The Gringos<br />A Story Of The Old California Days In 1849 by B. M. Bower (latest books to read .txt) 📗

Jack stared meditatively across at the young fellow sitting hunched upon another of the boxes that were the seats in this tent-jail, which was also the courtroom of the Vigilance Committee, and mechanically counted the slow tears that trickled down between the third and fourth fingers of each hand. A half-hour spent so would have rasped the nerves of the most phlegmatic man in the town, and Jack was not phlegmatic; fifteen minutes of watching that silent weeping sufficed to bring a muffled explosion.

"Ah, for God's sake, brace up!" he gritted. "There's some hope for you—if you don't spoil what chance you have got, by crying around like a baby. Brace up and be a man, anyway. It won't hurt any worse if you grin about it."

The young fellow felt gropingly for a red-figured bandanna, found it and wiped his face and his eyes dejectedly. "I beg your pardon for seeming a coward," he apologized huskily. "I got to thinking about my—m-mother and sisters, and—"

Jack winced. Mother and sisters he had longed for all his life. "Well, you better be thinking how you'll get out of the scrape you're in," he advised, with a little of Bill Wilson's grimness. "I'm afraid I'm to blame, in a way; and yet, if I hadn't mixed into the fight, you'd be dead by now. Maybe that would have been just as well, seeing how things have turned out," he grinned. "Still—have a smoke?"

"I never used tobacco in my life," declined the youth somewhat primly.

"No, I don't reckon you ever did!" Jack eyed him with a certain amount of pitying amusement. "A fellow that will come gold-hunting without a gun to his name, would not use tobacco, or swear, or do anything that a perfect lady couldn't do! However, you put up a good fight with your fists, old man, and that's something."

"I'd have been killed, though, if you hadn't shot when you did. They were too much for me. I haven't tried to thank you—"

"No, I shouldn't think you would," grinned Jack. "I don't see yet where I've done you any particular favor: from robbers to Vigilance Committee might be called an up-to-date version of 'Out of the frying-pan into the fire.'"

The boy glanced fearfully toward the closed tent-flaps. "Ssh!" he whispered. "The guard can hear—"

"Oh, that's all right," returned Jack, urged perhaps to a conscious bravado by the very weakness of the other. "It's all day with me, anyway. I may as well say what I think.

"And so—" He paused to blow one of his favorite little smoke rings and watch it float to the dingy ridge-pole, where it flickered and faded into a blue haze "—and so, I'm going to say right out in meeting what I think of this town and the Committee they let measure out justice. Justice!" He laughed sardonically. "Poor old lady, she couldn't stop within forty miles of Perkins' Committee if she had forty bandages over her eyes, and both ears plugged with cotton! You wait till their farce of a trial is over. You may get off, by a scratch—I hope so. But unless Bill Wilson—"

"Aw, yuh needn't pin no hopes on Bill Wilson!" came a heavy, malicious voice through the tent wall. "All hell can't save yuh, Jack Allen! You've had a ride out to the oak comin' to yuh for quite a while, and before sundown you'll get it."

"Oh! Is that so, Shorty? Say, you're breaking the rules, you old pirate; you're talking to the prisoners without permission. As the Captain's most faithful dog Tray, you'd better shoot yourself; it'll save the town the trouble of hanging you later on!" He smoked calmly while Shorty, on guard without, growled a vilifying retort, and the other guards snickered.

"Ah, brace up!" he advised his quaking companion again. "If my company doesn't damn you beyond all hope, you may get out of the scrape. You didn't have a gun, and you're a stranger and haven't said naughty things about your neighbors. Cheer up. Life looks just as good to me as it does to you. I love this old world just as well as any man that ever lived in it, and I'm not a bit pleased over leaving it—any more than you are. But I can't see where I could better matters by letting myself get wobbly in the knees. I'm sorry I didn't make a bigger fight to keep my guns, though. I'd like to have perforated a few more of our most worthy Committee before I quit; our friend Shorty, for instance," he stipulated wickedly and clearly, "and the Captain."

If he were deliberately trying to goad Shorty to further profanity, the result should have satisfied him. The huge shadow of Shorty moving back and forth upon the front wall of the tent, became violently agitated and developed a gigantic arm that waved threateningly over the ridge pole. The other guards laughed and checked their laughter with a suddenness which made Jack's eyes leave the dancing shadow and seek questioningly the closed tent flaps.

"If I'm any good at reading signs, we are now about to be tried by our peers—twelve good men and true," he announced ironically. "Brace up, old man! The chances are you'll soon be out of this mess and headed for home. Don't be afraid to tell the truth—and don't act scared; they'll take that as a sure sign you've got a guilty conscience. Just keep a stiff upper lip; it won't take long; we do things in a hurry, out here!"

"Say, you're a brick, Mr. Allen!" the boy burst out, impulsively gripping the hand of his champion.

Jack jerked his hand away—not unkindly, but rather as if he feared to drop, even for an instant, his flippant defiance of the trick fate had played him. The jerk sent a small, shining thing sliding down to the floor; where it stood upright and quivered in the soft sand.

"Lord!" he ejaculated under his breath, snatching it up as a thief would snatch at his spoils. He looked fearfully at the closed flaps, outside which the trampling of many feet sounded closer and closer; and with a warning shake of his head at the other, slid the dagger into his sleeve again, carefully fastening the point in the stout hem of the buckskin.

"You never can tell," he muttered, smiling queerly as he made sure the weapon was not noticeable.

He was rolling another cigarette when the Captain parted the tent flaps and came stooping in, followed by twelve men of the Committee who were to be the jury, and as many spectators as could crowd after them.

"Gentlemen, be seated," the Captain invited formally, and motioned the jury to the crude bunks that lined one side of the large tent. Jack and the boy he moved farther from the entrance, and took up his own position where his sharp eyes commanded every inch of the interior and where the gun which he drew from its holster and rested upon his knee could speak its deadly rebuke to any man there if, in the upholding of justice, the Captain deemed it necessary.

The jury shuffled to their places, perched in a row upon the edge of the bunks and waited silently, their eyes fixed expectantly upon their Captain. The crowd edged into the corners and along the sides, their hat crowns scraping the canvas roof as they were forced closer to the low wall.

The Captain waited until the silence was a palpable thing made alive by the rhythmic breathing of the men who were to look upon this new travesty of justice.

"Gentlemen," he said at last, his sonorous voice carrying his words distinctly to the crowd without, "we are now ready to proceed with the investigation. I wish to state, for the information of those present, that after the prisoners were placed here under guard, I went to get a statement from the wounded man, Mr. Texas Bill. I found him dying from a wound inflicted upon his person by a pistol ball which passed through his left lung, above and to the right of his heart. I did not take a written statement, for lack of time and writing materials. But Texas swore—"

"Yeah—I'll bet he swore!" commented Bill Wilson under his breath. Every one looked toward Bill, standing just inside the flaps, and the Captain scowled while he waited for attention.

"Texas swore that he was shot by one of the prisoners, Jack Allen by name, who fired upon him without due provocation, while he was talking to this other prisoner, whose name we have yet to learn. Texas stated that Allen, appearing suddenly from behind some bushes, began shooting with deadly intent and without warning, wantonly murdering Rawhide Jack, who lies dead in Smith's back room, and shooting him, Texas, through the lung. He also stated that Mr. Dick Swift was with him and Rawhide Jack, and was also shot by the prisoner, Jack Allen, without cause or provocation.

"They had met the stranger and were standing talking to him about his luck in the diggin's. This stranger, who is the other prisoner, was inclined to be sassy, and made a pass at Rawhide with his fist, telling him to mind his own business and not ask so many questions. Rawhide struck back; and Allen, coming out from behind some bushes, began shooting."

The Captain stopped and looked calmly and judicially from face to face in the crowd.

"That, gentlemen, is the statement made to me by Texas Bill, who now lies dead in Pete's Place as a result of the wound inflicted by Allen."

"That's a lot of swearing for a man to do that's been shot through the lungs," commented Bill Wilson skeptically.

The Captain gave him a malevolent look and continued. "We will ask Mr. Swift to come forward and tell us what he knows of this deplorable and, if I may be permitted the term, disgraceful affair."

Mr. Swift edged his way carefully through the crowd with his left arm thrust out to protect the right, which was bandaged and rested in a blood-stained sling. He asked permission to sit down; kicked a box into the small, open space between the Captain, the jury, and the prisoners, and seated himself with the air of a man about to perform an extremely painful duty.

"Hold up your right hand," commanded the Captain.

Swift apologetically raised his left hand and gazed steadfastly into the cold, impartial eyes of his Captain.

"You swear that you will tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, so-help-you-God?"

Swift, his purplish eyes wide and clear and honest as the gaze of a baby, calmly affirmed that he did.

Jack grinned and lazily fanned the smoke of his cigarette away, so that he might the better gaze upon this man who was about to tell the whole truth and nothing else. He caught Swift's eye and added a sneering lift to the smile; and Swift's eyes changed from bland innocence to hate triumphant.

"Mr. Swift, you will now relate to us the circumstances of this affair, truthfully, in the order of their happening," directed the deep voice of the Captain.

Mr. Swift carefully eased his wounded arm in its sling, turned his innocent gaze upon the crowd, and began:

"Texas, Rawhide, and myself were crossing the sandy stretch south of town about noon, when we met this chap—the stranger there." He nodded slightly toward the boy. "I was walking behind the other two, but I heard Rawhide say: 'Hello, son, any luck in the diggin's?' The kid