SOMEBODY told Dad Lacey that nobody ought to wear long underwear in the tropics. Dad Lacey wore long underwear after that.
But he didn’t wear a shirt. He saved that for state occasions. Instead he left the sleeves in the red flannels and used safety pins in place of two buttons which had come off sometime in the dim past.
He might have used a bath—in fact it was said that he could have used one for years without soiling it at all. His long mustaches drooped with the sadness of inattention.
But nothing was wrong with his two old Navy Colts. He wore them hung low on either hip and their ivory butts shone with constant care. The barrels looked like twin diamonds when you squinted along them. He even polished the cartridges. His pants contrasted sadly with the gun. They were the color of the jungle mud.
Dad Lacey got up from the bench alongside the main shack of Camp Chico, expectorated very carefully at the Chinese cook’s favorite cat and eyed Bill Murphy.
Bill came up and climbed down. He had a welt over his eye and his shirt was torn. He had a hole in his sun hat and his hand was barked.
Bill looked very happy.
“You been in a fight?” asked Dad, somewhat unnecessarily.
Bill went into the shack and sat down. Ching the Chinese brought him a mug of coffee without asking about it. Bill stirred the coffee round and round and slopped it all over the board.
“Women and oil,” said Dad, “don’t mix.”
Bill drank his coffee without noticing that it scalded him. His big hand almost hid the cup as he held it there, empty before his face.
“Them Stewarts,” said Dad, “never was much account anyhow.”
Bill took a refill and drank that.
“That Marcia is a no-account spitfire. She’s puttin’ on Northern ways, Bill, and they won’t go. You’re sure well off without her. I always told you not to mess with them Stewarts. They’re pizen. Especially that Mar …”
But Dad had ducked in time and the coffee cup missed him by a good inch.
Bill took another cup from Ching, set it down and started to build a smoke.
In a conversational tone of voice, Bill said, “I’ll shoot your brains all over the porch for the buzzards to scoop up, if you open your trap again.”
Dad Lacey solaced himself with a martyred sigh. “What’s wrong, Bill?”
“I been playin’ tag with every hunkie in Camp Jaguar. It’s lots of fun.”
“She turn you down?”
Bill rubbed a match in his hair to dry it and then lighted his smoke. He stretched out his legs and looked squarely at Dad. “Did you kill old man Stewart?”
“That son …”
“Be careful,” said Bill. “Ching’s trying to learn English.”
“No, I didn’t kill him.”
“Who did?” said Bill.
“Damned if I know. Whoever did sure did the country a favor. That old …”
“Careful.”
“That … well, that …” Dad coughed, unable to think of a complimentary word. “Anyway, I don’t care who chivvied him. Some Injun, I guess.”
“Marcia don’t think so.”
Dad sat up and blinked.
“Marcia says I did it.”
“Well for … Well, did you ever … For God’s sake, Bill, is she batty? What would you want to kill old Stewart for? And with a knife, too. That’s the part that don’t hang, Bill. We’ve got her there. You ain’t any good with a knife. Remember that greaser up in Sonora you tried …”
“Forget it,” said Bill. “Somebody killed their clerk Miguel and then somebody chivvied Stewart and now Marcia says I did it.”
“She ain’t in her right senses,” yowled Dad. “She ought to be ashamed of herself, accusin’ you of usin’ a knife like that.”
“No, wait,” said Bill. “If I killed her dad, then she’s plenty sore about it. She thinks I want her land because of this new government order about concession improvement.”
“You mean that thing about proving-in a well within two months? Well, we got thirty days left and we’ve got number three down to seep. She’s got hers already proved. What’s that got to do with it?”
“She thinks,” said Bill, “that we’re bluffing it through, that our concession is about wrecked and that I’m trying to save my neck by taking over Camp Jaguar.”
“She thinks …” began Dad. “Well for gawd’s sake.”
“And I had to fight my way in and out. They had an Indian ready to bushwhack me and then Romano had left orders for his machine-gun crew to blast me if I showed up, but the guard was asleep. Marcia bawled me out for everything she could think of.”
Dad spluttered about that, but Bill didn’t notice. Bill was thinking it over again. A smile was on Bill’s big face.
“She’s sure pretty when she gets mad,” said Bill, drawling thoughtfully.
Dad exploded about that. “So they ganged you, did they? So they want a fight, do they? Well, I ain’t in love and by God I can talk good and loud when I start.”
Dad stomped to the door and took out his guns. He spun them about his index fingers, sent a shot ricocheting between the legs of one of Ching’s best cats and swore luridly just as though he had intended to hit it all the time.
Two or three men off shift drifted over to see who had gotten shot. Dad acquainted them with the trouble. More men came and very soon Dad looked like a Communist on Union Square—with the exception that only his shirt was red, and with a somewhat different locale to back him.
The men stood in the blazing sun and muttered about it but anybody with half an eye could see that they thought a fight would be fine. They were a tough, hard-eyed breed peculiar to the land of derricks—drifters, most of them, fighters all of them by the sheer process of elimination.
There might not be much law in Venezuela, but there were plenty of guns. The men wanted to move off instantly.
A cry from the machine-gun tower stopped them. The man up there yelled, “Here comes somebody. Hey, here comes a whole bunch of guys. Hey, Bill, when do I start squirting lead?”
“Right away,” yelled Dad Lacey.
Bill tumbled out of the shack and stared down the trail. “Wait a minute,” he ordered the gunner. “Wait a minute, I think that’s cavalry.”
They couldn’t see through the interlacing trees and brush but Bill had caught the glint of sun on metal and he knew that the Camp Jaguar men wouldn’t come shined up if they wanted a battle.
Bill stalked down the trail to meet the callers. Behind him his men waited expectantly. Several automatics appeared magically and Dad was seen to lean upon a rifle with great unconcern.
The men coming up the trail were soldiers in the so-called republican army of Venezuela. They were, for the most part, llaneros and they looked very smart even after a long ride through the jungle and mud.
In their lead was an officer as slick and smooth and courteous as a Spanish grandee. You could see your face in his boots and his saber chain was gold.
He pulled in when he saw Bill. “¿Señor, donde esta el chico?”
“Aquí mismo,” said Bill. “Right here.”
Two troopers rode easily up as though to hear better.
“I am señor Murphy.”
“Ya lo creo,” said the officer. He turned in his saddle and held up his hand.
An instant later the two troopers were close beside Bill and a forest of carbines were covering him.
“Señor Murphy,” said the officer, “I am lugarteniente Herrero. For several days I have had orders for your arrest, but it is so far. I am desolated that I couldn’t have come sooner.”
“Quite all right,” said Bill, rolling himself a smoke. “No inconvenience at all. By the way, lugarteniente, what am I arrested for?”
“Oh,” said Herrero airily. “Some little thing. Let me see … I had the orders.… Ah yes, here they are. It says here that you are the murderer of some fellow named … named Stewart. Yes, that’s it. You’re arrested for murdering Stewart.”
Bill lit up and leaned on a trooper’s saddle. “Is that so?”
“Yes, I suppose it is. See here. There are the orders right there. See, it says Murphy there and Stewart there. Or maybe it’s Stewart for murdering.… No, that’s right. If you’d been murdered, you wouldn’t be here, would you?” Herrero thought that that was a pretty fair joke and he smiled, his teeth spectacular against his olive skin and dark mouth.
“I suppose you’ll want to take me to Maracaibo, won’t you?”
“I suppose so, señor. Long ride, eh? And a dry one too. I’m sure the judges wouldn’t have sent us if it hadn’t been very, very bad. Bah, what’s one man more or less up here, eh?”
“Who signed the order?” said Bill.
The lugarteniente inspected his orders again. “Ah, some señorita, I see. Ah, yes, the señorita, the daughter of this Stewart. Hmm, I think I have seen her in Maracaibo. So white with eyes so blue and with such a figure. Por Dios, it would be a pleasure to be so charged by that girl. Ah, well, it’s a long ride. You have a horse? It would be a pity to walk.”
Bill looked back at his drillers. They were no match for thirty troopers well armed, and the machine gun, because Bill was in the road, would be useless.
“Dad,” Bill shouted back, “Dad, bring me a horse.”
Dad Lacey presently came down to them, scowling and leading Bill’s fresh mount.
“What’s the charge, Herrero?” said Dad, gruffly, palms itching to get at the two Colts.
“Oh, murder, I think, or some such small thing. But I do not think we will shoot this pleasant señor Murphy. That would be quite a shame, you know. Maybe he will get off.”
“Look here,” said Dad, “when does the trial come up?”
“The court convenes in octubre,” said Herrero.
“Four months!”
“Yes, about that.”
“Why, you white-livered …”
“Dad!” said Bill. “Maybe the lugarteniente is learning to talk English.”
“Look here,” said Dad, excitedly. “We’ve only got thirty days to bring this well in and if you keep Bill for four months, we’ll lose this concession right off. That’s no way to do. Let him bring that well in first and then come and arrest him.”
“I am sooooo sorreee,” said Herrero.
Bill climbed his horse. “So long, Dad,” he said with a wink.
Dad growled and stamped and swore some more and then Herrero turned in the trail and followed it back toward Maracaibo. Bill rode with one heel hooked in the right stirrup, slouched and unworried. He was rolling a smoke when Dad last laid eyes on him.