Valley of Wild Horses Part 18

"Why, sh.o.r.e, stranger," replied Mac New, with nervous haste, and producing a key, he inserted it in the lock of a heavy whitewashed door.

Pan found himself ushered into a large room with small iron-barred windows on the west side. His experience of frontier jails had been limited, but those he had seen had been bare, empty, squalid cells.

This, however, was evidently a luxurious kind of a prison house. There were Indian blankets and rugs on the floor, an open fireplace with cheerful blaze, a table littered with books and papers, a washstand, a comfortable bed upon which reclined a man smoking and reading.

"Somebody to see you, Blake," called the guard, and he went out, shutting the door behind him.

Blake sat up. As he did so, moving his bootless feet, Pan's keen eye espied a bottle on the floor.

Pan approached leisurely, his swift thoughts revolving around a situation that looked peculiar to him. Blake was very much better cared for there than could have been expected. Why?

"Howdy, Blake. Do you remember me?" asked Pan halting beside the table.

He did not in the least remember Lucy's father in this heavy blond man, lax of body and sodden of face.

"Somethin' familiar aboot you," replied Blake, studying Pan intently.

"But I reckon you've got the best of me."

"Pan Smith," said Pan shortly.

"Wal!" he e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed, as if shocked into memory, and slowly he rose to hold out a shaking hand. "Bill's kid--the little boy who stuck by my wife--when Lucy was born."

"Same boy, and he's d.a.m.n sorry to find you in this fix," responded Pan, forcefully. "And he's here to get you out."

Blake sagged back as slowly as he had arisen. His face changed like that of a man suddenly stabbed. And he dropped his head. In that moment Pan saw enough to make him glad. Manifestly the good in him had not been wholly killed by evil. Jim Blake might yet be reclaimed or at least led away from evil life.

"Mr. Blake, I've been to see Lucy," went on Pan, and swiftly he talked of the girl, her unhappiness, and the faith she still held in her father. "I've come to get you out of here, for Lucy's sake. We're all going to Arizona. You and Dad can make a new start in life."

"My G.o.d, if I only could," groaned the man.

Pan reached out with quick hand and shook him. "Listen," he said, low and eagerly. "How long is this guard Mac New on duty?"

"Mac New? The fellow outside is called Hurd. He's on till midnight."

"All right, my mistake," went on Pan, swiftly. "I'll be here tonight about eleven. I'll have a horse for you, blanket, grub, gun, and money. I'll hold up this guard Hurd--get you out some way or other.

You're to ride away. Take the road south. There are other mining camps. You'll not be followed. Make for Siccane, Arizona."

"Siccane, Arizona," echoed Blake, as a man in a dream of freedom.

"Yes, Siccane. Don't forget it. Stay there till we all come."

Pan straightened up, with deep expulsion of breath, and tingling nerves. He had reached Blake. Whatever his doubts of the man, and they had been many, Pan divined that he could stir him, rouse him out of the lethargy of sordid indifference and forgetfulness. He would free him from this jail, and the shackles of Hardman in any case, but to find that it was possible to influence him gladdened Pan's heart.

What would this not mean to Lucy!

The door opened behind Pan.

"Wal, stranger, reckon yore time's up," called the jailer.

Pan gave the stunned Blake a meaning look, and then without a word, he left the room. The guard closed and locked the door. Then he looked up, with cunning, yet not wholly without pleasure. His companion at the card game had gone.

"Panhandle Smith!" whispered the guard, half stretching out his hand, then withdrawing it.

"Shake, Mac," said Pan in a low voice. "It's a small world."

"By Gord, it sh.o.r.e is," replied Mac New, wringing Pan's hand. "I'm known here as Hurd."

"Ah-huh.... Well, Hurd, I'm not a talking man. But I want to remind you that you owe me a good turn."

"You sh.o.r.e don't have to remind me of thet," returned the other.

"It pays to do good turns.... I'm lucky, old timer."

"I savvy, Panhandle Smith," said Hurd, with gleaming eyes, and he crooked a stubby thumb toward the door of Blake's jail.

"All right, cowboy," returned Pan, with a meaning smile. "I'll drop around tonight about eleven."

Pan slowed up in his stride when he reached the business section of the town, and strolled along as if he were looking for someone. He was.

He meant to have eyes in the back of his head henceforth. But he did not meet anyone he knew or see anyone who glanced twice at him.

He went into Black's general merchandise store to look at the saddle Moran had recommended. It was a bargain and Pan purchased it on sight.

Proof indeed was this that there were not many cowboys in and around Marco. While he was there, Pan bought a Winchester carbine and a saddle sheath for it. Thus burdened he walked out to the camp.

Lying Juan had supper about ready and the boys were noisy up at the corral. Some of their language was indicative of trouble and mean horses. Pan found a seat by the fire very welcome. Emotion had power to exhaust him far beyond physical exertion. Darkness had just about merged from dusk when the boys dragged themselves in, smelling of dust and horses. They went into the water basins like ducks. Pan lighted the lantern and put it on the table. Then the boys came straddling the bench like cowboys mounting horses. Their faces were red and shiny, their wet hair was pasted down.

"Wal, if heah ain't ole Pan Smith," announced Blinky, vociferously.

"Gus, take a peep at him. I'll bet he's got hold of a grand hoss.

Nothing else could make him look like thet."

"No. I just got back my girl," replied Pan gaily.

"Gurl! Say, cowboy," began Blinky, in consternation. "You didn't run foul of thet little Yellow Mine kid?"

"Eat your supper, you hungry-looking galoot," replied Pan. "And you too, Gus... Because if I begin to shoot off my chin now you'll forget the grub."

Thus admonished, and with curious glances at Pan, the cowboys took his advice and attacked the generous meal Juan had set before them. Their appet.i.tes further attested to a strenuous day. Pan did not seem to be hungry, which fact caused Juan much concern.

"Ahuh! It's the way a fellar gets when he's in love with a gurl,"

observed the keen Blinky. "I been there."

After supper they got together before the stove and rolled their cigarettes. The cold night wind, with its tang of mountain heights, made the fire most agreeable. Pan spread his palms to the heat.

"Wal, pard, throw it off your chest before you bust," advised Blinky shrewdly.

"What kind of a day did you boys have?" countered Pan with a laugh.

"Good an' bad," replied Gus, while Blinky shook his head. "Some hoss thieves have been runnin' off our stock. We had some fine hosses, not broke yet. Some we wanted to keep."

"What's the good news?" queried Pan, as Hans hesitated.