Jabez had got the rope on himself when Dick came back, an' he spoke to him in the voice of a father sayin' farewell to the son who had gone wrong once too often. "I don't care nothin' about the money, Dick," he said. "You'd 'a' been welcome to all I had; but I can't forgive you about my little girl. You made her love you, you schemed to do it, an' you came here with that end in view. I trusted you from the ground up, but I can see a heap o' things now 'at I wouldn't see before. I had a letter written from Bill Andrews tellin' me 'at he had heard you brag 'at you intended to get holt o' my money, an' that it would pay me to search you instead o' suspectin' him—"
"Where was the letter from?" asked Dick.
"Laramie," sez the ol' man.
"Kind o' curious," sez Dick, an' his vice was as bitter as the dregs o' sin; "that's where Denton came from too."
"You deceived me all along," sez the ol' man, not payin' much heed to Dick, but speakin' mostly to himself. "You know 'at what I hate worse'n anything else is deceit—an' here you've been fast an' loose with women—" Dick tried to say somethin', but the ol' man stopped him. "That was bad enough," he went on, "but I'm no fool; I know the world, an' I could forgive you a good deal; but hang it, I never could forgive you bein' a professional gambler—a man that lives by deceit an' trickery an' false pretenses. Lookin' back now, it strikes me as bein' mighty curious how you got the best o' Piker's deals too. Was Piker or Denton, or whatever his name is, a gambler too?"
"He was," answered Dick in a low tone.
The ol' man squared himself, an' his face was as fierce as the face of an ol' she bear. "Of all the human snakes I ever heard of, you crawl the closest to the ground. You come here an' act as square as a man can until you have made us all think the world of ya; an' yet in your black heart you were all the time plottin' to get my money, usin' my little girl as a burglar would use a bar to open a safe with. Even then you couldn't wait in patience; your inborn cussedness forced you to steal an' cheat—and yet, boy, I could almost forgive you for deceivin' me, but I can't never forgive you for deceivin' my little girl. You stand there with a gun in your hand an' I stand here with none; you brag 'at no man can't doubt your dealin' without havin' cause to remember it; but I tell you to your teeth that you're a sneak an' a cheat an' a low-grade coward."
Dick stood with his head thrown back an' his left hand clenched, while his right gripped the butt of his gun so fierce that the knuckles stood out white as chalk an' the veins was black an' swollen. His bosom was heavin', his teeth showed in a threatenin' white line, an' all the savage th' was in him was cryin' kill, kill, kill!
He tottered a little when he took a step toward Jabez; but he laid the gun on the table with the butt pointin' towards Jabez, an' then he went back to the wall an' folded his arms. He stood lookin' at Jabez for a moment, an' then he sez slow an' soft an' creepy: "Every word you have said from start to finish is a lie; and you yourself are a liar."
The ol' man choked. He loosened the collar around his neck, fairly gaspin' for breath; an' then he grabbed up the gun an' held it ready to drop on Dick's heart. A curious expression came over Dick as he looked into Jabez' face; a tired, heart-achy smile as though he'd be so glad to be all through with it that he wouldn't care a great deal how it was done. Ol' Cast Steel was livin' up to his name if ever a man did. The' wasn't a sign of anger in his face by this time, nothin' but one grim purpose, an' it was horrid. It looked like a plain case o' suicide on Dick's part, an' I was just makin' up my mind whether or not it would be polite to interfere, when the door opened noiselessly an' Barbie stood in the openin'.
She seemed turned to stone for a second, an' then she gave a spring an' grabbed the ol' man's arm. "Jabez Judson, what are you doin'?" she said, an' the' wasn't much blood relation in her tone.
The ol' man lowered his gun an' sank into a chair, while Barbie stood with her hands on her hips an' looked from one to the other of us. Then it would be the time for our eyes to hit the carpet. "Now I want to know the meanin' o' this," sez she, "an' I want the full truth. This is nice doin's over a game o' cards. I wish I had thought to set up a bar, so you'd all felt a little more at home. What's it about?"
We didn't none of us seem to have a great deal to say, but just stood there lookin' foolish. Finally Dick came out of it an' sez, "I have been accused of cheatin' an' lyin' an' stealin'. The circumstantial evidence is all again me, so I shall have to go away, but you remember all I told you out in the other room—an' on our rides across the plain, an' on our walks in the moonlight; an' Barbie, girl, don't you believe a word of it.
"Good-bye, Happy—I know you an' you know me. Jabez Judson, I know it ain't no use to attempt any explanation; but I give you my word of honor—an' I set just as much store by it as any man in all the world—that I never stacked a deck o' cards in my life, an' I never held a single underhanded thought again you; while as for Barbie—well, Barbie knows. Good-bye."
Dick turned on his heel an' stalked out o' the room, Barbie dropped into a chair sobbin', an' me an' the old man continued to look like the genuine guilty parties. Then it occurred to me that mebbe it would be wise to see if Piker was worth botherin' with. First thing I did though was to see where he had helt his gun when he fired beneath the table. The' wasn't no gun on the floor, an' I couldn't nowise savvy it.
He had one gun in his holster, but he couldn't have pulled it out without bein' seen, an' he couldn't have put it back, nohow. I was plumb mystified, an' had about give it up when I came across it. I own up it was a clever dodge, but snakish to an extreme. He had fashioned a rig just above his knee, an' when he had sat down the gun had been pointin' at Dick all through the game, an' nothin' but Jabez makin' Dick move had saved him. It was a blood-thirsty scheme, an' I felt like stampin' his face into a jelly.
His head was still bent over an' he was black in the face; but when I straightened him out an' soused a lot o' water over him, he came out of it, an' I fair itched to make him eat his gun—knee-riggin' an' all! He sat up an' began to tell what a low-down, sneakin' cuss Dick had allus been. I let him sing a couple o' verses, an' then I sez: "Now, you look here, you slimy spider. Dick's too busy just now to attend to your case an' if you don't swaller them few remarks instant I'll be obliged to prepare you for the coroner myself. I've knowed Dick sometime, an' I've knowed several other men; an' I know enough to know that such a dust-eatin' lizard as you never could know enough to know what such a man as Dick was thinkin' out or plannin' to do. An' furthermore, you're a liar in your heart, an' still further more, I don't like your face; an' one other furthermore—the longer I look at you the madder I get! My advice to you, an' I give it in the name o' peace an' sobriety, an' because the' 's a lady present, is to start right now to a more salubrious climate—you an' your knee-gun an' your black lies an' your marked decks. Do you hear what I say? Are you goin' to go?"
I was surely losin' my temper; the' was a blood taste in my throat, an' when I asked him the question I kicked him gently in the chest, just to let him know 'at I was ready for his verdict.
He was a coward. He just lunched himself away from me on his back an' whined somethin' about only tryin' to show us the truth an' not wantin' any trouble, an' a lot o' such foolishness; but I soon wearied of it, an' grabbed him by the collar an' yanked him to his feet, an' sez, "Now answer me one question—who told you that Dick was here?"
"Bill Andrews," he sez; an' I opened the door an' kicked him through it: but in a minute back he comes, cringin' like a cur. "Don't send me away until after I see what direction Silver takes," he whimpered. "He never forgives; He'll kill me if he sees me; let me stay until after he starts."
I laughed. "Why, you fool you," I sez, "if he SHOULD happen to ruin you beyond repair you don't imagine any one would put on mournin' do ya? But if it's goin' to make your mind any easier I stand ready to give you a written guarantee 'at he won't use any knee-gun to do it with. Now you get; I'm strainin' myself to keep from spoilin' you on my own hook."
I was in an advanced state of bein' exasperated, an' I walked up to him intendin' to brand him a few with the butt of his own gun, when Barbie spoke low an' cold, but in a voice fairly jagged with scorn: "Let the creature alone; I don't want Dick to soil his boots." Barbie's voice had lost its college finish, an' she was in the mood to do a little shootin' herself just then.
Dick finished his packin' in short order, an' went out an' saddled his pony an' rode away toward Danders an' Laramie. We all set like corpse-watchers for half an hour longer, an' then Jabez straightened up an' sez to Piker; "Take your money out o' that pot an' never get caught in this neighborhood again. Your partner started toward Laramie; when you see him tell him I'll send the full amount o' the pot to him as soon as he sends me his address. You can also tell him that I'll kill him if he ever sets foot on this ranch again."
Barbie was standin' at the window lookin' out into the moonlight which had swallered up the best part of her world. When Jabez finished speakin' she turned around an' looked at Piker. "I can't figger out just whose dog-robber yon are," she sez; "but next time you go gunnin' for Silver Dick—you better take the whole gang with you."
It fair hurt me to see Barbie's face, so hard it was an' so different from the real Barbie: but it warmed my heart to hear the way she made that Silver Dick ring out. Oh, she was a thoroughbred every inch of her, that girl was. Piker didn't say a word; he just picked up his coin an' walked out o' the room, an' I raised up the window an' drew a deep breath. The blame pole-cat had managed to slip out an' saddle his pony about supper time, an' in a second he dashed away toward Webb Station, mighty thankful in his nasty little heart that he wasn't bound for hell, where he rightly belonged.
"Did you ever know Dick before he came here, Happy?" asked Barbie.
"I swear to heaven that I never knew that our Dick was Silver Dick until this very night," sez I; "but I'd be willing to stake my life on his word, an' I'd take it again the word of any other livin' man—bar none."
"Thank you, Happy. Good-night." She held her head high as she walked out o' the room; but I knew that livin' serpents was tearin' at her heart.
Ol' Cast Steel sat for an hour, his chin on his hands an' his elbows on the table, lookin' at the pile of money an' checks on the table before him.
"Gold, gold, gold!" he mutters at last; "it builds the churches an' the schoolhouses an' the homes; an' it fills the jails and the insane asylums an' hell itself. It drives brother to murder brother, an' neither love nor friendship is proof against its curse. It starves those who scorn it, while those who pay out their souls for it find themselves sinking, sinking, sinking in its hideous quicksand until at last it closes above their mad screams. God! if I only had my life to live over!"
That was just the way he said it, deep an' hoarse an' coning between his set teeth; an' I felt the hair raisin' on my head. He looked like a lost soul, an' the whites of his eyes showed in ghastly rings around the pupils.
"You take this rubbish, Happy," sez he, turnin' on me. "You're too much like the birds an' the beasts for it to ever injure you. Take it an' spend it—drink it, throw it away, burn it up, destroy it, an' when it is gone come back here an' live in the open again an' you'll never be far from the spirit of God."
Well, I knew it was ol' Cast Steel who was speakin', but it was mighty hard to believe it. "I don't mean no disrespect to you, Jabez," I sez, edgin' toward the door, "but I'll see you damned first." An' I slid outside an' straddled a pony an' rode till the dawn wind blew all the fever out of me an' let the sunshine in.
All books are sourced from Project Gutenberg