Stepsons of Light Part 23

"Looks like a good season for fruit," said Charlie. A miner laughed.

Shaky drained his gla.s.s. "Come on, pool shark." He hooked his arm in Charlie's and they went back to the big hall. Part of the crowd drifted after them.

There was only one pool table, just beyond the door. Down one side were ranged tables for monte, faro, senate and stud. On the other side the bar extended beyond the part.i.tion and took up twenty feet of the hall, opposite the pool table. On the end of the bar were ranged generous platters of free lunch--shrimps, pretzels, strips of toasted bread, sausages, mustard, pickles, olives, crackers and cheese. Behind it was a large quick-lunch oil stove, darkened now. Beyond that was a vast oak refrigerator with a high ornamental top reaching almost to the ceiling. Next in order was a c.r.a.p table and another for seven-and-a-half. A big heater, unused now, shared the central s.p.a.ce with the pool table. Between these last two was a small table littered with papers and magazines. Two or three men sat there reading.

"Pretty quiet to-night?" said Charlie, nodding his chin at the sheeted games.

"Yes. Halfway between pay days. Don't pay to start up," said Shaky carelessly. "At that, it is quieter than usual to-night."

They played golf pool.

"It is not true that everyone who plays golf pool goes goopy,"

remarked Charlie at the end of the first game. "All crazy men play golf pool, of course. But that is not quite the same thing, I hope.

Beware of hasty deductions--as the bank examiner told the cashier.

Let's play rotation."

Jody Weir stuck his head through the doorway. "Hey, you! I'm buying.

Come have a drink!"

Most of the loungers rose and went forward to the bar. The men at the reading table did not move; possibly they did not hear. One was an Australian, a simple-faced giant, fathoms deep in a Sydney paper; his lips moved as he read, his eye glistened.

"Let's go up to the hotel," said Akins. "This table is no good. They got a jim dandy up there. New one."

"Oh, this is all right," said Charlie. "I'll break. Say, Shaky, you've seen my new ranch. What'll you give me for it, lock, stock and barrel, lease, cattle and cat, just as she lays, everything except the saddle stock? I'm thinking some about drifting."

"That's a good idea--a fine idea," said Shaky. He caught Charlie's eye, and pointed his brows significantly toward the barroom. "Where to?"

"Away. Old Mex, I guess. Gimme a bid."

Shaky considered while he chalked his cue. Then he shook his head.

"No. Nice place--but I wouldn't ever be satisfied there.... Mescaleros held up a wagon train there in 1879--where your pasture is now, halfway between your well and Mason's Ranch. Killed thirteen men and one woman. I was a kid then, living at Fort Selden. A d.a.m.n fool took me out with the burial party, and I saw all those mutilated bodies. I never got over it. That's why I'm Shaky Akins."

"Why, I thought--" began See uncomfortably.

"No. 'Twasn't chills. I'm giving it to you straight. I hesitated about telling you. I've never told anyone--but there's a reason for telling you--now--to-night. I lost my nerve. I'm not a man. See, I've dreamed of those people ten thousand times. It's h.e.l.l!"

Weir's head appeared at the door again; his face was red and hot.

"You, See! Ain't you comin' out to drink?"

"Why, no. We're playing pool."

"Well, I must say, you're not a bit--"

"I know I'm not a bit," said See placidly. "That's no news. I've been told before that I'm not a bit. You run on, now. We're playing pool."

The face withdrew. There was a hush in the boisterous mirth without.

Then it rose in redoubled volume.

"Come up to the hotel with me," urged Shaky, moistening his lips. "I got a date with a man there at ten. We can play pool there while I'm waiting."

"Oh, I'll stay here, I guess. I want to read the papers."

"You headstrong little fool," whispered Akins. "Their hearts is bad--can't you see? Come along!" Aloud he said: "If you get that ball it makes you pool."

The door from the barroom opened and two men appeared. One, a heavy man with a bullet head much too small for him, went to the free lunch; the other, a dwarfish creature with a twisted sullen face, walked to the Australian and shook him by the shoulder.

"Come on, Sanders. Say good night to the library. You're a married man and you don't want to be in this." His voice had been contemptuously kind so far; but now he snarled hatred. "h.e.l.l will be popping here pretty quick, and some smart Aleck is going to get what's coming to him. Oh, bring your precious 'pyper,' if you want to. Sim won't mind.

Come along--Larriken!"

The big man followed obediently.

"Part of that is good," observed Shaky Akins. "The part where he said good night. I'm saying it."

He made for the back door. The other man at the reading table rose and followed him.

"Good night, Shaky. Drop me a post hole, sometime," said Charlie.

The bullet-head man, now eating toast and shrimps, regarded See with a malicious sneer. See rummaged through the papers, selected a copy of The Black Range, and seated himself sidewise on the end of the billiard table; then laying the paper down he reached for the triangle and pyramided the pool b.a.l.l.s.

The swinging door crashed inward before a vicious kick. Caney stalked in. His pitted face was black with rage. Weir followed. As the door swung to there was a glimpse of savage eager faces crowded beyond.

Caney glared across the billiard table.

"We're not good enough for you to drink with, I reckon," he croaked.

Charlie laid aside the triangle. The free lunch man laughed spitefully. "Aren't you?" said Charlie, indifferently.

Caney raised his voice. "And I hear you been saying I was a gallows bird?"

Charlie See adjusted a ball at the corner of the pyramid. Then he gave to Caney a slow and speculative glance.

"Now that I take a good look at you--it seems probable, don't it?"

"d.a.m.n you!" roared Caney. "What do you mean?"

"Business!"

No man's eye could have said which hand moved first. But See was the quicker. As Caney's gun flashed, a pool ball struck him over the heart, he dropped like a log, his bullet went wide. A green ball glanced from Jody's gun arm as it rose; the cartridge exploded harmlessly as the gun dropped; Weir staggered back, howling. He struck the swinging door simultaneously with the free-lunch man; and in that same second a battering-ram mob crashed against it from the other side. Weir was knocked sprawling; the door sagged from a broken hinge.

See crouched behind the heavy table and pitched. Two things happened.

Bullets plowed the green cloth of the table and ricocheted from the smooth slate; bushels of billiard b.a.l.l.s streamed through the open door and thudded on quivering flesh. Flesh did not like that. It squeaked and turned and fled, tramping the fallen, screaming. Billiard b.a.l.l.s crashed sickeningly on defenseless backs. In cold fact, Charlie See threw six b.a.l.l.s; at that close range flesh could have sworn to sixty.

Charlie felt rather than saw a bloodless face rise behind the bar; he ducked to the shelter of the billiard table as a bullet grooved the rail; his own gun roared, a heavy mirror splintered behind the bar: the Merman had also ducked. Charlie threw two shots through the part.i.tion. At the front, woodwork groaned and shattered as a six-foot mob pa.s.sed through a four-foot door. Charlie had a glimpse of the crouching Merman, the last man through. For encouragement another shot, purposely high, crashed through the transom; the Merman escaped in a shower of gla.s.s.

"How's that, umpire?" said Charlie See.

The business had been transacted in ten seconds. If one man can cover a hundred yards in ten seconds how many yards can forty men make in the same time?

"Curious!" said Charlie. "Some of that bunch might have stood up to a gun well enough. But they can't see bullets. And once they turned tail--good night!"