The Girl of the Golden West (10 page)

The Girl laughed.

"Me waltz? Me?" she cried, answering Johnson at last. "Oh, I
can't waltz but I can polky."

Once more Johnson bent his tall figure to the ground, and
said:

"Then may I have the pleasure of the next polka?"

By this time Sonora had recovered from his astonishment. After
giving vent to a grunt expressive of his contempt, he blurted
out:

"That fellow's too flip!"

But the idea had taken hold of the Girl, though she temporised
shyly:

"Oh, I dunno! Makes me feel kind o' foolish, you know, kind o'
retirin' like a elk in summer."

Johnson smiled in spite of himself.

"Elks are retiring," was his comment as he again advanced and
offered his arm in an impressive and ceremonious manner.

"Well, I don't like everybody's hand on the back o' my waist,"
said the Girl, running her hands up and down her dress skirt. "But,
somehow—" She stopped, and fixing her eyes recklessly on Rance,
made a movement as if about to accept; but another look at
Johnson's proffered arm so embarrassed her that she sent a look of
appeal to the rough fellows, who stood watching her with grinning
faces.

"Oh, Lord, must I?" she asked; then, hanging back no longer, she
suddenly flung herself into his arms with the cry: "Oh, come
along!"

Promptly Johnson put his arm around the Girl's waist, and
breaking into a polka he swung her off to the dance-hall where
their appearance was greeted with a succession of wild whoops from
the men there, as well as from the hilarious boys, who had rushed
pell-mell after them.

Left to himself and in a rage Rance began to pace the floor.

"Cleaned out—cleaned out for fair by a high-toned, fine-haired
dog named Johnson! Well, I'll be—" The sentence was never finished,
his attention being caught and held by something which Nick was
carrying in from the dance-hall.

"What's that?" he demanded brusquely.

Nick's eyes were twinkling when he answered:

"Johnson's saddle."

Rance could control himself no longer; with a sweep of his long
arm he knocked the saddle out of the other's hand, saying:

"Nick, I've a great notion to walk out of this door and never
step my foot in here again."

Nick did not answer at once. While he did not especially care
for Rance he did not propose to let his patronage, which was not
inconsiderable, go elsewhere without making an effort to hold it.
Therefore, he thought a moment before picking up the saddle and
placing it in the corner of the room.

"Aw, what you givin' us, Rance! She's only a-kiddin' 'im," at
last he said consolingly.

The Sheriff was about to question this when a loud cry from
outside arrested him.

"What's that?" he asked with his eyes upon the door.

"Why that's—that's Ashby's voice," the barkeeper informed him;
and going to the door, followed by Rance, as well as the men who,
on hearing the cry, had rushed in from the dance-hall, he opened
it, and they heard again the voice that they all recognised now as
that of the Wells Fargo Agent.

"Come on!" he was saying gruffly.

"What the deuce is up?" inquired Trinidad simultaneously with
the Deputy's cry of "Bring him in!" And almost instantly the
Deputy, followed by Ashby and others, entered, dragging along with
him the unfortunate Jose Castro. The rough handling that he had
received had not improved his appearance. His clothing, half
Mexican, the rest of odds and ends, had been torn in several
places. He looked oily, greasy and unwashed, while the eyes that
looked around in affright had lost none of their habitual
trickiness and sullenness.

And precisely as Castro appeared wholly different than when last
seen in the company of his master, so, too, was Ashby
metamorphosed. His hat was on the back of his head; his coat looked
as if he had been engaged in some kind of a struggle; his hair was
ruffled and long locks straggled down over his forehead; while his
face wore a brutal, savage, pitiless, nasty look.

By this time all the regular habitués of the saloon had come in
and were crowding around the greaser with scowling, angry
faces.

"The greaser on the trail!" gurgled Ashby in his glass, having
left his prisoner for a moment to fortify himself with a drink of
whisky.

Whereupon, the Sheriff advanced and, with rough hands, jerked
the prisoner's head brutally.

"Here you," he said, "give us a look at your face."

But the Sheriff had never seen him before. And in obedience to
his commands to "Tie him up!" the Deputy and Billy Jackrabbit took
a lariat from the wall and proceeded to bind their prisoner fast.
When this was done Ashby called to Nick to serve him another drink,
adding:

"Come on, boys!"

Instantly there was an exclamatory lining up at the bar, only
Sonora, apparently, seeming disinclined to accept, which Ashby was
quick to note. Turning to him quickly, he inquired:

"Say, my friend, don't you drink?"

But no insult had been intended by Sonora's omission; it was
merely most inconsiderate on his part of the feelings of others;
and, therefore, there was a note of apology in the voice that
presently said:

"Oh, yes, Mr. Ashby, I'm with you all right."

During this conversation the eyes of the greaser had been
wandering all over the room. But as the men moved away from him to
take their drinks he started violently and an expression of dismay
crossed his features. "Ramerrez' saddle!" he muttered to himself.
"
The Maestro
—he is taken!"

Just then there came a particularly loud burst of approval from
the spectators of the dancing going on in the adjoining room, and
instinctively the men at the bar half-turned towards the noise. The
prisoner's eyes followed their gaze and a fiendish grin replaced
the look of dismay on his face. "No, he is there dancing with a
girl," he said under his breath. A moment later Nick let down the
bearskin curtain, shutting off completely the Mexican's view of the
dance-hall.

"Come, now, tell us what your name is?" The voice was Ashby's
who, together with the others, now surrounded the prisoner. "Speak
up—who are you?"

"My name ees Jose Castro;" and then he added with a show of
pride: "
Ex-padrona
 of the bull-fights."

"But the bull-fights are at Monterey! Why do you come to this
place?"

All eyes instantly turned from the prisoner to Rance, who had
asked the question while seated at the table, and from him they
returned to the prisoner, most of the men giving vent to
exclamations of anger in tones that made the greaser squirm, while
Trinidad expressed the prevailing admiration of the Sheriff's poser
by crying out:

"That's the talk—you bet! Why do you come here?"

Castro's face wore an air of candour as he replied:

"To tell the Señor Sheriff I know where ees Ramerrez."

Rance turned on the prisoner a grim look.

"You lie!" he vociferated, at the same time raising his hand to
check the angry mutterings of the men that boded ill for the
greaser.

"Nay," denied Castro, strenuously, "pleanty
Mexican 
vaquero
—my friend Peralta, Weelejos all weeth
Ramerrez—so I know where ees."

Rance advanced and shot a finger in his face.

"You're one of his men yourself!" he cried hotly. But if he had
hoped by his accusation to take the man off his guard, it was
eminently unsuccessful, for the look on the greaser's face was
innocence itself when he declared:

"No, no, Señor Sheriff."

Rance reflected a moment; suddenly, then, he took another
tack.

"You see that man there?" he queried, pointing to the Wells
Fargo Agent. "That is Ashby. He is the man that pays out that
reward you've heard of." Then after a pause to let his words sink
in, he demanded gruffly: "Where is Ramerrez' camp?"

At once the prisoner became voluble.

"Come with me one mile, Señor," he said, "and by the soul of my
mother, the blessed Maria Saltaja, we weel put a knife into hees
back."

"One mile, eh?" repeated Rance, coolly.

The miners looked incredulous.

"If I tho't—" began Sonora, but Rance rudely cut in with:

"Where is this trail?"

"Up the Madrona Canyada," was the greaser's instant reply.

At this juncture a Ridge boy, who had pushed aside the bear-skin
curtain and was gazing with mouth wide open at the proceedings,
suddenly cried out:

"Why, hello, boys! What's the—" He got no further. In a
twinkling and with cries of "Shut up! Git!" the men made for the
intruder and bodily threw him out of the room. When quiet was
restored Rance motioned to the prisoner to proceed.

"Ramerrez can be taken—too well taken," declared the Mexican,
gaining confidence as he went on, "if many men come with me—in
forty minutes there—back."

Rance turned to Ashby and asked him what he thought about
it.

"I don't know what to think," was the Wells Fargo Agent's reply.
"But it certainly is curious. This is the second warning—intimation
that we have had that he is somewhere in this vicinity."

"And this Nina Micheltoreña—you say she is coming here
to-night?"

Ashby nodded assent.

"All the same, Rance," he maintained, "I wouldn't go. Better
drop in to The Palmetto later."

"What? Risk losin' 'im?" exclaimed Sonora, who had been
listening intently to their conversation.

"We'll take the chance, boys, in spite of Ashby's advice," Rance
said decisively. It was with not a little surprise that he heard
the shouts with which his words were approved by all save the Wells
Fargo Agent.

Now the miners made a rush for their coats, hats and saddles,
while from all sides came the cries of, "Come on, boys!
Careful—there! Ready—Sheriff!"

Gladly, cheerfully, Nick, too, did what he could to get the men
started by setting up the drinks for all hands, though he remarked
as he did so:

"It's goin' to snow, boys; I don't like the sniff in the
air."

But even the probability of encountering a storm—which in that
altitude was something decidedly to be reckoned with—did not deter
the men from proceeding to make ready for the road agent's capture.
In an incredibly short space of time they had loaded up and got
their horses together, and from the harmony in their ranks while
carrying out orders, it was evident that not a man there doubted
the success of their undertaking.

"We'll git this road agent!" sung out Trinidad, going out
through the door.

"Right you are, pard!" agreed Sonora; but at the door he called
back to the greaser: "Come on, you oily, garlic-eatin',
red-peppery, dog-trottin', sunbaked son of a skunk!"

"Come on, you…!" came simultaneously from the Deputy, now
untying the rope which bound the prisoner.

The greaser's teeth were chattering; he begged:

"One dreenk—I freeze…"

Turning to Nick the Deputy told him to give the man a drink,
adding as he left the room:

"Watch him—keep your eye on him a moment for me, will you?"

Nick nodded; and then regarding the Mexican with a contemptuous
look, he asked:

"What'll you have?"

The Mexican rose to his feet and began hesitatingly:

"Geeve me—" He paused; and then, starting with the thought that
had come to him, he shot a glance at the dance-hall and called out
loudly, rolling his r's even more pronouncedly than is the custom
with his race: "Aguardiente! Aguardiente!"

"Sit down!" ordered Nick, vaguely conscious that there was
something in the greaser's voice that was not there before.

The greaser obeyed, but not until he knew for a certainty that
his voice had been heard by his master.

"So you did bring in my saddle, eh, Nick?" asked the road agent,
coming quickly, but unconcernedly into the room and standing behind
his man.

Up to this time, Nick's eyes had not left the prisoner, but with
the appearance on the scene of Johnson, he felt that his
responsibility ceased in a measure. He turned and gave his
attention to matters pertaining to the bar. As a consequence, he
did not see the look of recognition that passed between the two
men, nor did he hear the whispered dialogue in Spanish that
followed.

"
Maestro! Ramerrez!
" came in whispered tones from
Castro.

"Speak quickly—go on," came likewise in whispered tones from the
road agent.

"I let them take me according to your bidding," went on
Castro.

"Careful, Jose, careful," warned his master while stooping to
pick up his saddle, which he afterwards laid on the faro table. It
was while he was thus engaged that Nick came over to the prisoner
with a glass of liquor, which he handed to him gruffly with:

"Here!"

At that moment several voices from the dance-hail called
somewhat impatiently: "Nick, Nick!"

"Oh, The Ridge boys are goin'!" he said, and seeming intuitively
to know what was wanted he made for the bar. But before acceding to
their wishes, he turned to Johnson, took out his gun and offered it
to him with the words: "Say, watch this greaser for a moment, will
you?"

"Certainly," responded Johnson, quickly, declining the other's
pistol by touching his own holster significantly. "Tell the Girl
you pressed me into service," he concluded with a smile.

"Sure." But on the point of going, the little barkeeper turned
to him and confided: "Say, the Girl's taken an awful fancy to
you."

"No?" deprecated the road agent.

"Yes," affirmed Nick. "Drop in often—great bar!"

Johnson smiled an assent as the other went out of the room
leaving master and man together.

"Now, then, Jose, go on," he said, when they were alone.

"
Bueno!
 Our men await the signal in the bushes
close by. I will lead the Sheriff far off—then I will slip away.
You quietly rob the place and fly—it is death for you to
linger—Ashby is here."