THE GUNSHOT HAD been heard, even if it would go unnoticed beyond the confines of the diggings. Footsteps sounded, the shuffling walk of the coolie, who had never been more than a beast of burden. A pair came in, each carrying a shovel. Montana grunted, gesturing toward the grave. As he left, they were beginning to fill it in.
For the moment he should be reasonably safe. Everyone would assume that he was disposed of, and his disguise should be adequate, if he kept clear of the Mandarin.
His urgent wish was to get out, but there was another job to see about. He had a strong feeling that the man he’d seen in that other side room, looking so pale and washed out, must be George Wagner. It was now or never for Geneva’s brother, before he could be spirited off somewhere.
He’d seen him being transferred to a new hiding place only the day before. He must have been in that bogus casket in the funeral procession.
It was encouraging to reflect that his discoveries were creating jittery nerves among the opposition. Such men grew trigger-happy.
He found a side passage, which looked like the place. Only now there was no light. Fumbling in the gloom, he located the bench, but there was no one here. The Mandarin was taking no chances. It was such attention to detail which made him so formidable an opponent.
Montana returned to the lighted passage. Daylight had never been so welcome. He drew a deep breath as he stepped into the open, remembering to shuffle. He’d get back to his room and change.
“Hello, Abbott. What’s the disguise for?”
Montana halted, chagrined. It had seemed like an adequate disguise, fooling everyone except the sharp-eyed Mandarin. Now, in daylight, it was subjected to closer scrutiny. But he hadn’t expected to encounter Prentiss O’Leary, or anticipated that the dandified Irishman would know him. O’Leary was smiling.
“It seemed like a good idea,” Montana admitted with mingled resignation and disgust. “You’ve a good pair of eyes, O’Leary.”
“I have that,” O’Leary admitted. “And your secret’s safe with me, my friend, if a secret it is. But it was more than having good eyes. You overlooked one small but important detail. A coolie always wears a pigtail, and you don’t.”
His braid of hair must have been tom off during his struggle with the executioner. In the darkness he hadn’t noticed.
“So solly,” he said, and managed a grin. “Even so, you’re observant, O’Leary. But what do you find to amuse you in this country? I’d suppose that about one day in a mining town would exhaust its possibilities.”
“It begins to pall,” O’Leary confessed. “But since I’m out this way, I’ll probably stick around awhile longer and watch the rails come into town, since that will be a historical event. As soon as that is over, and the Iron Horse displaces the cayuse, I’m going fishing.”
He indicated a heavy wagon, the team tied nearby. It had a canvas top, and the horses were built for strength and stamina. “I’ve managed to get an outfit, and I’ll head for the mountains. There should be some big ones in such unspoiled country.”
“So there should—if the Sioux don’t resent you,” Montana agreed, and watched O’Leary climb to the wagon seat and drive away. He was thoughtful as he headed for the livery bam. Another man was passing, without a second glance, when Montana accosted him.
“Me workee Bloder and Western,” he observed blandly, and Desmond stopped with a surprised frown. Montana’s look grew more innocent.
“You no interested, mebby?” he asked.
Desmond started.
“Abbott!” he ejaculated. “What on earth are you up to now?”
“I’ve been what you might call mining—digging for information,” Montana assured him grimly. “And I think I’ve struck pay dirt. How about coming to my room, say in half an hour?”
“I’ll be there,” Desmond assured him. Montana was his usual self when the man from the P & P appeared.
“You really had me fooled,” Desmond confessed. “I’d never have guessed that you weren’t a coolie.”
“I wish I could have done as well with some others,” Montana said ruefully. “It didn’t work—with Prentiss O’Leary, for instance.”
“O’Leary? He’s the last person I’d expect to take notice of anything of that sort.”
“You’d be surprised at what he notices and the subjects he’s interested in. And I’ve discovered one thing. Your former hands all say that they are working for the B & W, and they’re certainly busy. But they are working for some third party.”
“I’ve been wondering about that. Who?”
“I wish I knew. I have a hunch that they’ve been fooled into believing that they’re doing it all for themselves, Chinese against white men who are out to exploit them. Actually, a white man, or a group of whites, are pulling the strings.”
Leaving out his more exciting experiences, Montana related what he had discovered of the underground activities.
“Gold!” Desmond breathed. “They must have stumbled onto a really rich pocket, and they’re after it, using the rest as a blind.”
“Well, they’re up to something,” Montana agreed. “And my guess is that both railroads are being rooked. Take O’Leary’s bet the other day. It seemed to be aimed at the B & W, but that could be a blind. See if you can find out about any similar bets in regard to the P & P.”
“But that would be self-defeating; the bets would cancel each other out,” Desmond protested. “In any case, it’s fantastic. Why should O’Leary be involved in such a deal? He’s the last man I’d pick to be involved in any part of a shady transaction.”
“That’s what everybody is supposed to think.”
Desmond rasped a hand across wiry whiskers.
“You could be right,” he conceded. “I agree that something’s going on, and I’ll see what I can discover. But you and I may not be very popular in certain quarters.”
Since his brief hope of remaining dead and consequently inconspicuous had been ruined, Montana strapped on his gun belt. The best course now would be a bold one. The sun shone warmly as he returned to the street; the mountains were blue in the distance. This was true Indian summer, following a couple of early storms, and it could hardly last much longer. While it did, men were enjoying it to the full.
A fresh placard in the window of the opera house advertised the play for that evening. A few were buying tickets, and Montana took his turn.
“Two of your best seats,” he instructed.
“The only good ones left are the loges,” the cashier explained. “Everything else is sold out, except for a few in the balcony.”
“The loges will do,” Montana agreed. The players were certainly popular in the town; in part, he supposed, because entertainment was rare, partly because of the combination of romance and violence.
Tucking the tickets into a pocket, he was turning away when a voice hit him, jostling like a physical shove.
“Well, look who’s struttin’ the streets of this town! Abbott himself, Montana Abbott—or maybe we ought to call a spade a spade and a killer a killer!”
Montana turned, coldly alert. Here was danger.
His eyes confirmed what his ears had already told him—the other man was a gunman, but a stranger. Already he’d been given sufficient warning that he was obnoxious to certain parties. Efforts to dispose of him had failed, but now that he had strapped on a gun, direct action was to be taken. This man was a killer, and he was wasting no time.
Physically, he was ordinary, with hair of a mousy hue, thinning on top, where his somewhat disreputable hat was pushed back. Eyebrows which sprouted wildly lent him an almost comical look, but the yellow glitter of the eyes beneath, like those of a crouching puma, stifled any inclination to laughter.
Montana had long since learned that it was not the physical characteristics which marked a gunman; it was the intangibles, a sense of deadliness such as permeated the atmosphere where one encountered a rattlesnake coiled in the pathway. This man bore the earmarks of a gunman, and was even more inclined to brag and swagger than most. But a man could not be judged by that; an extrovert could be as deadly as a quiet man.
“I don’t know you,” Montana returned. “Or should I?”
The gunman laughed. He carried two guns, one at either hip. Two guns were often an affectation, but this man wore them as though they were part of him.
“You know me,” he contradicted. “You murdered a friend of mine when you were wearin’ a tin star. He was Loop LaMonde, and I’m here to pay you back. I’m Smoky.”
“I never wore a tin star or knew a Loop LaMonde,” Montana denied. “But it makes as good an excuse as any.”
“I figured you’d crawl if I caught you when you couldn’t hide behind a piece of tin,” Smoky taunted. “But you’ll have to do better than that if you want to save your skin. Maybe, if you was to get down and crawl and lick my boots, I’d let you live. Maybe.”
A crowd had started to collect, attracted by the promise of excitement. Now they were drawing away again, sensing the deadliness about to erupt, leaving the street to the pair. A chill seemed to mock the sun, a haze between earth and sky.
“You bark a lot,” Montana returned. “Is that all that you can do, yap—or do you have a bite?”
Smoky’s face colored to match his name, then drained to a frenzied paleness.
“I gave you your chance,” he growled. “Now you’re askin’ for it!”
He was fast. The signs had not been amiss. Montana went for his own gun, not liking it, but having no choice. Even should he comply and crawl, that would not save him. The other man’s move made a blur almost too fast for the eye to follow, as the sun slanted on steel. Montana threw himself aside as his fingers closed and sound ripped, harshly blasting the peace of the afternoon.
Lead plucked his sleeve, insistent, eager. A second slug hammered the dust at his feet.
Only a whisper of time had divided them, a fraction so scant that the fall of the dice could have gone either way. Ho Hsueh Pin had picked a deadly henchman.
Smoky was still on his feet, his clutch desperate about a gun which sagged despite him. He tried to tip the muzzle up again as its weight grew insupportable, and mingled pain and anger twisted his face. His eyes held puzzlement, incredulity. This could not have happened to him; what he was receiving was the treatment he meted out to lesser men.
His knees buckled, and he collapsed in the dust. A horse snorted and tugged frantically, plunging and pitching at the tie rail farther along the street.
Montana stood there, and the sudden silence had a remembered quality; the smoke of old battles rose again in his nostrils. He was weary, tired of such challenges, but a man dared not show that outwardly, or give a sign of weakness; certainly not in the midst of battle. And this one was far from over.
He flipped out the empty shell and inserted a fresh cartridge in his gun. Then the hush was broken as a man came running, bursting around the corner of the bank. Montana had heard the ghostly pounding of those boots at midnight. It was the marshal of Duarf.
As though his coming were a signal, others reappeared and movement resumed. Men stared at Montana in awe and apprehension. Whatever hope he’d had for anonymity in the town was gone.
The marshal paused beside the gunman, glancing down briefly. One gun had made a groove in the dust; the other had come half clear of its holster and struck. The fingers which still clutched it were locked, the arm twisted and doubled under. A seep of blood stained the shirt front and dripped into the dust.
A clerk had delayed for extra moments, watching. Now he closed and locked the big doors of the bank, those beside the locomotive. Another workday was ending.
The marshal advanced like an alley cat. His hostility was as marked as it had been in the attitude of the gunman moments before.
“I saw that,” he growled. “I knew you were a trouble-maker the first time I set eyes on you. Do you think you can come here and murder men in broad daylight?”
This was a part of the pattern. They had been reasonably sure that Smoky could do the job, but if he failed, his demise would furnish an excuse for putting this trouble-maker out of circulation.
“If you saw what happened, you know that I had no choice,” Montana pointed out. “If you’re concerned for him, get him a doctor. A forty-five slug hits hard, but he’s not too badly hurt.”
It was as if he had not spoken. The marshal chose to ignore the second part of what he said.
“Choice, hell,” he snapped. “I tell you I saw it. Put up your hands. I’m arrestin’ you.”