CHAPTER III
FIRST BLOOD
Judge Thayer had completed the round of Ascalon's business section withthe town's new peace officer, introducing him in due form. They stoodnow in front of the hotel, the plank awning of which extended over thesidewalk breaking the sun, Judge Thayer about to go his way.
"We've got to change this condition of things, Seth," he said, sweepinghis hand around the quiet square, where nothing seemed awake but a fewloafers along the shady fronts: "we've got to make it a day town insteadof a night roost for the buzzards that wake up after sundown."
Seth did not answer. He stood turning his red eyes up and down thestreet, as if calculating distances and advantages for futureemergencies. And as he looked there came driving into the somnolentsquare two men on a wagonload of bones.
"Old Joe Lynch; he's loadin' another car of bones," Judge Thayer said.
"He used to pick up meat for me," said Seth in his sententious way,neither surprised nor pleased on finding this associate of hisadventurous days here in this place of his new beginning.
Joe Lynch drove across the farther side of the square, a block away fromthe two officials of Ascalon. There he stopped only long enough to allowhis passenger to alight, and continued on to the railroad siding wherehis car stood.
Judge Thayer lingered under the hotel awning, where the breeze struckrefreshingly, perhaps making a pretense of being cooled that was greaterthan his necessity, curious to see who it was Lynch had brought to townon his melancholy load. The passenger, carrying his flat bag, came ontoward the hotel.
"He's a stranger to me," said the judge. His interest ending there, hewent his way to take up again the preparation of his case in defense ofthe cattle thief whom he knew to be a thief, and nothing but a thief.
Seth Craddock, the new marshal, glanced sharply at the stranger as heapproached the hotel. It was nothing more severe than Seth's ordinaryscrutiny, but it appeared to the traveler to be at once hostile andinhospitable, the look of a man who sneered out of his heart and carrieda challenge in his eyes. The stranger made the mental observation thatthis citizen was a sour-looking customer, who apparently resented thecoming of one more to the mills of Ascalon's obscene gods.
There was a cluster of flies on the open page of the hotel register,where somebody had put down a sticky piece of chocolate candy and leftit. This choice confection covered three or four lines immediately belowthe last arrival's name, its little trickling rivulets, which the flieswere licking up, spreading like a spider's legs. There was nobody in theoffice to receive the traveler's application for quarters, but evidenceof somebody in the remote parts of the house, whence came the sound of avoice more penetrating than musical, raised in song.
With her apurn pinned round her, He took her for a swan, But oh and a-las, it was poor Pol-ly Bawn.
So she sang, the words of the ancient ballad cutting through thepartition like a saw. There was a nasal quality in them, as if thesinger were moved to tears by the pathos of Poor Polly's end. Thetraveler laid a finger on the little bell that stood on the cigar case,sending his alarm through the house.
The song ceased, the blue door with DINING-ROOM in pink across itspanels, shut against the flies, opened with sudden jerk, as if by apetulant hand. There appeared one who might have been Polly Bawnherself, taken by the white apron that shrouded her figure fromshoulders to floor. She stood a moment in the door, seeing that it was astranger, half closing that gay portal to step behind it and give herhair that swift little adjustment which, with women the world over, isthe most essential part of the toilet. She appeared smiling then,somewhat abashed and coy, a fair short girl with a nice figure andpretty, sophisticated face, auburn curls dangling long at her ears, aprecise row of bangs coming down to her eyebrows. She was a pink andwhite little lady, quick on foot, quicker of the blue eyes whichmeasured the waiting guest from dusty feet to dusty hat in the glancethat flashed over him in business-like brevity.
"Was you wishin' a room?" she inquired.
"If you can accommodate me."
"Register," she said, in voice of command, whirling the book about. Atthe same time she discovered the forgotten confection, which she removedto the top of the cigar case with an annoyed ejaculation under herbreath that sounded rather strong. She applied her apron to the page,not helping it much, spreading the brown paste rather than removing it.
"You'll have to skip three or four lines, mister, unless you've got a'delible pencil."
"No, I haven't. I'll write down here where it's dry."
And there the traveler wrote, the girl looking on sharply, spelling theletters with silently moving lips as the pen trailed them:
Calvin Morgan, Des Moines, Ia.
"In and out, or regular?" the girl asked, twisting the book around toverify the upside-down spelling of his name.
"I expect it will be only for a few days," Morgan replied, smiling alittle at the pert sufficiency of the clerk.
"It's a dollar a day for board and room--in advance in this man's town."
"Why in this man's town, any more than any other man's town?" the guestinquired, amused.
"What would you think of a man that would run up a three weeks' bill andthen walk out there and let somebody put a bullet through him?" shereturned by way of answer.
"I think it would be a mean way to beat a board bill," he told her,seriously. "Do they do that right along here?"
"One smarty from Texas done it three or four months ago. Since then it'scash in advance."
Morgan thought it was a very wise regulation for a town where perilswere said to be so thick, all in keeping with the notoriety of Ascalon.He made inquiry about something to eat. The girl's face set indisfavoring cast as she tossed her head haughtily.
"Dinner's over long ago," she said.
Morgan made amends for this unwitting breach of the rules, wonderingwhat there was in the air of Ascalon that made people combative. Eventhis fresh-faced girl, not twenty, he was sure, was resentful, snappishwithout cause, inclined to quarrel if a word got crosswise in a man'smouth. As he turned these things in mind, casting about for some placeto stow his bag, the girl smiled across at him, the mockery going out ofher bright eyes. Perhaps it was because she felt that she had defendedthe ancient right of hostelers to rise in dignified front when atraveler spoke of a meal out of the regular hour, perhaps because therewas a gentleness and sincerity in the tall, honest-looking man beforeher that reached her with an appeal lacking in those who commonly cameand went before her counter.
"Put your grip over there," she nodded, "and I'll see what I can find.If you don't mind a snack--" she hesitated.
"Anything--a slab of cold meat and a cup of coffee."
"I'll call you," she said, starting for the blue door.
The girl had reached the dining-room door when there entered from thestreet a man, lurching when he walked as if the earth tipped under himlike the deck of a ship. He was a young and slender man, dressed ratherloudly in black sateen shirt and scarlet necktie, with broad blue,tassel-ornamented sleeve holders about his arms. He wore neither coatnor vest, but was belted with a pistol and booted and spurred, hiscalling of cowboy impressed in every line.
The girl paused, hand on the door, waiting to see what he wanted, andturned back when he rested his arms on the cigar case, clicking theglass with a coin. While she was making change for him, the cowboy stoodwith his newly bought cigar in his mouth, scanning the register. Heseemed sober enough when standing still, save for the vacant,liquor-dead look of his eyes.
"Who wrote that?" he asked, pointing to Morgan's name.
"That gentleman," the girl replied, placing his change before him.
The cowboy picked up his money with numb fingers, fumbled to put it inhis pocket, dropping it on the floor. He kicked at it with a curse andlet it lie, scowling meantime at Morgan with angry eyes.
"Too good to write your name next to mine, are you?" he sneered. "Afraidit'd touch your fancy little handwritin', was you?"
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"I didn't know it was your name, pardner," Morgan returned, conciliatinghim as he would an irresponsible child. "Why, I'd walk a mile to writemy name next to yours any day. There was something on the book----"
"You spit on it! You spit on my name!" the foolish fellow charged,laying hand to his pistol. "A man that's too good to write his name nextto mine's too good to stay in the same house with me. You'll hit thebreeze out of here, pardner, or you'll swaller lead!"
The girl came swiftly from behind the counter, and ran lightly to thedoor. Morgan put up his hand to silence the young man, knowing well thathe could catch his slow arm before he could drag his gun two inches fromthe holster.
"Keep your gun where it is, old feller," he suggested, rather thanwarned, in good-natured tone. "I didn't mean any insult, but I'll takemy hat off and apologize to you if you want me to. There was a piece ofcandy on the book right----"
"I'll put a piece of hot iron in your guts!" the cowboy threatened. Heleaned over the register, hand still on his pistol, and tore out theoffending page, crumpling it into a ball. "You'll eat this, then you'llhit the road back where you come from!"
The girl was beckoning to somebody from the door. Morgan was moreannoyed and shamed by his part in this foolish scene than he wasdisturbed by any feeling of danger. He stood watching the young man'sshooting arm. There was not more than five feet between them; a step, asharp clip on the jaw, and the young fool would be helpless. Morgan wassetting himself to act, for the cowboy, whose face was warrant that hewas a simple, harmless fellow when sober, was dragging on his gun, whenone came hastening in past the girl.
This was a no less important person than the new city marshal, whomMorgan had seen without knowing his official standing, as he arrived atthe hotel.
"This man's raisin' a fuss here--he's tore the register--look what he'sdone--tore the register!" the indignant girl charged.
"You're arrested," said the marshal. "Come on."
The cowboy stood mouthing his cigar, a weak look of scorn and derisionin his flushed face. His right hand was still on his pistol, the waddedpage of the register in the other.
"You'd better take his gun," Morgan suggested to the marshal, "he's sodrunk he might hurt himself with it."
Seth Craddock fixed Morgan a moment with his sullen red eyes, in whichthe sneer of his heart seemed to speak. But his lips added nothing tothe insult of that disdainful look. He jerked his head toward the doorin command to his prisoner to march.
"Come out! I'll fight both of you!" the cowboy challenged, making forthe door. He was squarely in it, one foot lifted in his drunkenbalancing to step down, when Seth Craddock jerked out his pistol betweenthe lifting and the falling of that unsteady foot, and shot theretreating man in the back. The cowboy pitched forward into the street,where he lay stretched and motionless, one spurred foot still in thedoor.
Morgan sprang forward with an exclamation of shocked protest at thisunjustified slaughter, while the girl, her blue eyes wide in horror,shrunk against the counter, hands pressed to her cheeks, a cry ofoutraged pity ringing from her lips.
"Resist an officer, will you?" said the city marshal, as he strodeforward and looked down on the first victim in Ascalon of the woefulharvest his pistol was to reap. So saying, as if publishing hisjustification, he sheathed his weapon and walked out, as little moved asif he had shot the bottom out of a tomato can in practice among friends.
A woman came hastening from the back of the house with dough on herhands, a worn-faced woman, whose eyes were harried and afraid as if theyhad looked on violence until horror had set its seal upon them. Sheexclaimed and questioned, panting, frantic, holding her dough-cloggedfingers wide as she bent to look at the slain man in her door.
"It was the new marshal Judge Thayer was in here with just afterdinner," the girl explained, the pink gone out of her pretty face, thereflection of her mother's horror in her eyes.
"My God!" said the woman, clutching her breast, looking with a wilderterror into Morgan's face.
"Oh, I wish they'd take him away! I wish they'd take him away!" the girlmoaned, cringing against the counter, covering her face with her hands.
Outside a crowd collected around the fallen man, for common as death byviolence was in the streets of Ascalon, the awe of its swift descent,the hushing mystery of its silence, fell as coldly over the hearts ofmen there as in the walks of peace. Presently the busy undertaker camewith his black wagon to gather up this broken shape of what had been aman but a few minutes past.
The marshal did not trouble himself in the case further. Up the streetMorgan saw him sauntering along, unmoved and unconcerned, from alloutward show, as if this might have been just one incidental task in abusy day. Resentment rose in Morgan as he watched the undertaker and hishelper load the body into the wagon with unfeeling roughness; as he sawthe marshal go into a saloon with a crowd of noisy fellows from thestock pens who appeared to be applauding his deed.
This appeared to Morgan simply murder in the name of the law. Thatbragging, simple, whisky-numbed cowboy could not have hurt a cat. Alldesire for dinner was gone out of Morgan's stomach, all thought ofpreparing it from the girl's mind. She stood in the door with hermother, watching the black wagon away with this latest victim to becrushed in Ascalon's infernal mill, twisting her fingers in her apron,her face as white as the flour on her mother's hands. The undertaker'sman came hurrying back with a bucket of water and broom. The womenturned away out of the door then, while he briskly went to work washingup the dark little puddle that spread on the boards of the sidewalk.
"Dora, where's your pa?" the elder woman asked, stopping suddenly as shecrossed the room, her face drawn in a quick stroke of fear, her handslifted to ease the smothering in her breast again.
"I don't know, Ma. He ain't been around since dinner."
The woman went to the door again, to lean and peer up and down thestreet with that great anxiety and trouble in her face that made it old,and distorted the faint trace of lingering prettiness out of it as ifit had been covered with ashes.
"He's comin'," she said presently, in voice of immeasurable relief. Sheturned away from the door without allowing her glance to fall directlyon the wet spot left by the undertaker's man.
Mother and daughter talked together in low words, only a few of whichnow and then reached Morgan as he stood near the counter where themutilated register lay, turning this melancholy event in his thoughts.He recovered the torn crumpled page from the floor, smoothed andreplaced it in the book. A man came in, the woman turning with a quickglad lighting of the face to meet him.
"O Tommy! I was worried to death!" she said.
Tom Conboy, proprietor of the Elkhorn, as the hotel was called, gruntedin discount of this anxiety as he turned his shifty eyes to thestranger, flicking them on and off like a fly. He saw the coins droppedby the cowboy, picked them up, put them in his pocket, face red fromwhat evidently was unaccustomed effort as he straightened his back.
"You seem to be gettin' mighty flush with money around this joint," hesaid, severe censure in his tone.
"He dropped it--the man the marshal shot dropped it--it was his," thegirl explained. "I wouldn't touch it!" she shuddered, "not for anythingin the world!"
"Huh!" said Conboy, easily, entirely undisturbed by the dead man's moneyin his pocket.
"My God! I wish he hadn't done it here!" the woman moaned.
"I didn't think he'd shoot him or I wouldn't 'a' called him," the girlpleaded, pity for the deed in her shocked voice. "He didn't need to doit--he didn't have to do it, at all!"
"Sh-h-h! No niggers in Ireland, now--no-o-o niggers in Ireland!"
Conboy shook his head at her as he spoke, pronouncing this ratheramazing and altogether irrelevant declaration with the utmost gravity,an admonitory, cautioning inflection in his naturally grave and resonantvoice. The girl said no more on the needless sacrifice of the youngman's life.
"I was goin' to get this gentleman some dinner," she said.
"You'd better go on and
do it, then," her father directed, gently enoughfor a man of his stamp, rather surprisingly gentle, indeed, Morganthought.
Tom Conboy was a short-statured man, slight; his carefully trimmed graybeard lending a look of serious wisdom to his face which the shiftinessof his insincere eyes at once seemed to controvert. He wore neither coatnor vest, but a white shirt with broad starched bosom, a large goldbutton in its collarless neckband. A diamond stud flashed in the middleof his bosom; red elastic bands an inch broad, with silver buckles, heldup the slack of the sleeves which otherwise would have enveloped hishands.
"Are you goin' to stay in the office a while now, Tommy, and look afterthings while Dora and I do the work?" the woman asked.
"I've got to get the jury together for the inquest," Conboy returned,with the briskness of a man of importance.
"Will I be wanted to give my testimony at the inquest, do you suppose?"Morgan inquired. "I was here when it happened; I saw the whole thing."
He spoke in the hope that he might be given the opportunity of relievingthe indignation, so strong in him that it was almost oppressive, beforethe coroner's jury. Tom Conboy shook his head.
"No, the marshal's testimony is all we'll need," Conboy replied."Resistin' arrest and tryin' to escape after arrest. That's all therewas to it. These fellers'll have to learn better than that with this newman. I know him of old--he's a man that always brings in the meat."
"But he didn't try to escape," Morgan protested. "He was so drunk hedidn't know whether he was coming or going."
Conboy looked at him disfavoringly, as if to warn him to be discreet inmatters of such remote concern to him as this.
"Tut, tut! no niggers in Ireland," said he, shaking his head with anexpression between a caution and a threat.