The Buckaroo of Blue Wells/Chapter 11

FTER Goode rode back to Blue Wells he met Lee Barnhardt, who was taking a drink at the Oasis, and Goode, who was also drinking, told him of his visit to the Double Bar 8, and of the mysterious shot. The lawyer was naturally interested and questioned Goode closely, but Goode knew nothing of who had fired the shot.

“I met Hartley and Stevens,” offered Goode. “They’re the same two jiggers that cleaned up that Modoc job.”

“Detectives?” asked Barnhardt.

“Oh, I dunno about that part of it. But that ain’t the only job they ever cleaned up. There’s a lot more behind that one, and I’ll betcha they’ve not been idle since then. I’m wonderin’ what they’re doin’ here.”

“Perhaps they’re working on that train robbery.”

“Pshaw, that might be it. I’ll buy a drink, Barnhardt.”

On his way back to the office Barnhardt met Le Moyne.

“What ever happened to that detective the Santa Rita was going to put on that robbery?” asked Barnhardt.

Le Moyne smiled.

“Why, I guess the company didn’t think it was worth while, as long as you folks had jailed some one for doing the job.”

Barnhardt laughed softly, knowingly.

“That’s all right, Chet. But when you hire detectives, why don’t you get men whose reputations are not so well known?”

Le Moyne looked him over coldly.

“What do you mean, Lee?”

“Oh, I respect your secrecy. But really, Hartley and Stevens are too well known to do much good.”

“Eh?” Le Moyne frowned heavily. “Those two men at the Taylor ranch?”

“Sure. The two best man hunters you could have hired. But it’s a case of them being too well known.”

“Yeah?” Le Moyne smiled thinly. “Too well known, eh? But don’t blame me—I’m not the Santa Rita company.”

“That’s true.”

“Personally, I know nothing about their reputation, Lee.”

“You don’t? Well, I don’t know very much, but I do know that they’ve never lost a case. I’d hate to have them on my trail.”

“Well,” Le Moyne shrugged his shapely shoulders, “it seems as though we had hired two very good men, Lee.”

“You have.” Barnhardt laughed and grew confidential. “Tex Alden is as sore as a boil. He didn’t want them two men to stay at the ranch. He intended to run the ranch himself.”

“He did, eh?” Le Moyne scowled. “Yeah, I suppose he would. I’m glad he missed out on that. And I’m glad the sheriff and the railroad detective had to make that arrest. It rather lets me out of any blame in the matter, you see.”

“Certainly.”

“They’ve got plenty of help at the Double Bar 8,” said Barnhardt, after a pause. “That tenderfoot, Jimmy Legg, who was at the AK ranch, has volunteered his services. Tex sure is sore at him.”

“Sore at Legg? What for?”

“Well, Tex thinks Marion pays too much attention to Legg.”

“Well, does she?”

“I don’t know, Chet. She calls him Jimmy, and he calls her Marion.”

“Does, eh? Say, Lee, where did that fellow come from?”

“Nobody seems to know. He tramped in here the night of the hold-up. He said the train passed him. I can’t quite figure him out. I’ve talked with Scotty Olson and Al Porter about him, and they’re not quite sure what he is. He’s not a bad looking fellow, and I think he has a way with women.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“Well, you know, Chet; sort of a way of talking.”

“Yea-a-ah, I guess I know what you mean,” sighed Le Moyne. “I’ll see you later, Lee.”

Barnhardt went back to his office, glowing with the self satisfaction that comes to men who love to gossip. Le Moyne met Goode at the Oasis, and Goode was carrying just a little too much liquor. Goode happened to be extolling Hashknife and Sleepy to the bartender, who evidently didn’t care a bit about it.

“I tell yuh, they’re invin-shi-ble,” he declared. “Bes’ pair of two-handed fighters on earth. Betcha odds, tha’s what’ll do.”

“Hello, Plenty,” said Le Moyne.

Goode goggled at Le Moyne.

“Howza paymashter? Whatcha usin’ f’r money these days, Chet?”

“Good yellow gold, Plenty. What do you want to bet on?”

“Don’t get him started,” advised the bartender. “He’s drunk. Wants to bet odds that Hartley and Stevens will find the men who robbed your pay-roll.”

Le Moyne laughed and bought a drink for every one at the bar.

“I’m tellin’ yuh,” declared Goode. “’F they was after me, I’d run like, and pray every jump.”

“Bad men, eh?” asked Le Moyne, laughing.

“Wors’ you ever sheen! Gun-shootin’ mind-readers. Yesshir. Oh, you’ll shee.”

He pointed a wavering finger in the direction of the bartender.

“Betcha oddsh. Betcha anythin’—”

Goode waved his arm, as if to encompass everything, and sat down on the bar-rail, where he began snoring.

“Can’t stand much,” said the bartender. “Give him ten drinks of hooch, and he’s plumb gone. Know anythin’ about Hartley and Stevens?”

Le Moyne smiled and his brows lifted slightly.

“You knew the Santa Rita had detectives on the case, didn’t you?”

“Oh, I did hear they was goin’ to. What’ll yuh drink, Chet?”

“Same thing. I wonder where Goode found out so much about those two men?”

“I don’t know. He’s been out to the Double Bar 8 to see ’em, and when he came back he met Al Porter here. They had a few shots of hooch, and Goode told Al all about ’em. The more drinks he took, the more he told. After Al went away, Barnhardt came in, and Goode told it all over again. When Barnhardt went out, I was the victim. You’re lucky he went to sleep.”

“I suppose I am,” laughed Le Moyne. “It appears that the Double Bar 8 is well taken care of right now. Did any one find out who shot that tenderfoot kid the other night?”

“Never tried to, I reckon. The kid went back to the AK.”

“He’s over at the Taylor place now.”

“Is that so?”

“That’s what I heard.”

“Oh, sure; I heard that too. You heard about somebody takin’ a shot at the gang at the Double Bar 8, didn’t yuh?”

Le Moyne hadn’t; so the bartender told him what he had heard Goode tell Barnhardt. It was interesting to Le Moyne, inasmuch as the bullet nearly struck Marion.

“That sure beats !” snorted Le Moyne. “What kind of a country is this getting to be? I wonder,” he squinted thoughtfully, “if that shot was fired at Legg, the tenderfoot?”

“Might have been. What’ll yuh have, Chet?”

“Nothing; I’ve had enough.”

Le Moyne turned his back to the bar, while he rolled and lighted a cigaret, his eyes thoughtful. Scotty Olson came in and spoke to Le Moyne as he walked past, but the handsome paymaster of the Santa Rita did not reply. Finally he walked out, mounted his horse and rode away.

The sheriff came back to the bar.

“What’s the matter with Le Moyne?” he asked of the bartender.

“I dunno.” The bartender rested his elbows on the bar, chewing on his cigar. “I told him about the bushwhacker out at the Double Bar 8 almost killin’ Marion Taylor, and I suppose Le Moyne is sore about it.”

“Al Porter was tellin’ me about it,” nodded the sheriff. “I don’t sabe it.”

“You’d be a wonder if yuh did, Scotty. This country is getting pretty salty, don’tcha know it? First a train robbery, then an attempted murder on the main street, and now they’re shootin’ from the hills.”

“And what for?” wailed the sheriff. “My, I do hate a mystery!”

“Sure yuh do, Scotty. What’ll yuh drink? See-gar? Sure. These ought to be good. Paid five dollars for that box of ’em three years ago. Pretty dry? Well, my, you’d be dry, too, if yuh was kept in a box in Arizona for three years. Whatcha suppose anybody’s tryin’ to kill off Legg for?”

“I didn’t know they was.”

“Somebody shot at him the other night, didn’t they? And Goode says that shot was fired at him today.”

“He ought to go away,” said Scotty, looking gloomily at his cigar, which seemed to be trying to expand into a rose, or a cabbage.

He flung it in a cuspidor, and smoothed his huge mustache.

“We never had no trouble around here until he came,” said Scotty. “He’s a hoodoo, that tenderfoot!”

“How’s that dog comin’ along, Scotty?”

“First class. It bit me once, and Al Porter twice.”

“Ha, ha, ha, ha! Don’t like officers, eh?”

“Takes after his owner, I reckon. Gimme somethin’ to take the taste of that cigar out of my mouth.”

The sheriff drank a glass of liquor and scowled at Plenty Goode, who still sat on the bar-rail, snoring blissfully.

“Don’t wake him up,” pleaded the bartender. “When that jigger gets on one subject, he never knows when to quit.”

“I ain’t goin’ to wake him up,” wearily. “I suppose I’d better go out to the Double Bar 8 and investigate that shooting. It won’t do no good, though. I’ve got more prisoners now than I know what to do with. Three of ’em—and a dog! I wish I wasn’t the sheriff.”

“Well, cheer up, Scotty; somebody will prob’ly kill yuh very soon, and then yore troubles will all be over.”

“I s’pose that’s true.”

The sheriff went back to his office, where he found Porter cleaning a Winchester.

“Hear anythin’ new?” growled Porter.

“No. Reckon there’s any use investigatin’ that shootin’ at the Taylor ranch?”

Porter inserted a piece of white paper in the breech of the rifle, and squinted down the barrel.

“With two of the smartest detectives already there?” he replied. “You’d find out a of a lot, wouldn’t yuh?”

“Mebbe that’s right. I understand they’re hired by Le Moyne, or by the Santa Rita mine.”

“Mm-m-m-m-m,” Porter reached for the oil-can and proceeded to lubricate the mechanism.

“I dunno how a detective can ever find out who held up that train, if he spends all his time runnin’ a ranch,” said the sheriff.

“Not bein’ a detective, I don’t know,” said Porter coldly. “And what’s a lot more I don’t care a !”