading a whole gang, like they
said you was, and all that--well, I knew it was a lie. Used to tell 'em
that."
"You talked foolish, then," burst out Lefty suddenly. "It was all
straight."
The brakie could hear the click of his companion's teeth at the period
to this statement, as though he regretted his outburst.
"Well, I'll be hanged," murmured the brakie innocently.
Ordinarily, Lefty was not easily lured, but this night he apparently was
in the mood for talk.
"Kennebec Lou, the Clipper, and Suds. Them and a lot more. They was all
with me; they was all under me; I was the Main Guy!"
What a ring in his voice as he said it! The beaten general speaks thus
of his past triumphs. The old man remembered his youth in such a voice.
The brakie was impressed; he repeated the three names.
"Even Suds?" he said. "Was even Suds with you?"
"Even Suds!"
The brakie stirred a little, wabbling from side to side as he found a
more comfortable position; instead of looking straight before him, he
kept a side-glance steadily upon his companion, and one could see that
he intended to remember what was said on this night.
"Even Suds," echoed the brakie. "Good heavens, and ain't he a man for
you?"
"He was a man," replied Lefty Joe with an indescribable emphasis.
"Huh?"
"He ain't a man any more."
"Get bumped off?"
"No. Busted."
The brakie considered this bit of news and rolled it back and forth and
tried its flavor against his gossiping palate.
"Did you fix him after he left you?"
"No."
"I see. You busted him while he was still with you. Then Kennebec Lou
and the Clipper get sore at the way you treat Suds. So here you are back
on the road with your gang all gone bust. Hard luck, Lefty."
But Lefty whined with rage at this careless diagnosis of his downfall.
"You're all wrong," he said. "You're all wrong. You don't know nothin'."
The brakie waited, grinning securely into the night, and preparing his
mind for the story. But the story consisted of one word, flung bitterly
into the rushing air.
"Donnegan!"
"Him?" cried the brakie, starting in his place.
"Donnegan!" cried Lefty, and his voice made the word into a curse.
The brakie nodded.
"Them that get tangled with Donnegan don't last long. You ought to know
that."
At this the grief, hate, and rage in Lefty Joe were blended and caused
an explosion.
"Confound Donnegan. Who's Donnegan? I ask you, who's Donnegan?"
"A guy that makes trouble," replied the brakie, evidently hard put to it
to find a definition.
"Oh, don't he make it, though? Confound him!"
"You ought to of stayed shut of him, Lefty."
"Did I hunt him up, I ask you? Am I a nut? No, I ain't. Do I go along
stepping on the tail of a rattlesnake? No more do I look up Donnegan."
He groaned as he remembered.
"I was going fine. Nothing could of been better. I had the boys
together. We was doing so well that I was riding the cushions and I went
around planning the jobs. Nice, clean work. No cans tied to it. But one
day I had to meet Suds down in the Meriton Jungle. You know?"
"I've heard--plenty," said the brakie.
"Oh, it ain't so bad--the Meriton. I've seen a lot worse. Found Suds
there, and Suds was playing Black Jack with an ol gink. He was trimmin'
him close. Get Suds going good and he could read 'em three down and bury
'em as fast as they came under the bottom card. Takes a hand to do that
sort of work. And that's the sort of work Suds was doing for the old
man. Pretty soon the game was over and the old man was busted. He took
up his pack and beat it, saying nothing and looking sick. I started
talking to Suds.
"And while he was talking, along comes a bo and gives us a once-over. He
knew me. 'Is this here a friend of yours, Lefty? he says.
"'Sure,' says I.
"'Then, he's in Dutch. He trimmed that old dad, and the dad is one of
Donnegan's pals. Wait till Donnegan hears how your friend made the cards
talk while he was skinning the old boy!
"He passes me the wink and goes on. Made me sick. I turned to Suds, and
the fool hadn't batted an eye. Never even heard of Donnegan. You know
how it is? Half the road never heard of it; part of the roads don't know
nothin' else. He's like a jumpin tornado; hits every ten miles and don't
bend a blade of grass in between.
"Took me about five minutes to tell Suds about Donnegan. Then Suds let
out a grunt and started down the trail for the old dad. Missed him. Dad
had got out of the Jungle and copped a rattler. Suds come back half
green and half yeller.
"'I've done it; I've spilled the beans,' he says.
"'That ain't half sayin' it,' says I.
"Well, we lit out after that and beat it down the line as fast as we
could. We got the rest of the boys together; I had a swell job planned
up. Everything staked. Then, the first news come that Donnegan was after
Suds.
"News just dropped on us out of the sky. Suds, you know how he is.
Strong bluff. Didn't bat an eye. Laughed at this Donnegan. Got a hold of
an old pal of his, named Levine, and he is a mighty hot scrapper. From a
knife to a toenail, they was nothing that Levine couldn't use in a
fight. Suds sent him out to cross Donnegan's trail.
"He crossed it, well enough. Suds got a telegram a couple days later
saying that Levine had run into a wild cat and was considerable chawed
and would Suds send him a stake to pay the doctor?
"Well, after that Suds got sort of nervous. Didn't take no interest in
his work no more. Kept a weather eye out watching for the coming of
Donnegan. And pretty soon he up and cleaned out of camp.
"Next day, sure enough, along comes Donnegan and asks for Suds. We kept
still--all but Kennebec Lou. Kennebec is some fighter himself. Two
hundred pounds of mule muscle with the brain of a devil to tell what to
do--yes, you can lay it ten to one that Kennebec is some fighter. That
day he had a good edge from a bottle of rye he was trying for a friend.
"He didn't need to go far to find trouble in Donnegan. A wink and a grin
was all they needed for a password, and then they went at each other's
throats. Kennebec made the first pass and hit thin air; and before he
got back on his heels, Donnegan had hit him four times. Then Kennebec
jumped back and took a fresh start with a knife."
Here Lefty Joe paused and sighed.
He continued, after a long interval: "Five minutes later we was all busy
tyin' up what was left of Kennebec; Donnegan was down the road whistlin'
like a bird. And that was the end of my gang. What with Kennebec Lou and
Suds both gone, what chance did I have to hold the boys together?"
2
The brakie heard this recital with the keenest interest, nodding from
time to time.
"What beats me, Lefty," he said at the end of the story, "is why you
didn't knife into the fight yourself and take a hand with Donnegan"
At this Lefty was silent. It was rather the silence of one which cannot
tell whether or not it is worth while to speak than it was the silence
of one who needs time for thought.
"I'll tell you why, bo. It's because when I take a trail like that it
only has one end I'm going to bump off the other bird or he's going to
bump off me"
The brakie cleared his throat
"Look here," he said, "looks to me like a queer thing that you're on
this train"
"Does it" queried Lefty softly "Why?"
"Because Donnegan is two cars back, asleep."
"The devil you say!"
The brakie broke into laughter
"Don't kid yourself along," he warned. "Don't do it. It ain't
wise--with me."
"What you mean?"
"Come on, Lefty. Come clean. You better do a fade off this train."
"Why, you fool--"
"It don't work, Joe. Why, the minute I seen you I knew why you was here.
I knew you meant to croak Donnegan."
"Me croak him? Why should I croak him?"
"Because you been trailing him two thousand miles. Because you ain't got
the nerve to meet him face to face and you got to sneak in and take a
crack at him while he's lying asleep. That's you, Lefty Joe!"
He saw Lefty sway toward him; but, all stories aside, it is a very bold
tramp that cares for argument of a serious nature with a brakie. And
even Lefty Joe was deterred from violent action. In the darkness his
upper lip twitched, but he carefully smoothed his voice.
"You don't know nothing, pal," he declared.
"Don't I?"
"Nothing," repeated Lefty.
He reached into his clothes and produced something which rustled in the
rush of wind. He fumbled, and finally passed a scrap of the paper into
the hand of the brakie.
"My heavens," drawled the latter. "D'you think you can fix me with a
buck for a job like this? You can't bribe me to stand around while you
bump off Donnegan. Can't be done, Lefty!"
"One buck, did you say?"
Lefty Joe expertly lighted a match in spite of the roaring wind, and by
this wild light the brakie read the denomination of the bill with a
gasp. He rolled up his face and was in time to catch the sneer on the
face of Lefty before a gust snatched away the light of the match.
They had topped the highest point in Jericho Pass and now the long train
dropped into the down grade with terrific speed. The wind became a
hurricane. But to the brakie all this was no more than a calm night. His
thoughts were raging in him, and if he looked back far enough he
remembered the dollar which Donnegan had given him; and how he had
promised Donnegan to give the warning before anything went wrong. He
thought of this, but rustling against the palm of his right hand was
the bill whose denomination he had read, and that figure ate into his
memory, ate into his brain.
After all what was Donnegan to him? What was Donnegan but a worthless
tramp? Without any answer to that last monosyllabic query, the brakie
hunched forward, and began to work his way up the train.
The tramp watched him go with laughter. It was silent laughter. In the
most quiet room it would not have sounded louder than a continual, light
hissing noise. Then he, in turn, moved from his place, and worked his
way along the train in the opposite direction to that in which the
brakie had disappeared.
He went expertly, swinging from car to car with apelike clumsiness--and
surety. Two cars back. It was not so easy to reach the sliding side door
of that empty car. Considering the fact that it was night, that the
train was bucking furiously over the old roadbed, Lefty had a not
altogether simple task before him. But he managed it with the same
apelike adroitness. He could climb with his feet as well as his hands.
He would trust a ledge as well as he would trust the rung of a ladder.
Under his discreet manipulations from above the door loosened and it
became possible to work it back. But even this the tramp did with
considerable care. He took advantage of the lurching of the train, and
every time the car jerked he forced the door to roll a little, so that
it might seem for all the world as though the motion of the train alone
were operating it.
For suppose that Donnegan wakened out of his sound sleep and observed
the motion of the door; he would be suspicious if the door opened in a
single continued motion; but if it worked in these degrees he would be
hypersuspicious if he dreamed of danger. So the tramp gave five whole
minutes to that work.
When it was done he waited for a time, another five minutes, perhaps, to
see if the door would be moved back. And when it was not disturbed, but
allowed to stand open, he knew that Donnegan still slept.
It was time then for action, and Lefty Joe prepared for the descent into
the home of the enemy. Let it not be thought that he approached this
moment with a fallen heart, and with a cringing, snaky feeling as a man
might be expected to feel when he approached to murder a sleeping
foeman. For that was not Lefty's emotion at all. Rather he was overcome
by a tremendous happiness. He could have sung with joy at the thought
that he was about to rid himself of this pest.
True, the gang was broken up. But it might rise again. Donnegan had
fallen upon it like a blight. But with Donnegan out of the way would not
Suds come back to him instantly? And would not Kennebec Lou himself
return in admiration of a man who had done what he, Kennebec, could not
do? With those two as a nucleus, how greatly might he not build!
Justice must be done to Lefty Joe. He approached this murder as a
statesman approaches the removal of a foe from the path of public
prosperity. There was no more rancor in his attitude. It was rather the
blissful largeness of the heart that comes to the politician when he
unearths the scandal which will blight the race of his rival.
With the peaceful smile of a child, therefore, Lefty Joe lay stretched
at full length along the top of the car and made his choice of weapons.
On the whole, his usual preference, day or night, was for a revolver.
Give him a gat and Lefty was at home in any company. But he had reasons
for transferring his alliance on this occasion. In the first place, a
box car which is reeling and pitching to and fro, from side to side, is
not a very good shooting platform--even for a snapshot like Lefty Joe.
Also, the pitch darkness in the car would be a further annoyance to good
aim. And in the third and most decisive place, if he were to miss his
first shot he would not be extremely apt to place his second bullet. For
Donnegan had a reputation with his own revolver. Indeed, it was said
that he rarely carried the weapon, because when he did he was always
tempted too strongly to use it. So that the chances were large that
Donnegan would not have the gun now. Yet if he did have it--if he,
Lefty, did miss his first shot--then the story would be brief and bitter
indeed.
On the other hand, a knife offered advantages almost too numerous to be
listed. It gave one the deadly assurance which only comes with the
knowledge of an edge of steel in one's hand. And when the knife reaches
its mark it ends a battle at a stroke.
Of course these doubts and considerations pro and con went through the
mind of the tramp in about the same space of time that it requires for a
dog to waken, snap at a fly, and drowse again. Eventually, he took out
his knife. It was a sheath knife which he wore from a noose of silk
around his throat, and it always lay closest to his heart. The blade of
the knife was of the finest Spanish steel, in the days when Spanish
smiths knew how to draw out steel to a streak of light; the handle of
the knife was from Milan. On the whole, it was a delicate and beautiful
weapon--and it had the durable suppleness of--say--hatred itself.
Lefty Joe, like a pirate in a tale, took this weapon between his teeth;
allowed his squat, heavy bulk to swing down and dangle at arm's length
for an instant, and then he swung himself a little and landed softly on
the floor of the car.
Who has not heard snow drop from the branch upon other snow beneath?
That was the way Lefty Joe dropped to the floor of the car. He remained
as he had fallen; crouched, alert, with one hand spread out on the
boards to balance him and give him a leverage and a start in case he
should wish to spring in any direction.
Then he began to probe the darkness in every direction; with every
glance he allowed his head to dart out a little. The movement was like a
chicken pecking at imaginary grains of corn. But eventually he satisfied
himself that his quarry lay in the forward end of the car; that he was
prone; that he, Lefty, had accomplished nine-tenths of his purpose by
entering the place of his enemy unobserved.
3
But even though this major step was accomplished successfully, Lefty Joe
was not the man to abandon caution in the midst of an enterprise. The
roar of the train would have covered sounds ten times as loud as those
of his snaky approach, yet he glided forward with as much care as though
he were stepping on old stairs in a silent house. He could see a vague
shadow--Donnegan; but chiefly he worked by that peculiar sense of
direction which some people possess in a dim light. The blind, of
course, have that sense in a high degree of sensitiveness, but even
those who are not blind may learn to trust the peculiar and inverted
sense of direction.
With this to aid him, Lefty Joe went steadily, slowly across the first
and most dangerous stage of his journey. That is, he got away from the
square of the open door, where the faint starlight might vaguely serve
to silhouette his body. After this, it was easier work.
Of course, when he alighted on the floor of the car, the knife had been
transferred from his teeth to his left hand; and all during his progress
forward the knife was being balanced delicately, as though he were not
yet quite sure of the weight of the weapon. Just as a prize fighter
keeps his deadly, poised hands in play, moving them as though he fears
to lose his intimate touch with them.
This stalking had occupied a matter of split seconds. Now Lefty Joe rose
slowly. He was leaning very far forward, and he warded against the roll
of the car by spreading out his right hand close to the floor; his left
hand he poised with the knife, and he began to gather his muscles for
the leap. He had already taken the last preliminary movement--he had
swung himself to the right side a little and, lightening his left foot,
had thrown all his weight upon the right--in fact, his body was
literally suspended in the instant of springing, catlike, when the
shadow which was Donnegan came to life.
The shadow convulsed as shadows are apt to swirl in a green pool when a
stone is dropped into it; and a bit of board two feet long and some
eight inches wide cracked against the shins of Lefty Joe.
It was about the least dramatic weapon that could have been chosen under
those circumstances, but certainly no other defense could have
frustrated Lefty's spring so completely. Instead of launching out in a
compact mass whose point of contact was the reaching knife, Lefty
crawled stupidly forward upon his knees, and had to throw out his knife
hand to save his balance.
It is a singular thing to note how important balance is to men. Animals
fight, as a rule, just as well on their backs as they do on their feet.
They can lie on their sides and bite; they can swing their claws even
while they are dropping through the air. But man needs poise and balance
before he can act. What is speed in a fighter? It is not so much an
affair of the muscles as it is the power of the brain to adapt itself
instantly to each new move and put the body in a state of balance. In
the prize ring speed does not mean the ability to strike one lightning
blow, but rather that, having finished one drive, the fighter is in
position to hit again, and then again, so that no matter where the
impetus of his last lunge has placed him he is ready and poised to shoot
all his weight behind his fist again and drive it accurately at a
vulnerable spot. Individually the actions may be slow; but the series of
efforts seem rapid. That is why a superior boxer seems to hypnotize his
antagonist with movements which to the spectator seem perfectly easy,
slow, and sure.
But if Lefty lacked much in agility, he had an animallike sense of
balance. Sprawling, helpless, he saw the convulsed shadow that was
Donnegan take form as a straight shooting body that plunged through the
air above him. Lefty Joe dug his left elbow into the floor of the car
and whirled back upon his shoulders, bunching his knees high over his
stomach. Nine chances out of ten, if Donnegan had fallen flatwise upon
this alert enemy, he would have received those knees in the pit of his
own stomach and instantly been paralyzed. But in the jumping, rattling
car even Donnegan was capable of making mistakes. His mistake in this
instance saved his life, for springing too far, he came down not in
reaching distance of Lefty's throat, but with his chest on the knees of
the older tramp.
As a result, Donnegan was promptly kicked head over heels and tumbled
the length of the car. Lefty was on his feet and plunging after the
tumbling form in the twinkling of an eye, literally speaking, and he was
only kept from burying his knife in the flesh of his foe by a sway of
the car that staggered him in the act of striking. Donnegan, the next
instant, was beyond reach. He had struck the end of the car and
rebounded like a ball of rubber at a tangent. He slid into the shadows,
and Lefty, putting his own shoulders to the wall, felt for his revolver
and knew that he was lost. He had failed in his first surprise attack,
and without surprise to help him now he was gone. He weighed his
revolver, decided that it would be madness to use it, for if he missed,
Donnegan would instantly be guided by the flash to shoot him full of
holes.
Something slipped by the open door--something that glimmered faintly;
and Lefty Joe knew that it was the red head of Donnegan. Donnegan,
soft-footed as a shadow among shadows. Donnegan on a blood trail. It
lowered the heartbeat of Lefty Joe to a tremendous, slow pulse. In that
moment he gave up hope and, resigning himself to die, determined to
fight to the last gasp, as became one of his reputation and national
celebrity on "the road."
Yet Lefty Joe was no common man and no common fighter. No, let the shade
of Rusty Dick, whom Lefty met and beat in his glorious prime--let this
shade arise and speak for the prowess of Lefty Joe. In fact it was
because he was such a good fighter himself that he recognized his
helplessness in the hands of Donnegan.
The faint glimmer of color had passed the door. It was dissolved in
deeper shadows at once, and soundlessly; Lefty knew that Donnegan was
closer and closer.
Of one thing he felt more and more confident, that Donnegan did not have
his revolver with him. Otherwise, he would have used it before. For what
was darkness to this devil, Donnegan. He walked like a cat, and most
likely he could see like a cat in the dark. Instinctively the older
tramp braced himself with his right hand held at a guard before his
breast and the knife poised in his left, just as a man would prepare to
meet the attack of a panther. He even took to probing the darkness in a
strange hope to catch the glimmer of the eyes of Donnegan as he moved to
the attack. If there were a hair's breadth of light, then Donnegan
himself must go down. A single blow would do it.
But the devil had instructed his favorite Donnegan how to fight. He did
not come lunging through the shadows to meet the point of that knife.
Instead, he had worked a snaky way along the floor and now he leaped in
and up at Lefty, taking him under the arms.
A dozen hands, it seemed, laid hold on Lefty. He fought like a demon and
tore himself away, but the multitude of hands pursued him. They were
small hands. Where they closed they tore the clothes and bit into his
very flesh. Once a hand had him by the throat, and when Lefty jerked
himself away it was with a feeling that his flesh had been seared by
five points of red-hot iron. All this time his knife was darting; once
it ripped through cloth, but never once did it find the target. And half
a second later Donnegan got his hold. The flash of the knife as Lefty
raised it must have guided the other. He shot his right hand up behind
the left shoulder of the other and imprisoned the wrist. Not only did it
make the knife hand helpless, but by bearing down with his own weight
Donnegan could put his enemy in most exquisite torture.