Jim Waring of Sonora-Town Part 7

Waring shook his head. "You hear our horses. The rurales won't ride into this pocket before daylight. Stay right here till I come back."

He rose and worked cautiously down the eastern slope, searching for Dex in the valley. In the gray gloom he saw the outline of his horse grazing alone. He stepped down to him. The big horse raised its head. Waring spoke. Rea.s.sured, Dex plodded to his master, who turned and tracked back to the pocket in the rocks. "I think your cayuse has drifted south," he told Ramon.

The young Mexican showed no surprise. He seemed resigned to the situation. "I knew when the senor said to turn my horse loose that he would seek the horses of his kind. He has gone back to the horses of those who follow us."

"You said it" said Waring. "And that's going to bother them. It tells me that the rurales are not far behind. They'll figure that I put you out of business to get rid of you. They'll look for a dead Mexican, and a live gringo riding north, alone. But they're too wise to ride up here.

They'll trail up afoot and out of sight. That's your one chance."

"My chance, senor?"

"Yes. Here's some grub. You've got your gun. Drift down the slope, get back of the next ridge, and strike south. Locate their horses and wait till they leave them to come up here. Get a horse. Pick a good one. I'll keep them busy till you get back."

Ramon rose and climbed to the edge of the pocket. "I go," he said sadly.

"And I shall never see the senor again."

"Don't bet all you've got on that," said Waring.

When Ramon had disappeared, Waring led Dex back from the pocket, and, saddling him, left him concealed in the brush. Then the gunman crept back to the rim and lay waiting, a handful of rifle sh.e.l.ls loose on a flat rock in front of him. He munched some dried meat and drank from the canteen.

The red dawn faded quickly to a keen white light. Heat waves ran over the rocks and danced down the hillside. Waring lighted a match and blackened the front sight of his carbine. The sun rolled up and struck at him, burning into the pocket of rock where he lay motionless gazing down the slope. Sweat beaded his forehead and trickled down his nose.

Scattered boulders seemed to move gently. He closed his eyes for an instant. When he opened them he thought he saw a movement in the brush below. The heat burned into his back, and he shrugged his shoulders. A tiny bird flitted past and perched on the dry, dead stalk of a yucca.

Again Waring thought he saw a movement in the brush.

Then, as if by magic, the figure of a rural stood clear and straight against the distant background of brownish-green. Waring smiled. He knew that if he were to fire, the rurales would rush him. They suspected some kind of a trap. Waring's one chance was to wait until they had given up every ruse to draw his fire. They were not certain of his whereabouts, but were suspicious of that natural fortress of rock. There was not a rural in Old Mexico who did not know him either personally or by reputation. The fact that one of them had offered himself as a possible target proved that they knew they had to deal with a man as crafty as themselves.

The standing figure, shimmering in the glare, drew back and disappeared.

Waring eased his tense muscles. "Now they'll go back for their horses,"

he said to himself. "They'll ride up to the next ridge, where they can look down on this pocket, but I won't be here."

Waring planned every move with that care and instinct which marks a good chess-player. And because he had to count upon possibilities far ahead he drew Ramon's saddle to him and cut the stirrup-leathers, cinchas, and latigos. If Ramon got one of their horses, his own jaded animal would be left. Eventually the rurales would find the saddle and Ramon's horse.

And every rural out of the riding would be a factor in their escape.

The sun blazed down until the pocket of rock was a pit of stagnant heat. The silence seemed like an ocean rolling in soundless waves across the hills; a silence that became disturbed by a faint sound as of one approaching cautiously. Waring thought Ramon had shown cleverness in working up to him so quietly. He raised on his elbow and turned his head. On the eastern edge of the pocket stood a rural, and the rural smiled.

Chapter VI

_Arizona_

Waring, who had known the man in Sonora, called him by name. The other's smile faded, and his eyes narrowed. Waring thrust up his hands and jokingly offered to toss up a coin to decide the issue. He knew his man; knew that at the first false move the rural would kill him. He rose and turned sideways that the other might take his gun. "You win the throw,"

he said. The Mexican jerked Waring's gun from the holster and c.o.c.ked it.

Then he whistled.

From below came the faint clatter of hoofs. The rural seemed puzzled that his call should have been answered so promptly. He knew that his companions had gone for their horses, picketed some distance from the pocket. He had volunteered to surprise the gunman single-handed.

Waring, gazing beyond the rural, saw the head of a horse top the rise.

In the saddle sat Ramon, hatless, his black hair flung back from his forehead, a gun in his hand. Waring drew a deep breath. Would Ramon bungle it by calling out, or would he have nerve enough to make an end of it on the instant?

Although Waring was unarmed, the rural dared not turn. The gringo had been known to slip out of as tight a place despite the threat of a gun almost against his chest. With a despondent shrug, Waring lowered his arms.

"You win the throw," he said hopelessly.

Still the Mexican dared not take his eyes from Waring. He would wait until his companions appeared.

A few yards behind the rural, Ramon reined up. Slowly he lowered the muzzle of his gun. The rural called the name of one of his fellows. The answer came in a blunt crash, which rippled its harsh echoes across the sounding hills. The rural flung up his arms and pitched forward, rolling to Waring's feet. The gunman leaped up, and, s.n.a.t.c.hing his carbine from the rock, swung round and took his six-gun from the rural's limp fingers. Plunging to the brush beyond the pocket, he swung to the saddle and shot down the slope. Behind him he could hear Ramon's horse scattering the loose rock of the hillside. A bullet struck ahead of him and whined across the silence. A shrill call told him that the pursuers had discovered the body of their fellow.

Dex, with ears laid back, took the ragged grade in great, uneven leaps that shortened to a regular stride as they gained the level of the valley. Glancing back, Waring saw Ramon but a few yards behind. He signaled to him to ride closer. Together they swung down the valley, dodging the low brush--and leaping rocks at top speed.

Finally Waring reined in. "We'll make for that ridge,"--and he indicated the range west. Under cover of the brush they angled across the valley and began the ascent of the range which hid the western desert.

Halfway up, Waring dismounted. "Lead my horse on up," he told Ramon.

"I'll argue it out with 'em here."

"Senor, I have killed a man!" gasped Ramon.

Waring flung the reins to his companion. "All right! This isn't a fiesta, hombre; this is business."

Ramon turned and put his horse up the slope, Dex following. Waring curled behind a rock and swept the valley with his gla.s.s. The heads of several rurales were visible in the brush. They had halted and were looking for tracks. Finally one of them raised his arm and pointed toward the hill. They had caught sight of Ramon on the slope above.

Presently three riders appeared at the foot of the grade. It was a long shot from where Waring lay. He centered on the leading rural, allowed for a chance of overshooting, and pressed the trigger. The carbine snarled. An echo ripped the shimmering heat. A horse reared and plunged up the valley, the saddle empty.

Waring rose, and plodded up the slope.

"Three would have trailed us. Two will ride back to the railroad and report. I wonder how many of them are bushed along the trail between here and Nogales?"

In the American custom-house at Nogales sat a lean, lank man gazing out of a window facing the south. His chair was tilted back, and his large feet were crossed on the desk in front of him. He was in his shirt-sleeves, and he puffed indolently at a cigar and blew smoke-rings toward the ceiling. Incidentally his name was known throughout the country and beyond its southern borders. But if this distinction affected him in any way it was not evident. He seemed submerged in a la.s.situde which he neither invited nor struggled against.

A group of riders appeared down the road. The lean man brushed a cloud of smoke away and gazed at them with indifference. They drew nearer. He saw that they were Mexicans--rurales. Without turning his head, he called to an invisible somebody in the next room.

"Jack, drift over to the cantina and get a drink."

A chair clumped to the floor, and a stocky, dark-faced man appeared, rubbing his eyes. "On who?" he queried, grinning.

"On old man Diaz," replied the lean man.

"All right, Pat. But mebby his credit ain't good on our side of the line."

The lean man said nothing. He continued to gaze out of the window. The white road ran south and south into the very haze of the beyond. His a.s.sistant picked up a hat and strolled out. A few doors down the street stood several excellent saddle animals tied to the hitching-rail in front of the cantina. He didn't need to be told that they were the picked horses of the rurales, and that for some strange reason his superior had sent him to find out just why these same rurales were in town.

He entered the cantina and called for a drink. The lithe, dark riders of the south, grouped round a table in one corner of the room, glanced up, answered his general nod of salutation indifferently, and turned to talk among themselves. Catering to authority, the Mexican proprietor proffered a second drink to the Americano. The a.s.sistant collector toyed with his gla.s.s, and began a lazy conversation about the weather. The proprietor, his fat, oily face in his hands and his elbows on the bar, grunted monosyllables, occasionally nodding as the Americano forced his acknowledgment of a highly obvious plat.i.tude.

And the a.s.sistant collector, listening for a chance word that would explain the presence of armed Mexico on American soil, knew that the proprietor was also listening for that same word that might explain their unprecedented visit. Presently the a.s.sistant collector of customs began a tirade against Nogales, its climate, inst.i.tutions, and citizens collectively and singly. The proprietor awoke to argument. Their talk grew loud. The a.s.sistant collector thumped the bar with his fist, and ceased talking suddenly. A subdued buzz came from the corner where the rurales sat, and he caught the name "Waring."

"And the whole town ain't worth the matches to burn it up," he continued. "If it wasn't for Pat, I'd quit right now." And he emptied his gla.s.s and strode from the room.