The Coyote Part 29

Sautee p.r.i.c.ked up his ears. "You let them arrest you," he said.

"Why----"

"Because I knew Mannix didn't know who I was an' didn't have anything on me," said Rathburn quickly. "An' I got peevish at Carlisle an'

plumb suspicious when he tried to make things look bad for me right there at the start. I began to wise up to the whole lay when you got me out of jail."

Sautee's face went white again.

"Your fine explanations of why you couldn't get that money up to the mine were thin as water, Sautee. You could get that money up there if you wanted to, an' when you asked me to carry the package to the mine it was a dead out-an'-out give-away. I reckon you didn't play me to have any sense, an' I don't think you gave Carlisle credit for havin'

the brains of a jack rabbit, either."

Rathburn laughed as the mine manager stared at mention of Carlisle's name again.

"Don't worry," he said contemptuously. "I know it was Carlisle who held me up. I take it he figured that you'd actually put money in that package. Wouldn't be surprised if it was him that you got to try that stunt. An' he started away with the package as soon as he got it instead of sneakin' back home to split with you. He double crossed you an' you double crossed him an' me. Now I'm double crossing the two of you."

Sautee's look had changed to one of anger. He glared at Rathburn, forgetting his predicament.

"You'd have a fine time proving any of this nonsense," he found the courage to say.

"I'm not only goin' to prove what I've said so far, but I'm goin' to prove that these robberies were a put-up job between you an' Carlisle, with somebody helping you," said Rathburn. "I've been in the mining game myself, Sautee, but in our country men spend their lives hunting metal to make some bunch of stockholders rich. Maybe they get something out of it themselves, an' maybe they don't; but they're square, an' the men that run the mines are square 'most always. Anyway they develop properties, an' that's more'n you're doing. You're not doing this camp any good. You're bleeding the mine an' the company, too."

"And I suppose you--The Coyote--are taking a hand in this business as a matter of principle," sneeringly replied Sautee.

"I didn't take a hand," Rathburn pointed out sternly. "You an'

Carlisle forced a hand on me, an' I'm goin' to play it out. I've another reason, too," he added mysteriously.

"Did you say you had Carlisle?" Sautee asked in feigned anxiety.

"I've got him dead to rights," replied Rathburn shortly, taking some paper and a pencil from a pocket.

Sautee looked at him curiously as he started to write on the paper.

"Going to write it all out and leave it?" he asked sneeringly.

"I'm going to put it outside the powder house in a place where Mannix or some of the others will be sure to find it," was the puzzling answer.

"I suppose they'll believe it quicker if it's in writing," said Sautee bravely.

Rathburn finished writing, folded the paper, and placed it in the left-hand pocket of his coat. He carefully put away the pencil. His next act caused Sautee real concern.

Using a drill which was there for the purpose, evidently, Rathburn broke open a box of dynamite caps and a box of dynamite. A single coil of fuse was lying on a box. He quickly affixed the cap to a stick of the dynamite and crimped on a two-foot length of fuse. Then he moved the opened box of dynamite to the doorway and struck the stick with cap and fuse attached into it.

"There," he said, evidently greatly satisfied with his work. "That fuse will burn about two minutes----" He paused. "That's too long," he concluded.

Perspiration again stood out on Sautee's forehead as he watched Rathburn cut off a foot of the fuse.

"That's better," said Rathburn with a queer smile. "That'll burn about a minute. Time enough."

Sautee stared in horrified fascination at the foot of fuse which stuck straight out from the box of dynamite in the doorway. "What--what are you going to do?" he gasped out.

"Listen, Sautee," said Rathburn coolly. "When that stick of powder explodes it'll set off the box an' the other boxes, an' instead of a powder house here there'll be a big hole in the side of the mountain."

"Man--man--you're not going to do--_that_!" Sautee's words came in a hoa.r.s.e whisper.

"I reckon that's what I'm goin' to have to do," said Rathburn as he bent over the form on the floor of the powder house.

The boy's eyes were open and were staring into Rathburn's.

Rathburn lifted him to his feet, where he stood unsteadily. Again the gun was in Rathburn's hand.

"This party is goin' to leave us," he said to the frightened mine manager. "I'm goin' to step just outside for a minute. It's your chance to make a break, Sautee; but if you try it I'll send a bullet into that cap. Maybe you heard somewhere that I can shoot tolerably well," he concluded in his drawl.

Sautee gripped the sides of the boxes piled behind him.

Rathburn led the boy outside and said quickly: "Just what is this man Carlisle to you?"

A look of fear, remorse, dejection--all commingled and pleading--came into the dark eyes that looked up into his.

Rathburn didn't wait for a verbal answer.

"Your horse is just up the trail a piece," he said hurriedly. "Get up there--go up behind the powder house, so the men below can't see you.

Swing off into the timber to the left and get down out of here. I'll keep their attention. Go home."

He waited a moment until he saw that his instructions were being carried out, then he leaped again to the doorway of the powder house.

Sautee's face was livid, and his teeth were chattering. Rathburn took a match from his shirt pocket.

"Stop!" screamed Sautee. "I'll talk. You were right. It was a frame-up. I'll tell everything--_everything_!"

The perspiration was streaming from his face, and his voice shook with terror.

"You'll have a chance to talk in less than a minute," said Rathburn calmly.

A chorus of shouts came from the trail just below the powder house as a number of men came into view.

Rathburn stepped in front of the door with the match in his left hand and his gun in his right.

CHAPTER XXIV

THE SHOW-DOWN

A wild chorus of yells greeted him. He had surmised that the men had seen him coming back down the trail to the powder house with his human burden. Now he called Sautee into view. They would most naturally a.s.sume that it was the mine manager he had been carrying.

"Come to the door where they can see you," he called to Sautee.

The ring in his voice brought Sautee, white-faced and shivering, to the doorway beside Rathburn.