The Best of Robert E. Howard, Volume 2 Read online

  To the surprise of all, Steve Corcoran was noticed at several bars, drinking heavily, though the liquor did not seem to affect him in any way.

  The men in the jail were suffering from nerves. Somehow the word had gotten out that the vigilante organization was a reality, and that they were to be tried before a vigilante court. Joel Miller, hysterical, accused Middleton of double-crossing his men.

  “Shut up, you fool!” snarled the sheriff, showing the strain under which he was laboring merely by the irascible edge on his voice. “Haven’t you seen your friends drifting by the jail? I’ve gathered the men in from the hills. They’re all here. Forty-odd men, every Vulture in the gang, is here in Wahpeton.

  “Now, get this – and McNab, listen closely: we’ll stage the break just before daylight, when everybody is asleep. Just before dawn is the best time, because that’s about the only time in the whole twenty-four hours that the camp isn’t going full blast.

  “Some of the boys, with masks on, will swoop down and overpower you deputies. There’ll be no shots fired until they’ve gotten the prisoners and started off. Then start yelling and shooting after them – in the air, of course. That’ll bring everybody on the run to hear how you were overpowered by a gang of masked riders.

  “Miller, you and Letcher and Barlow will put up a fight –”

  “Why?”

  “Why, you fool, to make it look like it’s a mob that’s capturing you, instead of friends rescuing you. That’ll explain why none of the deputies are hurt. Men wanting to lynch you wouldn’t want to hurt the officers. You’ll yell and scream blue murder, and the men in the masks will drag you out, tie you and throw you across horses and ride off. Somebody is bound to see them riding away. It’ll look like a capture, not a rescue.”

  Bearded lips gaped in admiring grins at the strategy.

  “All right. Don’t make a botch of it. There’ll be hell to pay, but I’ll convince Hopkins that it was the work of a mob, and we’ll search the hills to find your bodies hanging from trees. We won’t find any bodies, naturally, but maybe we’ll contrive to find a mass of ashes where a log hut had been burned to the ground, and a few hats and belt buckles easy to identify.”

  Miller shivered at the implication and stared at Middleton with painful intensity.

  “Middleton, you ain’t planning to have us put out of the way? These men in masks are our friends, not vigilantes you’ve put up to this?”

  “Don’t be a fool!” flared Middleton disgustedly. “Do you think the gang would stand for anything like that, even if I was imbecile enough to try it? You’ll recognize your friends when they come.

  “Miller, I want your name at the foot of a confession I’ve drawn up, implicating somebody as the leader of the Vultures. There’s no use trying to deny you and the others are members of the gang. Hopkins knows you are; instead of trying to play innocent, you’ll divert suspicion to someone outside the gang. I haven’t filled in the name of the leader, but Dick Lennox is as good as anybody. He’s a gambler, has few friends, and never would work with us. I’ll write his name in your ‘confession’ as chief of the Vultures, and Corcoran will kill him ‘for resisting arrest,’ before he has time to prove that it’s a lie. Then, before anybody has time to get suspicious, we’ll make our last big haul – the raid on the Hopkins and Bisley cache! – and blow! Be ready to jump, when the gang swoops in.

  “Miller, put your signature to this paper. Read it first if you want to. I’ll fill in the blanks I left for the ‘chief’s’ name later. Where’s Corcoran?”

  “I saw him in the Golden Eagle an hour ago,” growled McNab. “He’s drinkin’ like a fish.”

  “Damnation!” Middleton’s mask slipped a bit despite himself, then he regained his easy control. “Well, it doesn’t matter. We won’t need him tonight. Better for him not to be here when the jail break’s made. Folks would think it was funny if he didn’t kill somebody. I’ll drop back later in the night.”

  Even a man of steel nerves feels the strain of waiting for a crisis. Corcoran was in this case no exception. Middleton’s mind was so occupied in planning, scheming and conniving that he had little time for the strain to corrode his will power. But Corcoran had nothing to occupy his attention until the moment came for the jump.

  He began to drink, almost without realizing it. His veins seemed on fire, his external senses abnormally alert. Like most men of his breed he was high-strung, his nervous system poised on a hair-trigger balance, in spite of his mask of unemotional coolness. He lived on, and for, violent action. Action kept his mind from turning inward; it kept his brain clear and his hand steady; failing action, he fell back on whisky. Liquor artificially stimulated him to that pitch which his temperament required. It was not fear that made his nerves thrum so intolerably. It was the strain of waiting inertly, the realization of the stakes for which they played. Inaction maddened him. Thought of the gold cached in the cave behind John Middleton’s cabin made Corcoran’s lips dry, set a nerve to pounding maddeningly in his temples.

  So he drank, and drank, and drank again, as the long day wore on.

  The noise from the bar was a blurred medley in the back room of the Golden Garter. Glory Bland stared uneasily across the table at her companion. Corcoran’s blue eyes seemed lit by dancing fires. Tiny beads of perspiration shone on his dark face. His tongue was not thick; he spoke lucidly and without exaggeration; he had not stumbled when he entered. Nevertheless he was drunk, though to what extent the girl did not guess.

  “I never saw you this way before, Steve,” she said reproachfully.

  “I’ve never had a hand in a game like this before,” he answered, the wild flame flickering bluely in his eyes. He reached across the table and caught her white wrist with an unconscious strength that made her wince. “Glory, I’m pullin’ out of here tonight. I want you to go with me!”

  “You’re leaving Wahpeton? Tonight?”

  “Yes. For good. Go with me! This joint ain’t fit for you. I don’t know how you got into this game, and I don’t give a damn. But you’re different from these other dance hall girls. I’m takin’ you with me. I’ll make a queen out of you! I’ll cover you with diamonds!”

  She laughed nervously.

  “You’re drunker than I thought. I know you’ve been getting a big salary, but –”

  “Salary?” His laugh of contempt startled her. “I’ll throw my salary into the street for the beggars to fight over. Once I told that fool Hopkins that I had a gold mine right here in Wahpeton. I told him no lie. I’m rich!”

  “What do you mean?” She was slightly pale, frightened by his vehemence.

  His fingers unconsciously tightened on her wrist and his eyes gleamed with the hard arrogance of possession and desire.

  “You’re mine, anyway,” he muttered. “I’ll kill any man that looks at you. But you’re in love with me. I know it. Any fool could see it. I can trust you. You wouldn’t dare betray me. I’ll tell you. I wouldn’t take you along without tellin’ you the truth. Tonight Middleton and I are goin’ over the mountains with a million dollars’ worth of gold tied on pack mules!”

  He did not see the growing light of incredulous horror in her eyes.

  “A million in gold! It’d make a devil out of a saint! Middleton thinks he’ll kill me when we get away safe, and grab the whole load. He’s a fool. It’ll be him that dies, when the time comes. I’ve planned while he planned. I didn’t ever intend to split the loot with him. I wouldn’t be a thief for less than a million.”

  “Middleton –” she choked.

  “Yeah! He’s chief of the Vultures, and I’m his right-hand man. If it hadn’t been for me, the camp would have caught on long ago.”

  “But you upheld the law,” she panted, as if clutching at straws. “You killed murderers – saved McBride from the mob.”

  “I killed men who tried to kill me. I shot as square with the camp as I could, without goin’ against my own interests. That business of McBride has nothin’ to do with it. I’d given
him my word. That’s all behind us now. Tonight, while the vigilantes and the Vultures kill each other, we’ll vamose! And you’ll go with me!”

  With a cry of loathing she wrenched her hand away, and sprang up, her eyes blazing.

  “Oh!” It was a cry of bitter disillusionment. “I thought you were straight – honest! I worshiped you because I thought you were honorable. So many men were dishonest and bestial – I idolized you! And you’ve just been pretending – playing a part! Betraying the people who trusted you!” The poignant anguish of her enlightenment choked her, then galvanized her with another possibility.

  “I suppose you’ve been pretending with me, too!” she cried wildly. “If you haven’t been straight with the camp, you couldn’t have been straight with me, either! You’ve made a fool of me! Laughed at me and shamed me! And now you boast of it in my teeth!”

  “Glory!” He was on his feet, groping for her, stunned and bewildered by her grief and rage. She sprang back from him.

  “Don’t touch me! Don’t look at me! Oh, I hate the very sight of you!”

  And turning, with an hysterical sob, she ran from the room. He stood swaying slightly, staring stupidly after her. Then fumbling with his hat, he stalked out, moving like an automaton. His thoughts were a confused maelstrom, whirling until he was giddy. All at once the liquor seethed madly in his brain, dulling his perceptions, even his recollections of what had just passed. He had drunk more than he realized.

  Not long after dark had settled over Wahpeton, a low call from the darkness brought Colonel Hopkins to the door of his cabin, gun in hand.

  “Who is it?” he demanded suspiciously.

  “It’s Middleton. Let me in, quick!”

  The sheriff entered, and Hopkins, shutting the door, stared at him in surprise. Middleton showed more agitation than the Colonel had ever seen him display. His face was pale and drawn. A great actor was lost to the world when John Middleton took the dark road of outlawry.

  “Colonel, I don’t know what to say. I’ve been a blind fool. I feel that the lives of murdered men are hung about my neck for all Eternity! All through my blindness and stupidity!”

  “What do you mean, John?” ejaculated Colonel Hopkins.

  “Colonel, Miller talked at last. He just finished telling me the whole dirty business. I have his confession, written as he dictated.”

  “He named the chief of the Vultures?” exclaimed Hopkins eagerly.

  “He did!” answered Middleton grimly, producing a paper and unfolding it. Joel Miller’s unmistakable signature sprawled at the bottom. “Here is the name of the leader, dictated by Miller to me!”

  “Good God!” whispered Hopkins. “Bill McNab!”

  “Yes! My deputy! The man I trusted next to Corcoran. What a fool – what a blind fool I’ve been. Even when his actions seemed peculiar, even when you voiced your suspicions of him, I could not bring myself to believe it. But it’s all clear now. No wonder the gang always knew my plans as soon as I knew them myself! No wonder my deputies – before Corcoran came – were never able to kill or capture any Vultures. No wonder, for instance, that Tom Deal ‘escaped,’ before we could question him. That bullet hole in McNab’s arm, supposedly made by Deal – Miller told me McNab got that in a quarrel with one of his own gang. It came in handy to help pull the wool over my eyes.

  “Colonel Hopkins, I’ll turn in my resignation tomorrow. I recommend Corcoran as my successor. I shall be glad to serve as deputy under him.”

  “Nonsense, John!” Hopkins laid his hand sympathetically on Middleton’s shoulder. “It’s not your fault. You’ve played a man’s part all the way through. Forget that talk about resigning. Wahpeton doesn’t need a new sheriff; you just need some new deputies. Just now we’ve got some planning to do. Where is McNab?”

  “At the jail, guarding the prisoners. I couldn’t remove him without exciting his suspicion. Of course he doesn’t dream that Miller has talked. And I learned something else. They plan a jail-break shortly after midnight.”

  “We might have expected that!”

  “Yes. A band of masked men will approach the jail, pretend to overpower the guards – yes, Stark and Richardson are Vultures, too – and release the prisoners. Now this is my plan. Take fifty men and conceal them in the trees near the jail. You can plant some on one side, some on the other. Corcoran and I will be with you, of course. When the bandits come, we can kill or capture them all at one swoop. We have the advantage of knowing their plans, without their knowing we know them.”

  “That’s a good plan, John!” warmly endorsed Hopkins. “You should have been a general. I’ll gather the men at once. Of course, we must use the utmost secrecy.”

  “Of course. If we work it right, we’ll bag prisoners, deputies and rescuers with one stroke. We’ll break the back of the Vultures!”

  “John, don’t ever talk resignation to me again!” exclaimed Hopkins, grabbing his hat and buckling on his gun-belt. “A man like you ought to be in the Senate. Go get Corcoran. I’ll gather my men and we’ll be in our places before midnight. McNab and the others in the jail won’t hear a sound.”

  “Good! Corcoran and I will join you before the Vultures reach the jail.”

  Leaving Hopkins’ cabin, Middleton hurried to the bar of the King of Diamonds. As he drank, a rough-looking individual moved casually up beside him. Middleton bent his head over his whisky glass and spoke, hardly moving his lips. None could have heard him a yard away.

  “I’ve just talked to Hopkins. The vigilantes are afraid of a jail break. They’re going to take the prisoners out just before daylight and hang them out of hand. That talk about legal proceedings was just a bluff. Get all the boys, go to the jail and get the prisoners out within a half hour after midnight. Wear your masks, but let there be no shooting or yelling. I’ll tell McNab our plan’s been changed. Go silently. Leave your horses at least a quarter of a mile down the gulch and sneak up to the jail on foot, so you won’t make so much noise. Corcoran and I will be hiding in the brush to give you a hand in case anything goes wrong.”

  The other man had not looked toward Middleton; he did not look now. Emptying his glass, he strolled deliberately toward the door. No casual onlooker could have known that any words had passed between them.

  When Glory Bland ran from the backroom of the Golden Garter, her soul was in an emotional turmoil that almost amounted to insanity. The shock of her brutal disillusionment vied with passionate shame of her own gullibility and an unreasoning anger. Out of this seething cauldron grew a blind desire to hurt the man who had unwittingly hurt her. Smarting vanity had its part, too, for with characteristic and illogical feminine conceit, she believed that he had practiced an elaborate deception in order to fool her into falling in love with him – or rather with the man she thought he was. If he was false with men, he must be false with women, too. That thought sent her into hysterical fury, blind to all except a desire for revenge. She was a primitive, elemental young animal, like most of her profession of that age and place; her emotions were powerful and easily stirred, her passions stormy. Love could change quickly to hate.

  She reached an instant decision. She would find Hopkins and tell him everything Corcoran had told her! In that instant she desired nothing so much as the ruin of the man she had loved.

  She ran down the crowded street, ignoring men who pawed at her and called after her. She hardly saw the people who stared after her. She supposed that Hopkins would be at the jail, helping guard the prisoners, and she directed her steps thither. As she ran up on the porch Bill McNab confronted her with a leer, and laid a hand on her arm, laughing when she jerked away.

  “Come to see me, Glory? Or are you lookin’ for Corcoran?”

  She struck his hand away. His words, and the insinuating guffaws of his companions were sparks enough to touch off the explosives seething in her.

  “You fool! You’re being sold out, and don’t know it!”

  The leer vanished.

  “What do you mean?” he snar
led.

  “I mean that your boss is fixing to skip out with all the gold you thieves have grabbed!” she blurted, heedless of consequences, in her emotional storm, indeed scarcely aware of what she was saying. “He and Corcoran are going to leave you holding the sack, tonight!”

  And not seeing the man she was looking for, she eluded McNab’s grasp, jumped down from the porch and darted away in the darkness.

  The deputies stared at each other, and the prisoners, having heard everything, began to clamor to be turned out.

  “Shut up!” snarled McNab. “She may be lyin’. Might have had a quarrel with Corcoran and took this fool way to get even with him. We can’t afford to take no chances. We’ve got to be sure we know what we’re doin’ before we move either way. We can’t afford to let you out now, on the chance that she might be lyin’. But we’ll give you weapons to defend yourselves.

  “Here, take these rifles and hide ’em under the bunks. Pete Daley, you stay here and keep folks shooed away from the jail till we get back. Richardson, you and Stark come with me! We’ll have a show-down with Middleton right now!”

  When Glory left the jail she headed for Hopkins’ cabin. But she had not gone far when a reaction shook her. She was like one waking from a nightmare, or a dope-jag. She was still sickened by the discovery of Corcoran’s duplicity in regard to the people of the camp, but she began to apply reason to her suspicions of his motives in regard to herself. She began to realize that she had acted illogically. If Corcoran’s attitude toward her was not sincere, he certainly would not have asked her to leave the camp with him. At the expense of her vanity she was forced to admit that his attentions to her had not been necessary in his game of duping the camp. That was something apart; his own private business; it must be so. She had suspected him of trifling with her affections, but she had to admit that she had no proof that he had ever paid the slightest attention to any other woman in Wahpeton. No; whatever his motives or actions in general, his feeling toward her must be sincere and real.