The Forfeit Part 2

"Sure. A h.e.l.l of a piece. But--it don't signify."

"No-o," Bud meditated. Then he added: "I was kind o' thinkin'."

"How?"

"Why, mebbe two folks chasin' up a pin in a bunch o' gra.s.s is li'ble to halve most o' the chances agin either of 'em jabbin' their hands on the business end of it."

"Two? You mean you're goin' to come along an' help find--Ronny?"

Jeff's eyes were expressing the thanks his lips withheld.

Bud excused himself.

"Them Cathills is plumb full of fur an' things. Say, I ain't handled a gun in weeks."

"Bud, you're----"

The door of the room was abruptly flung open and Jeff's words remained unspoken.

"Supper, folks!"

Nan's smiling eyes glanced from one to the other. She stood in the doorway compelling them. Besides, the memory of Jeff's letter was still with her, and she was anxious to observe its later effect. That which she now beheld was obviously satisfactory, and her smile deepened contentedly.

CHAPTER II

CONFLICTING CURRENTS

They were busy days in Orrville. But business rarely yielded outward display in its citizens. Men talked more. They perhaps moved about more--in their customary leisurely fashion. But any approach to bustle was as foreign to the rule of the township as it would be to a colony of aged snails in a cyclone.

It was the custom of Orrville to rise early and go to bed late. But this by no means implies any excessive activity. On the contrary.

These spells of activity lasted just as long as their accomplishment required. In the interim its citizens returned to a slumber little less profound than that which supervened at night after the last roysterer had been ejected, by force, or persuasion, from the salubrious precincts of Ju Penrose's saloon.

Orrville was a ranching township in the northwestern corner of Montana lying roughly some twenty miles west of the foothills of the Cathill Mountains, which, in turn, formed a projecting spur of the main range of the Rockies.

Orrville was the township and Ju Penrose was the pioneer of its commerce. He was a man of keen instincts for commerce of his own especial brand, and rejoiced in a disreputable past. He possessed a thin, hooked nose of some dimensions, which never failed to cut a way for its owner into the shady secrets of his neighbors. He possessed a temper as amiable and mild as a spring lamb when the stream of prosperity and profit flowed his way, and as vitriolic as a she-wolf in winter, when that stream chanced to become diverted into a neighbor's direction.

He was considered a man of some importance in the place. But this was probably the result of the nature of his trade, which, in the eyes of the denizens of the neighborhood, certainly possessed an advantage over such stodgy callings as "dry goods." But besides the all-important thirst-quenching purpose of his establishment, it had become a sort of bureau for large and small transactions of a ranching nature, and a resort where every sort of card game could be freely indulged in, without regard for the limit of the stakes, and had thus gained for itself the subsidiary t.i.tle amongst its clientele of "Ju's Poker Joint."

At the moment Ju's usually busy tongue was taking a well-earned rest, and his hawk-like visage was shrouded in a deep, contemplative repose.

His always bloodshot eyes were speculative as he surveyed the smoke-laden scene from behind his shabby bar. The place was full of drinkers and gamblers. The hour was past midnight. And he was estimating silently the further spending possibilities of his customers, and consequently considering the advisability of closing down.

A group of three ranch hands leaned against the centre of the bar.

Their gla.s.ses were empty and none of them seemed anxious to command their refilling. They were talking earnestly. And their voices were unusually modulated. Just beyond these a slight, good-looking man in chapps, with a face of particularly refined but somewhat debauched appearance, was obviously interested in their talk, although he took no part in it. On the other side of them, away at the far end of the bar, leaned a solitary, tough-looking drinker, who seemed to take no interest whatever in his surroundings. Every man in the place, the dozen or so occupying the card tables included, was fully armed in the customary fashion prevailing in this distant corner of the ranching world, and it would have needed no second thought to realize that these heavy, loaded weapons were not by any means intended for decorative purposes.

"Wal, anyways they're a long time fixin' things," observed one of the three at the centre of the bar, with a yawn that displayed a double row of gleaming white teeth. "The boss guessed I'd best wait around, so it ain't a heap o' use kickin'. I'll hev to wait till the durned committee's through, if it takes 'em sittin' as long us a hide-bound hen."

"It's allus that-a-way when folks gets on a committee racket, Curly,"

replied one of his friends with a sympathetic grin.

"That's just how, Dan," agreed the third. "Hot air. That's what it is. This tarnation Vigilance stunt sets folk whisperin' among 'emselves 'bout the h.e.l.l goin' to be ladled out to all cattle thieves in general. Gives 'em visions of hangin'-bees, an' a sort o' firework display with guns an' things, an' when they hatched out, what's the result? Why, a waste o' hot air, an'--no checkens."

"'T'so, Dan," agreed Curly, with easy decision. "The boss is too near relative of a fancy gentleman for to hand out the sort o' dope rustlers need. If us boys had the job we'd fix things quick. You'd see this b.u.m gang kicking air at the end of a rope 'fore Ju, here, had time to dope out four fingers of rotgut at the expense of the house."

He leered across at the unsmiling face of the saloon-keeper. Ju permitted himself to be drawn.

"Nothin' doin', Curly." A solemn shake of the head set his walrus moustache flapping. Then he drew a cigar from a top vest pocket and bit the end through, brushing his moustache aside to discover a place in which to deposit it in his mouth. "I'd sure hate to dope out any rotgut on you boys. Y'see, I sure got your health at heart. I kind o'

love you fellers to death. I'd hate to see you sufferin' at my hands.

Guess I was raised Christian."

"Was you?"

Curly's sarcasm achieved the laugh intended, and, as a result of his satisfaction, he flung his last half-dollar on the dingy bar.

"Make that into three drops of liver souse, an' hand us a smile, Ju.

Your face is sure killin' trade."

Ju rolled his cigar across his mouth under the curtain of moustache, lit it, and proceeded to push an uncorked bottle across to his customers.

"Guess it ain't a bad proposition handin' you boys a smile. Smiles allus happen easy on foolish faces. Seein' I ain't deaf I been listenin' to your talk, an' I ain't made up my mind if you're as bright as you're guessin', or if you're the suckers your talk makes you out.

Seein' I don't usual take chances, I'll put my dollars on the sucker business. I've stood behind this darned old bar fer ten years, an' I guess for five of 'em I've listened to talk like yours--from fellers like you." He removed the bottle from which the three men had helped themselves to liberal "four fingers," and eyed their gla.s.ses askance.

"Now, you're worritin' over this lousy Lightfoot gang. So was the others. So's everybody bin fer five years. An' fer five years this same lousy Lightfoot gang has just been helpin' 'emselves to the cattle on the ranches around here--liberal. Same as youse fellers have helped yourselves out o' this bottle. An', durin' that time, I ain't heard tell of one o' them boys who's been spoilin' to hang 'em all doin' a thing. Not a thing, 'cep' it's lap up whisky to keep up a supply o'

hot air.

"Wal," he proceeded, in his biting fashion, as he thrust the bottle on the shelf and began wiping gla.s.ses with a towel that looked to be decomposing for want of soap, "them lousy rustlers is still running their play in the district jest wher', when, an' how they darn please.

See? You, Curly, are kickin' because your boss Dug McFarlane is too much of a gentleman. Wal, if I know a man from a seam-squirrel, I'd sure say Dug's got more savee in his whiskers than you got dirt--which is some. If I got things right, this night's sittin's goin' to put paid to the Lightfoot gang's account. I'd be glad to say the same of one or two scores three b.u.ms have lately run up right here."

The offensiveness of his manner left the men quite undisturbed. The place would have been strange to them without it. They accepted it as part of the evening's entertainment. But the allusion to the Vigilance Committee's efforts brought them into att.i.tudes of close attention. It drew the attention, too, of the cattleman with the refined features, and, equally, that of the tough-looking individual at the far end of the bar.

"What are they goin' to do?" demanded Dan urgently.

Ju puffed aggravatingly at his cigar.

"Do?" he echoed at last, gazing distantly at the card players across the room. "Why, what any bunch of savee should ha' done five years ago. Put out a great reward."

Curly snorted in disdain.

"See, I tho't it was to be a big play."

"You allus was bright," sneered Dan. "How's that goin' to fix the Lightfoot crowd?"

"How?" Ju's contempt always found an outlet in the echo of an opponent's interrogation. "Say, Dan, how old are you? Twenty?"

"That ain't nuthin' to you," the cowpuncher retorted, with a gesture of hot impatience.

"Ain't it? Wal, mebbe it ain't," Ju agreed imperturbably. "But y'see it takes years an' years gettin' the value o' dollars right. I allow ther's folks guesses dollars talks. Wal, I'm guessin' they just _holler_. Make the wad big enough and ther' ain't nuthin' you can't buy from a wheat binder to a royal princess with a crown o' jools. The only thing you're li'ble to have trouble over is the things Natur'