The Bells of San Juan Page 4

  CHAPTER III

  A MAN'S BOOTS

  In the bar at the Casa Blanca, a long, wide room, low-ceilinged andwith cool, sprinkled floor, a score of men had congregated. For themost part they were silent, content to look at the signs left by therecent shooting and to have what scraps of explanation were vouchsafedthem. And these were meagre enough. The man who had done the shootingwas sullen and self-contained. The dead man . . . it was the sheepmanfrom Las Palmas . . . lay in an adjoining card-room, stark under theblanket which the large hands of Jim Galloway had drawn over him.

  When the clatter of hoofs rang out in the street a couple of men wentto the door. Coming back, "It is the sheriff," they said.

  Roderick Norton, entering swiftly, his spurs dragging and jangling,swept the faces in the room with eyes which had in them none of thathuman glint of good-will which the girl at the arroyo had glimpsed inthem. Again they were steely, angry, bespeaking both threat andsuspicion.

  "Who is it this time?" he demanded sharply.

  "Bisbee, from Las Palmas," they told him.

  "Who did it?" came the quick question. And then, before an answercould come, his voice ringing with the anger in it: "Antone or KidRickard? Which one?"

  He had shifted his rifle so that it was caught up under his left arm.His right hand, frank and unhidden, rested upon the butt of theheavy-caliber revolver sagging from his belt. Standing just within theroom, he had stepped to one side of the doorway so that the wall was athis back.

  "It was the Kid," some one answered, and was continuing, "He says itwas self-defense . . ." when Norton cut in bluntly:

  "Was Galloway here when it happened?"

  "Yes."

  "Where's Galloway now?"

  It was noteworthy that he asked for Jim Galloway rather than for KidRickard.

  "In there," they told him, indicating a second card-room adjoining thatin which the Las Palmas sheepman lay. Rod Norton, again glancingsharply across the faces confronting him, went to the closed door andset his hand to the knob. But Jim Galloway, having desired privacyjust now, had locked the door. Norton struck it sharply, commanding:

  "Open up, Galloway. It's Norton."

  There came the low mutter of a voice hasty and with the quality ofstern exhortation, the snap of the lock, and the door was jerked open.Norton's eyes, probing into every square foot of the chamber, tookstock of Jim Galloway, and beyond him of Kid Rickard, slouching forwardin a chair and rolling a cigarette.

  "Hello, Norton," said Galloway tonelessly. "Glad you showed up.There's been trouble."

  A heavy man above the waist-line, thick-shouldered, with large head andbull throat, his muscular torso tapered down to clean-lined hips, hislegs of no greater girth than those of the lean-bodied man confrontinghim, his feet small in glove-fitting boots. His eyes, prominent andfull and a clear brown, were a shade too innocent. Chin, jaw, andmouth, the latter full-lipped, were those of strength, smashing power,and a natural cruelty. He was the one man to be found in San Juan whowas dressed as the rather fastidiously inclined business men dress inthe cities.

  "Another man down, Galloway," said Norton with an ominous sternness."And in your place. . . How long do you think that you can keep outfrom under?"

  His meaning was plain enough; the men behind him in the barroomlistened in attitudes which, varying in other matters, were alike intheir tenseness. Galloway, however, staring stonily with eyes notunlike polished agate, so cold and steady were they, gave no sign oftaking offense.

  "You and I never were friends, Rod Norton," he said, unmoved. "Stillthat's no reason you should jump me for trouble. Answering yourquestion, I expect to keep out from under just as long as two thingsremain as they are: first, as long as I play the game square and in theopen, next, as long as an overgrown boy holds down the job of sheriffin San Juan."

  In Norton's eyes was blazing hatred, in Galloway's mere steady,unwinking boldness.

  "You saw the killing?" the sheriff asked curtly.

  "Yes," said Galloway.

  "The Kid there did it?"

  For the first time the man slouching forward in the chair lifted hishead. Had a stranger looked in at that moment, curious to see him whohad just committed homicide . . . or murder . . . he must haveexperienced a positive shock. Sullen-eyed, sullen-lipped, theman-killer could not yet have seen the last of his teens. A thin wispof straw-colored hair across a low, atavistic forehead, unhealthy,yellowish skin, with pale, lack-lustre, faded blue eyes, he looked eviland vicious and cruel. One looking from him to Jim Galloway would havesuspected that one could be as inhuman as the other, but with thedifference that that which was but means to an end with Galloway wouldbe end in itself to Kid Rickard. Something of the primal savage shonein the pale fires of his eyes.

  "Yes," retorted the Kid, his surly voice little better than a snarl."I got him and be damned to him!"

  "Bad luck cursing a dead man, Rickard," said Norton coldly. "What didyou kill him for?"

  Kid Rickard's tongue ran back and forth between his colorless lipsbefore he replied.

  "He tried to get me first," he said defiantly.

  "Who saw the shooting?"

  "Jim Galloway. And Antone."

  Rod Norton grunted his disgust with the situation.

  "Give me your gun," he commanded tersely.

  The Kid frowned. Galloway cleared his throat. Rickard's eyes went tohim swiftly. Then he got to his feet, jerked a thirty-eight-caliberrevolver from the hip pocket of his overalls and held it out,surrendering it reluctantly. Norton "broke" it, ejecting thecartridges into his palm. Not an empty shell among them; the Kid hadslipped in a fresh shell for every exploded one.

  "How many times did you shoot?"

  "I don't know. Two or three, I guess. . . . Damn it, do you imagine aman counts 'em?"

  "What were you and Galloway doing alone in here with the door locked?"

  Galloway cut in sharply:

  "I didn't want any more trouble; I was afraid somebody . . ."

  "Shut up, will you?" cried the sheriff fiercely. "I'll give you allthe chance you want to talk pretty soon. Answer me, Rickard."

  "I told him to lock me up somewhere until you or Tom Cutter come," saidthe Kid slowly. "I was afraid somebody might jump me for what I done.I didn't want no more trouble."

  Norton turned briefly to the crowded room behind him.

  "Anybody know where Cutter is?" he asked.

  It appeared that every one knew. Tom Cutter, Rod Norton's deputy, hadgone in the early morning to Mesa Verde, and would probably return inthe cool of the evening. Frowning, Norton made the best of thesituation, and to gain his purpose called four men out of the crowd.

  "I want you boys to do me a favor," he said.

  "Antone, come here."

  The short, squat half-breed standing behind the bar lifted his heavyblack brows, demanding:

  "_Y porque_? What am I to do?"

  "As you are told," Norton snapped at him. "Benny, you and Dick walkdown the street with Antone; you other boys walk down the other waywith Rickard. If they haven't had all the chance to talk togetheralready that they want, don't give them any more opportunity. Step up,Rickard."

  The Kid sulked, but under the look the sheriff turned on him cameforward and went out, his whole attitude remaining one of defiance.Antone, his swart face as expressionless as a piece of mahogany,hesitated, glanced at Galloway, shrugged, and did as Rickard had done,going out between his two guards. The men remaining in the barroomwere watching their sheriff expectantly. He swung about upon Galloway.

  "Now," he said quickly, "who fired the first shot. Galloway?"

  Galloway smiled, went to his bar, poured himself a glass of whiskey,and standing there, the glass twisting slowly in his fingers, staredback innocently at his interrogator.

  "Trying the case already, Judge Norton?" he inquired equably.

  "Will you answer?" Norton said coolly.

  "Sure." Galloway kept his look steady upon the sheriff's,
and into theinnocence of his eyes there came a veiled insolence. "Bisbee shotfirst."

  "Where was he standing?"

  Galloway pointed.

  "Right there." The spot indicated was about three or four feet fromwhere Norton stood, near the second card-room door.

  "Where was the Kid?"

  "Over there." Again Galloway pointed. "Clean across the room, wherethe chair is tumbled over against the table."

  "How many times did Bisbee shoot?"

  Galloway seemed to be trying to remember. He drank his whiskey slowly,reached over the bar for a cigar, and answered:

  "Twice or three times."

  "How many times did Rickard shoot?"

  "I'm not sure. I'd say about the same; two or three times."

  "Where was Antone standing?"

  "Behind the bar; down at the far end, nearest the door."

  "Where were you?"

  "Leaning against the bar, talking to Antone."

  "What were you talking about?"

  This question came quicker, sharper than the others, as thoughcalculated to startle Galloway into a quick answer. But the proprietorof the Casa Blanca was lighting his cigar and took his time. When helooked up, his eyes told Norton that he had understood any danger whichmight lie under a question so simple in the seeming. His eyes weresmiling contemptuously, but there was a faint flush in his cheeks.

  "I don't remember," he replied at last. "Some trifle. The shooting,coming suddenly that way . . .

  "What started the ruction?"

  "Bisbee had been drinking a little. He seemed to be in the devil's owntemper. He had asked the Kid to have a drink with him, and Rickardrefused. He had his drink alone and then invited the Kid again.Rickard told him to go to hell. Bisbee started to walk across the roomas though he was going to the card-room. Then he grabbed his gun andwhirled and started shooting."

  "Missing every time, of course?"

  Galloway nodded.

  "You'll remember I said he was carrying enough of a load to make hisaim bad."

  Norton asked half a dozen further questions and then said abruptly:

  "That's all. As you go out will you tell the boys to send Antone in?"

  Again a hint of color crept slowly, dully, into Galloway's cheeks.

  "You're going pretty far, Rod Norton," he said tonelessly.

  "You're damned right I am!" cried Norton ringingly. "And I am going alot further, Jim Galloway, before I get through, and you can bet all ofyour blue chips on it. I want Antone in here and I want you outside!Do I get what I want or not?"

  Galloway stood motionless, his cigar clamped tight in his big squareteeth. Then he shrugged and went to the door.

  "If I am standing a good deal off of you," he muttered, hanging on hisheel just before he passed out, "it's because I am as strong as any manin the county to see the law brought into San Juan. And"--for thefirst time yielding outwardly to a display of the emotion riding him,he spat out venomously and tauntingly--"and we'd have had the law herelong ago had we had a couple of men in the boots of the Nortons, fatherand son!"

  Rod Norton's face went a flaming red with anger, his hand grew whiteupon the butt of the gun at his side.

  "Some day, Jim Galloway," he said steadily, "I'll get you just as sureas you got Billy Norton!"

  Galloway laughed and went out.

  To Antone, Norton put the identical questions he had asked of Galloway,receiving virtually the same replies. Seeking the one opportunitysuggesting itself into tricking the bartender, he asked at the end:

  "Just before the shooting, when you and Galloway were talking and hetold you that Bisbee was looking for trouble, why weren't you ready tograb him when he went for his gun?"

  Antone was giving his replies as guardedly as Galloway had done. Hetook his time now.

  "Because," he began finally, "I do not belief when Senor Galloway speakthat . . ."

  His eyes had been roving from Norton's, going here and there about theroom. Suddenly a startled look came into them and he snapped his mouthshut.

  "Go on," prompted the sheriff.

  "I don't remember," grunted Antone. "I forget what Senor Galloway say,what I say. Bisbee say: 'Have a drink.' The Kid say: 'Go to hell.'Bisbee shoot, one, two, three, like that. I forget what we talk about."

  Norton turned slowly and looked whither Antone had been looking when hecut his own words off so sharply. The man upon whom his eyes restedlongest was a creased-faced Mexican, Vidal Nunez, who now stood, headdown, making a cigarette.

  "That's all, Antone," Norton said. "Send the Kid in."

  The Kid came, still sullen but swaggering a little, his hat cockedjauntily to one side, the yellow wisp of hair in his faded eyes. Andhe in turn questioned, gave such answers as the two had given beforehim.

  Now for the first time the sheriff, stepping across the room, lookedfor such evidence as flying lead might have left for him. In the walljust behind the spot where Bisbee had stood were two bullet holes.Going to the far end of the room where the chair leaned against thetable, he found that a pane of glass in the window opening upon thestreet had been broken. There were no bullet marks upon wall orwoodwork.

  "Bisbee shot two or three times, did he?" he cried, wheeling on theKid. "And missed every time? And all the bullets went through the onehole in the window, I suppose?"

  The Kid shrugged insolently.

  "I didn't watch 'em," he returned briefly.

  Galloway and Antone were allowed to come again into the room, and ofGalloway, quite as though no hot word had passed between them, Nortonasked quietly:

  "Bisbee had a lot of money on him. What happened to it?"

  "In there." Galloway nodded toward the card-room whose door hadremained closed. "In his pocket."

  A few of the morbid followed as the sheriff went into the little room.Already most of the men had seen and had no further curiosity. Nortondrew the blanket away, noted the wounds, three of them, two at the baseof the throat and one just above the left eye. Then, going through thesheepman's pockets, he brought out a handful of coins. A few gold,most of them silver dollars and half-dollars, in all a little overfifty dollars.

  The dead man lay across two tables drawn together, his booted feetsticking out stolidly beyond the bed still too short to accommodate hislength of body. Norton's eyes rested on the man's boots longer thanupon the cold face. Then, stepping back to the door so that all in thebarroom might catch the significance of his words, he said sharply:

  "How many men of you know where Bisbee always carried his money when hewas on his way to bank?"

  "In his boots!" answered two voices together.

  "Come this way, boys. Take a look at his boots, will you?"

  And as they crowded about the table, sensing some new development,Galloway pushing well to the fore, Norton's vibrant voice rang out:

  "It was a clean job getting him, and a clean job telling the story ofhow it happened. But there wasn't overmuch time and in the rush. . . .Tell me, Jim Galloway, how does it happen that the right boot is on theleft foot?"