'Firebrand' Trevison - Charles Alden Seltzer (top 10 books of all time .txt) 📗

certain that any performance he participated in would be well worth seeing. So, in order to influence the rider she turned her back, pretending not to be interested. But when she heard exclamations of satisfaction from the group of men she wheeled again, to see that the rider had mounted and was sitting in the saddle, grinning at a man who had produced a harmonica and was rubbing it on a sleeve of his shirt, preparatory to placing it to his lips.

The rider had gone too far now to back out, and Rosalind watched him in frank curiosity. And in the next instant, when the strains of the harmonica smote the still morning air, Nigger began to prance.

What followed reminded the girl of a scene in the ring of a circus. The horse, proud, dignified, began to pace slowly to the time of the accompanying music, executing difficult steps that must have tried the patience of both animal and trainer during the teaching period; the rider, lithe, alert, proud also, smiling his pleasure.

Rosalind stood there long, watching. It was a clever exhibition, and she found herself wondering about the rider. Had he always lived in the West?

The animal performed a dozen feats of the circus arena, and the girl was so deeply interested in him that she did not observe Corrigan when he emerged from the bank, stepped down into the street and stood watching the rider. She noticed him though, when the black, forced to her side of the street through the necessity of executing a turn, passed close to the easterner. And then, with something of a shock, she saw Corrigan smiling derisively. At the sound of applause from the group on the opposite side of the street, Corrigan’s derision became a sneer. Miss Benham felt resentment; a slight color stained her cheeks. For she could not understand why Corrigan should show displeasure over this clean and clever amusement. She was looking full at Corrigan when he turned and caught her gaze. The light in his eyes was positively venomous.

“It is a rather dramatic bid for your interest, isn’t it, Miss Benham?” he said.

His voice came during a lull that followed the applause. It reached Rosalind, full and resonant. It carried to the rider of the black horse, and glancing sidelong at him, Rosalind saw his face whiten under the deep tan upon it. It carried, too, to the other side of the street, and the girl saw faces grow suddenly tense; noted the stiffening of bodies. The flat, ominous silence that followed was unreal and oppressive. Out of it came the rider’s voice as he urged the black to a point within three or four paces of Corrigan and sat in the saddle, looking at him. And now for the first time Rosalind had a clear, full view of the rider’s face and a quiver of trepidation ran over her. For the lean jaws were corded, the mouth was firm and set—she knew his teeth were clenched; it was the face of a man who would not be trifled with. His chin was shoved forward slightly; somehow it helped to express the cold humor that shone in his narrowed, steady eyes. His voice, when he spoke to Corrigan, had a metallic quality that rang ominously in the silence that had continued:

“Back up your play or take it back,” he said slowly.

Corrigan had not changed his position. He stared fixedly at the rider; his only sign of emotion over the latter’s words was a quickening of the eyes. He idly tapped with his fingers on the sleeve of his khaki shirt, where the arm passed under them to fold over the other. His voice easily matched the rider’s in its quality of quietness:

“My conversation was private. You are interfering without cause.”

Watching the rider, filled with a sudden, breathless premonition of impending tragedy, Rosalind saw his eyes glitter with the imminence of physical action. Distressed, stirred by an impulse to avert what threatened, she took a step forward, speaking rapidly to Corrigan:

“Mr. Corrigan, this is positively silly! You know you were hardly discreet!”

Corrigan smiled coldly, and the girl knew that it was not a question of right or wrong between the two men, but a conflict of spirit. She did not know that hatred had been born here; that instinctively each knew the other for a foe, and that this present clash was to be merely one battle of the war that would be waged between them if both survived.

Not for an instant did Corrigan’s eyes wander from those of the rider. He saw from them that he might expect no further words. None came. The rider’s right hand fell to the butt of the pistol that swung low on his right hip. Simultaneously, Corrigan’s hand dropped to his hip pocket.

Rosalind saw the black horse lunge forward as though propelled by a sudden spring. A dust cloud rose from his hoofs, and Corrigan was lost in it. When the dust swirled away, Corrigan was disclosed to the girl’s view, doubled queerly on the ground, face down. The black horse had struck him with its shoulder—he seemed to be badly hurt.

For a moment the girl stood, swaying, looking around appealingly, startled wonder, dismay and horror in her eyes. It had happened so quickly that she was stunned. She had but one conscious emotion—thankfulness that neither man had used his pistol.

No one moved. The girl thought some of them might have come to Corrigan’s assistance. She did not know that the ethics forbade interference, that a fight was between the fighters until one acknowledged defeat.

Corrigan’s face was in the dust; he had not moved. The black horse stood, quietly now, several feet distant, and presently the rider dismounted, walked to Corrigan and turned him over. He worked the fallen man’s arms and legs, and moved his neck, then knelt and listened at his chest. He got up and smiled mirthlessly at the girl.

“He’s just knocked out, Miss Benham. It’s nothing serious. Nigger—”

“You coward!” she interrupted, her voice thick with passion.

His lips whitened, but he smiled faintly.

“Nigger—” he began again.

“Coward! Coward!” she repeated, standing rigid before him, her hands clenched, her lips stiff with scorn.

He smiled resignedly and turned away. She stood watching him, hating him, hurling mental anathemas after him, until she saw him pass through the doorway of the bank. Then she turned to see Corrigan just getting up.

Not a man in the group across the street had moved. They, too, had watched Trevison go into the bank, and now their glances shifted to the girl and Corrigan. Their sympathies, she saw plainly, were with Trevison; several of them smiled as the easterner got to his feet.

Corrigan was pale and breathless, but he smiled at her and held her off when she essayed to help him brush the dust from his clothing. He did that himself, and mopped his face with a handkerchief.

“It wasn’t fair,” whispered the girl, sympathetically. “I almost wish that you had killed him!” she added, vindictively.

“My, what a fire-eater!” he said with a broad smile. She thought he looked handsomer with the dust upon him, than he had ever seemed when polished and immaculate.

“Are you badly hurt?” she asked, with a concern that made him look quickly at her.

He laughed and patted her arm lightly. “Not a bit hurt,” he said. “Come, those men are staring.”

He escorted her to the step of the private car, and lingered a moment there to make his apology for his part in the trouble. He told her frankly, that he was to blame, knowing that Trevison’s action in riding him down would more than outweigh any resentment she might feel over his mistake in bringing about the clash in her presence.

She graciously forgave him, and a little later she entered the car alone; he telling her that he would be in presently, after he returned from the station where he intended to send a telegram. She gave him a smile, standing on the platform of the car, dazzling, eloquent with promise. It made his heart leap with exultation, and as he went his way toward the station he voiced a sentiment:

“Entirely worth being ridden down for.”

But his jaws set savagely as he approached the station. He did not go into the station, but around the outside wall of it, passing between it and another building and coming at last to the front of the bank building. He had noted that the black horse was still standing in front of the bank building, and that the group of men had dispersed. The street was deserted.

Corrigan’s movements became quick and sinister. He drew a heavy revolver out of a hip pocket, shoved its butt partly up his sleeve and concealed the cylinder and barrel in the palm of his hand. Then he stepped into the door of the bank. He saw Trevison standing at one of the grated windows of the wire netting, talking with Braman. Corrigan had taken several steps into the room before Trevison heard him, and then Trevison turned, to find himself looking into the gaping muzzle of Corrigan’s pistol.

“You didn’t run,” said the latter. “Thought it was all over, I suppose. Well, it isn’t.” He was grinning coldly, and was now deliberate and unexcited, though two crimson spots glowed in his cheeks, betraying the presence of passion.

“Don’t reach for that gun!” he warned Trevison. “I’ll blow a hole through you if you wriggle a finger!” Watching Trevison, he spoke to Braman: “You got a back room here?”

The banker stepped around the end of the counter and opened a door behind the wire netting. “Right here,” he directed.

Corrigan indicated the door with a jerking movement of the head. “Move!” he said shortly, to Trevison. The latter’s lips parted in a cold, amused grin, and he hesitated slightly, yielding presently.

An instant later the three were standing in the middle of a large room, empty except for a cot upon which Braman slept, some clothing hanging on the walls, a bench and a chair. Corrigan ordered the banker to clear the room. When that had been done, Corrigan spoke again to the banker:

“Get his gun.”

A snapping alertness of the eyes indicated that Trevison knew what was coming. That was the reason he had been so quiescent this far; it was why he made no objection when Braman passed his hands over his clothing in search of other weapons, after his pistol had been lifted from its holster by the banker.

“Now get out of here and lock the doors!” ordered Corrigan. “And let nobody come in!”

Braman retired, grinning expectantly.

Then Corrigan backed away until he came to the wall. Reaching far up, he hung his revolver on a nail.

“Now,” he said to Trevison, his voice throaty from passion; “take off your damned foolish trappings. I’m going to knock hell out of you!”