Sudden: Rides Again Read online

  “If it warn’t him why did he skip?” the stout one argued. “Would yu wait if the Ol’ Man promised to stretch yore neck?”

  The other hesitated; Keith’s reputation for keeping his word was well established. “It was his hoss,” he evaded.

  “Mebbe, with another fella straddling it,” Frosty retorted Lagley cut in. “Green told me hisself no one else could ride the black. He was as guilty as hell, an’ yu know it.”

  The cowboy stood up, his face suddenly stern. “What yu mean, I know it?” he asked, and his voice had an edge. “If yo’re tryin’ to rope me up with the rustlin’, yu an’ me’ll have a li’l argument, foreman or no.”

  Lagley’s gesture was one of impatience. “I didn’t mean nothin’ o’ the sort. Yu talk like a kid. Where’s the sense gettin’ sore over a cussed outlaw who oughta be swingin’ in a loop?”

  “He’s my friend.”

  “They say a fella is knowed by the company he mixes with,” Turvey sneered.

  “If there was any truth in that yu’d be damned lonely,” Frosty snapped.

  A black scowl was all the answer he received. Good tempered as he usually was, when the white-haired puncher went “on the prod,” none of the outfit was anxious to get in his way.

  Silver was in a seventh heaven. Passing along the street, the woman Anita had smiled at him from the entrance to her abode, and, when he paused in sheer bewilderment, invited him to come in and talk with her.

  “It is cool inside, and I am lonely,” she made excuse.

  The experience was a novel one; usually members of the other sex shrank from him in fear or repulsion. This fact, of which he was bitterly conscious, rendered him painfully shy whenever a female was even in sight. Anita was not so beautiful as Belle Dalroy, but she was young and comely. For a moment he hesitated, glancing right and left. Was she playing a joke upon him? Well, if so, he had it in his power to make it an expensive amusement. The thought gave him courage, and he went in. The squalid place set him more at ease, and he perched himself on a stool.

  “You like whisky?” she asked.

  Silver did; it made him forget that he was not as other men. His small, deep-set eyes glittered as she poured out nearly a full glass, handed it to him, and sat down.

  “Ain’t you drinkin’?” he asked, and grinned when she said the spirit burned her throat. “It don’t hurt mine,” he boasted. “The more it bites, the better I’m pleased.” He tilted the tumbler, absorbing half the contents at a gulp. “That’s the stuff; makes a man o’ one. Try some.” He emptied the glass as he spoke and held it out. This time she filled it.

  “I don’t want to be a man,” she smiled. “You are one already, important, a friend of the Chief.”

  “Friend?” he repeated, and his expression was hardly one of affection. Then, “So you reckon me a man—like the rest?”

  “Not like the rest,” she said softly. “You have the strength of three and—I admire strong men.”

  Silver drank again and laughed coarsely. “you shore picked a loser in Pedro.”

  “True, he was weak,” she said carelessly, and he did not detect the tremor in her voice. “I had almost forgotten him. The Chief would not dare do that to you.”

  The liquor and flattery were beginning to take effect. “He threatens me,” he growled. “Me, that could break him wlth my two hands, easy as snappin’ a stick.”

  His great paws rose in the air and dropped suddenly, portraying the act with such savage realism that the woman shivered. She was playing with something worse than fire, but she did not falter.

  “He would not have you whipped,” she said quietly, “but he might keep you shut up, as he does one other.”

  “What you know o’ that?”

  “Nothing, save his existence, and that he is seen only by the Chief, and you, who take him food.”

  “Why do you ask? Is this fella anythin’ to you?” the dwarf asked thickly.

  She laughed at him. “A man I’ve never seen? No, my friend, put it down to a woman’s curiosity. Don’t you like my whisky?”

  She passed the bottle and he helped himself liberally. “Best not meddle with what don’t concern you,” he warned. His covetous eyes dwelt on her. “You an’ me’d make a good team,” he said. “Allus wanted a woman o’ my own.”

  Anita shrugged. “you travel too fast,” she replied. “I’m not a dance-hall drab, and I’d never take up with one who wouldn’t trust me completely.”

  Silver was silent. He had to choose between a man who mocked him as a monstrosity and a woman who seemed blind to his physical defects and admired the one attribute on which he prided himself—his strength. In some such way his drink-bemused brain reasoned it out. He could take her, she was at his mercy, and since the passing of Pedro, she had no friends, but mere possession would not satisfy his craving; she must come to him willingly.

  Inwardly trembling, but outwardly calm, the woman watched him as might a desperate gambler the spinning wheel which spelled riches or ruin. She saw the huge claw-like fingers open and reach for her.

  “It’s a bargain, girl,” Silver said, and breathed heavily. “You an’ me—”

  She swayed back. “You must have patience, amigo,” she murmured, but her smile was kind. “Women like to be wooed, you know, and besides, you have not trusted me—yet. There is still some whisky; drink to our future.”

  With a raucous chuckle of triumph, Silver clutched the bottle, drained and flung it to the floor. Anita knew that the act signified surrender, but she had the wisdom to wait. He bent towards her, and in a low rumble, like far distant thunder, said: “There is a fella—I dunno who he is, but the Chief calls him his `ace in the hole,’ an’ he’d ruther lose an eye than let him go.”

  “What’s the poor devil done?”

  “Ain’t a notion, suthin’ bad, likely.”

  “His `ace in the hole,’ ” Anita mused. “That means he’s saving him for some special purpose. I’d like to see this man; ake me with you one time, Silver.”

  The massive shoulders shook with mirth. “I ain’t no wizard, glrl. To do that I’d have to get you through the Chief’s room, there’s no other way ‘less yo’re a bird,” Silver wheezed, and anxious to prove that she was asking the impossible, went on to explain that the captive was confined in a cavern below Satan’s, and only to be reached by padlocked trapdoors. “He keeps the keys hisself,” he finished.

  Her face fell. “But he goes away sometimes,” she urged.

  “An’ takes ‘em with him,” was the reply. “Mebbe he won’t come back one time an’ that hombre’ll just starve.”

  “A terrible death.”

  Hell, we all gotta go, sooner or later, but you an’ me’ll have a good innin’s first.”

  He stood up, staggering a little on his stumpy legs, and made an awkward attempt to seize her. She evaded him easily enough and shook her head.

  “Not yet, amigo, I am only half won,” she smiled. “The Chief will be missing you. Come again—if you wish.”

  Greatly to her relief, he went docilely enough; the reminder that his dreaded master might be waiting somewhat sobered him. When his lurching, tipsy figure had disappeared, she sank down on a stool.

  “God, what a weapon to have to use,” she muttered, and fell to thinking. Had she found a way of striking at the man who had flogged her lover to death and humiliated her? It seemed so, but she could see little hope of using her information.

  “That brute has no brain, and fears his keeper,” she decided.

  Alone, she was impotent. She must find a man wo was not afraid of the bandit chief, and where, in Hell City, was he to be found? With knitted brow, she puzzled over the problem, and then the strange cowboy who had buried her dead occurred to her. He appeared to be on good terms with the Red Mask, and yet ..

  “At least, he would not betray me,” she told herself.

  Sudden’s survey of the scene of the hold-up produced little. The ambushing party, he reported, consisted of four riders—he
had doubled the number—and having obtained the money, they had taken the northern trail. The latter was true, but he omitted to mention that after a couple of miles, they had swung south in the direction of the Twin Diamond. The Chief received the particulars with indifference.

  “It is, after all, a small matter,” he said. “I was annoyed at the time because I do not like my plans to miscarry, but …”

  Sudden, suspecting something behind this attitude, spent the next two days in the town. He would have liked to see Frosty or Merry but it was too dangerous; he had more than a dim suspicion that if he rode out, he would be followed.

  It was on the second evening, as he was returning to the saloon, that a whispered invitation from the darkness took him into Anita’s dwelling. A guttering candle served only to show the discomfort of the place.

  “I gotta thank yu for the word about Butch,” he said. “It was real useful.”

  “I couldn’t let you be tricked,” she replied quietly.

  It was a different woman to the one who had cajoled Silver. Anita divined that her present guest was not one to allow his senses to be deadened by drink or snared by desire; he would be more likely to appreciate frankness.

  “What are you to this mountebank who hides behind a mask?” she asked.

  “Just one of his men,” was the reply. “Holm’ up, like the rest of ‘em.” - Her gestute showed that she was dissatisfied with the answer. “You may have reasons for hiding, but you are different,” she said. “Why does Satan want you killed?”

  Sudden was silent for a moment. This woman had rendered him a service, but she might be playing a part, and his position in this den of desperadoes was too precarious for further risk.

  “News to me,” he said stolidly.

  “Butch was sent for on purpose,” she stated. “You don’t :rust me, and I cannot blame you, but I am going to put my cards on the table. Odd as it may seem, I cared for Pedro—he was my one friend, and yet, it was because of me he died. I have vowed to avenge him and am ready to run any hazard.”

  In the frail light of the flickering candle he saw her sombre eyes gleam and realized that she was in earnest. But what could a mere woman do against one who was all-powerful? She read something of his thought.

  “You are thinking I am mad,” she went on. “That a weak creature like myself cannot injure him. But I have already dealt a blow, for you are alive, and I know of another and greater one that will wound him far more deeply than the loss of his stolen steers, or the plunder from Bosville.”

  “How do you know these things?”

  She laughed contemptuously. “Men drink—and talk. If Satan wants his secrets kept, he should ban liquor and women from Hell City.”

  “Why are yu tellin’ me?”

  “It is something I cannot do myself, and you do not like the beast any better than I do.” She raised her head as she spoke, looking him squarely in the face, but learned nothing. “You should win at any card game. Listen.” She gave him the gist of her interview with Silver, ending, “Who is this man, and why is he buried alive?”

  “I reckon we’ll have to ask him that, ma’am,” Sudden said. Instantly her face lit up with a fierce joy. “you’ll help me?” she cried. “Then we shall succeed.”

  “I’m obliged for yore good opinion, ma’am,” the puncher said a trifle ironically. “All we gotta do is steal the key from Silver or his master, get ‘em both out’n the road …”

  “Hopeless,” she decided, and sat, her face cupped in her hands, thinking. “Silver said there was no other way save for a bird,” she mused. “What did that mean?”

  “Plain enough,” was the reply. “All these caverns have holes for light an’ air.”

  “That will be it,” Anita said eagerly. “Could a man clever with a rope climb up?”

  “In the daylight, mebbe, but at night he’d need the eyes an’ claws of a cat,” Sudden told her. “Allasame, it seems to be the on’y chance. That big ape might win out—he’s built for it.”

  “He fears the whip and would turn traitor,” she said.

  “I’ll look it over in the mornin’,” the puncher promised.

  In the seclusion of his room at the saloon, he dwelt again on the strange story. The mysterious prisoner could not be one of Bleke’s men; the body of the first had been returned, and Sudden himself had accounted for the second. Satan’s “ace in the hole”—the phrase recurred to him; if indeed the unknown was a winning card in the bandit’s crooked game, he must be spirited away, and hidden—where?

  “The Double K? No, Steve would talk,” he muttered. “I guess Merry could use another band.”

  Having settled this point, he turned in and slept as though Hell City and its problems did not exist.

  Chapter XVIII

  “Nigger, it’s goin’ to be dead easy—to break my fool neck.”

  At sunrise, Sudden had slipped out of the town by the ‘western exit, followed the beaten track for over a mile and then struck north until he reached an open strip of sand and scrub. Crossing this, he hid in the bushes and waite Presently, satisfied that his movements were not being spied upon, he circled round and was now at the foot of the precipice on the brink of which stood Hell City. He had no fear of discovery here, for the trees and undergrowth afforded complete cover even for a horseman, Before him rose the vertical cliff, bare save for occasional clumps of cactus, coarse grass, and, here and there, a shrunken shrub, mesquite or sage, fighting tenaciously for life against the inhospitable surroundings. At a first glance, the task of scaling the height appeared an impossibility, but the puncher knew what to look for. One by one, his experienced eye picked out tiny crevices and ledges which might serve as hand or footholds. He noted too that, twenty feet up, the wall was a little less abrupt and more broken.

  Moving backwards, he could see the great, jagged rampart of rock which formed one side of the bandit settlement, pitted with its primitive windows. Remembering that he had buried the Mexican almost immediately below Anita’s, enabled him to locate Satan’s quarters with some certainty. Twenty feet below, and a little to the right, was another opening.

  “That’ll be where he had Dolver,” he reflected. “Didn’t notice any trapdoor but there was plenty else to look at.” A third hole, lower, and still further away, attracted his attention. “Reckon that’s it,” he said, and mentally measured the distance. “She’s a seventy-foot climb, an’ I’m admittin’ a little moonlight’ll be welcome.”

  For a long time he remained, selecting a route up the rock, studying each step and fixing them in his mind. There could be no margin for error; one slip and … At length, satisfied he had done all that was possible, he retraced his way to the town. The saloon-keeper had news for him.

  “Silver’s bin twice,” he said. “Dunno what he wanted.”

  “The Chief is anxious ‘bout my health, I expect,” Sudden smiled. “I’ll go an’ set his mind at rest.”

  Satan appeared to be in a friendly mood, which put the puncher on his guard. To a careless question as to what he had been doing he replied, “Givin’ my hoss a li’l run—idleness don’t suit neither of us.”

  “Then you’ll be glad to hear I have some work for you. The stage from the East should reach Red Rock before sundown tonight. It will carry forty thousand dollars in gold consigned to the bank. About five miles short of the town the road dips and then rises quickly where it passes through a tract of timber. There is excellent cover; in fact, the place might have been designed for our purpose. You understand?”

  “Shorely. Do I play a lone hand?”

  “No, Scar and his men will go with you—five should be sufficient. They have their orders.”

  Somehow, the last four words had an ominous sound. Why had these men, with whom he had clashed more than once, been chosen? Sudden asked himself. But if the masked man expected protest he was disappointed.

  “Suits me,” Sudden said off-handedly. “I’ll go hunt them fellas up right away. See yu tomorrow—mebbe.”


  “Yes,” Satan said, and when his visitor had gone, added the one word, “Maybe.”

  The puncher did not at once seek his assistants, it was early ‘et, and there was time to spare. Instead, he routed out young Holt.

  “Still honin’ for a chance to get outa here?” he asked, and when he saw the eager look come into the lad’s eyes, went on, “I’m givin’ yu one. Got a hoss? Good. Know Red Rock?”

  “On’y where it is—never bin there.”

  “Yo’re goin’, right away, an’ when yu make it, search out the sheriff an’ tell him to take a strong posse to meet the coach tonight ‘bout seven mile out an’ escort her to town. Sabe?”

  Holt looked dubious. “I ain’t stuck much on meetin’ sheriffs,” he muttered.

  “Shucks,” Sudden replied. “Yore trouble was down South, huh? Red Rock won’t know nothin’ of yu. Tell ‘em yu been held prisoner by the gang what’s aimin’ to rob the coach, an’ gettin loose, yu came to warn ‘em. They’ll be too grateful to ask questions.”

  “I’ll risk it,” the boy said. “It’s mighty good o’ you, mister, but how’ll I get outa Hell City?”

  Sudden gave him certain instructions and then went to the saloon, where, as he expected, he found his men huddled round a table, drinking.

  “We start in twenty minutes from the west gate,” he said. “The main trail from Dugout is easier,” Scar objected. “I’m handlin’ this,” the puncher replied curtly, and went to make his own preparations.

  “Quite the boss, ain’t he?” Scar sneered. “Well, we can stand it for a while, seein’ it means a double-barrelled chance to pay off a score an’ collect a stake.”

  “Ten thousand bucks apiece, fair handed to us at that,” Daggs chuckled. “I can swaller a lot o’ lip at the price.”

  “Same here,” Squint agreed. “When do we square with that—?”

  “After the stick-up, o’ course,” Scar told him. “Five ain’t too many, an’ besides, if anythin’ goes wrong, he’s in charge an’ takes the blame.”

  The other applauded the wisdom of this course and complimented the maker of it upon his foresight. Meanwhile, Sudden had ridden to the gate and prevailed upon the custodian to open it on the plea that his party was late, and they had no time to lose.