CHAPTER IX
MR. HOLDEN DROPS IN
Mr. Cassidy dismounted and viewed the building with open disgust,walking around it to see what held it up, and when he finally realizedthat it was self-supporting his astonishment was profound. Undoubtedlythere were shacks in the United States in worse condition, but he hopedtheir number was small. Of course he knew that the building was small.Of course he knew that the building would make a very good place ofdefence, but for the sake of argument he called to his companion andurged that they be satisfied with what defence they could extemporize inthe open. Mr. Connors hotly and hastily dissented as he led the horsesinto the building, and straightway the subject was arbitrated with muchfeeling and snappy eloquence. Finally Hopalong thought that Red was achump, and said so out loud, whereat Red said unpleasant things abouthis good friend's pedigree, attributes, intelligence, et al., even goingso far as to prognosticate his friend's place of eternal abode. Theremarks were fast getting to be somewhat personal in tenor when a whinein the air swept up the scale to a vicious shriek as it passed betweenthem, dropped rapidly to a whine again and quickly died out in thedistance, a flat report coming to their ears a few seconds later.Invisible bees seemed to be winging through the air, the angry andvenomous droning becoming more pronounced each passing moment, and theirregular cracking of rifles grew louder rapidly. An angry _s-p-a-t!_told of where a stone behind them had launched the ricochet which hurledskyward with a wheezing scream. A handful of 'dobe dust sprang from thecorner of the building and sifted down upon them, causing Red to cough.
"That ricochet was a Sharps!" exclaimed Hopalong, and they lost no timein getting into the building, where the discussion was renewed as theyprepared for the final struggle. Red grunted his cheerful approval, fornow he was out of the blazing sun and where he could better appreciatethe musical tones of the flying bullets; but his companion, slammingshut the door and propping it with a fallen roof-beam, grumbled andfinally gave rein to his rancor by sneering at the Winchester.
"It shore gets me that after all I have said about that gun you willtote it around with you and force yoreself into a suicide's grave,"quoth Mr. Cassidy, with exuberant pugnacity. "I ain't in no wayobjecting to the suicide part of it, but I can't see that it's at allfair to drag _me_ onto the edge of everlasting eternity with you. If youain't got no regard for yore own life you shore ought to think a littleabout yore friend's. Now you'll waste all yore cartridges an' thencome snooping around me to borrow my gun. Why don't you lose the damnedthing?"
"What I pack ain't none of yore business, which same I'll uphold,"retorted Mr. Connors, at last able to make himself heard. "You get overon yore own side an' use yore Colt; I've wondered a whole lot where youever got the sense to use a Colt--_I_ wouldn't be a heap surprised tosee you toting a pearl-handled .22, like the kids use. Now you 'tend toyore grave-yard aspirants, an' lemme do the same with mine."
"The Lord knows I've stood a whole lot from you because you just can'thelp being foolish, but I've got plumb weary and sick of it. It stopsright here or you won't get no 'Paches," snorted Hopalong, peeringintently through a hole in the shack. The more they squabbled the betterthey liked it,--controversies had become so common that they weremerely a habit; and they served to take the grimness out of desperatesituations.
"Aw, you can't lick one side of me," averred Red loftily. "You never didstop anybody that was anything," he jeered as he fired from his window."Why, you couldn't even hit the bottom of the Grand Canyon if you leanedover the edge."
"You could, if you leaned too far, you red-headed wart of a half-breed,"snapped Hopalong. "But how about the Joneses, Tarantula Charley, SlimTravennes, an' all the rest? How about them, hey?"
"Huh! You couldn't 'a' got any of 'em if they had been sober," and Mr.Connors shook so with mirth that the Indian at whom he had fired gotaway with a whole skin and cheerfully derided the marksman. "That 'Pacheshore reckons it was you shooting at him, I missed him so far. Now, youshut up--I want to get some so we can go home. I don't want to stay outhere all night an' the next day as well," Red grumbled, his words dyingslowly in his throat as he voiced other thoughts.
Hopalong caught sight of an Apache who moved cautiously through achaparral lying about nine hundred yards away. As long as the distantenemy lay quietly he could not be discerned, but he was not contentwith assured safety and took a chance. Hopalong raised his rifle to hisshoulder as the Indian fired and the latter's bullet, striking theedge of the hole through which Mr. Cassidy peered, kicked up a generoushandful of dust, some of which found lodgment in that individual's eyes.
"Oh! Oh! Oh! Wow!" yelled the unfortunate, dancing blindly around theroom in rage and pain, and dropping his rifle to grab at his eyes. "Oh!Oh! Oh!"
His companion wheeled like a flash and grabbed him as he stumbled past."Are you plugged bad, Hoppy? Where did they get you? Are you hit bad?"and Red's heart was in his voice.
"No, I ain't plugged bad!" mimicked Hopalong. "I ain't plugged at all!"he blazed, kicking enthusiastically at his solicitous friend. "Get mesome water, you jackass! Don't stand there like a fool! I ain't going tofall down. Don't you know my eyes are full of 'dobe?"
Red, avoiding another kick, hastily complied, and as hastily leftMr. Cassidy to wash out the dirt while he returned to his post by thewindow. "Anybody'd think you was full of red-eye, the way you act,"muttered Red peevishly.
Hopalong, rubbing his eyes of the dirt, went back to the hole in thewall and looked out. "Hey, Red! Come over here an' spill that brave'sconceit. I can't keep my eyes open long enough to aim, an' it's a niceshot, too. It'd serve him right if you got him!"
Mr. Connors obeyed the summons and peered out cautiously. "I can't seehim, nohow; where is the coyote?"
"Over there in that little chaparral; see him now? _There!_ See himmoving. Do you mean to tell me--"
"Yep; I see him, all right. You watch," was the reply. "He's just overnine hundred--where's yore Sharps?" He took the weapon, glanced at theBuffington sight, which he found to be set right, and aimed carefully.
Hopalong blinked through another hole as his friend fired and saw theIndian flop down and crawl aimlessly about on hands and knees. "What'she doing now, Red?"
"Playing marbles, you chump; an' here goes for his agate," replied theman with the Sharps, firing again. "There! Gee!" he exclaimed, as abullet hummed in through the window he had quitted for the moment, andthudded into the wall, making the dry adobe fly. It had missed him byonly a few inches and he now crept along the floor to the rear of theroom and shoved his rifle out among the branches of a stunted mesquitewhich grew before a fissure in the wall. "You keep away from that windyfor a minute, Hoppy," he warned as he waited.
A terror-stricken lizard flashed out of the fissure and along the wallwhere the roof had fallen in and flitted into a hole, while a fly buzzedloudly and hovered persistently around Red's head, to the rage of thatindividual. "Ah, ha!" he grunted, lowering the rifle and peering throughthe smoke. A yell reached his ears and he forthwith returned to hiswindow, whistling softly.
Evidently Mr. Cassidy's eyes were better and his temper sweeter, for hehummed "Dixie" and then jumped to "Yankee Doodle," mixing the twoairs with careless impartiality, which was a sign that he was thinkingdeeply. "Wonder what ever became of Powers, Red. Peculiar feller, hewas."
"In jail, I reckon, if drink hasn't killed him."
"Yes; I reckon so," and Mr. Cassidy continued his medley, which promptedhis friend quickly to announce his unqualified disapproval.
"You can make more of a mess of them two songs than anybody I ever heardmurder 'em! _Shut up!_"--and the concert stopped, the vocalist ventinghis feelings at an Indian, and killing the horse instead.
"Did you get him?" queried Red.
"Nope; but I got his cayuse," Hopalong replied, shoving a freshcartridge into the foul, greasy breech of the Sharps. "An' here's whereI get him--got to square up for my eyes some way," he muttered, firing."Missed! Now what do you think of that!" he exclaimed.
"
Better take my Winchester," suggested Red, in a matter-of-fact way, buthe chuckled softly and listened for the reply.
"Aw, you go to the devil!" snapped Mr. Cassidy, firing again. "Whoop!Got him that time!"
"Where?" asked his companion, with strong suspicion.
"None of yore business!"
"Aw, darn it! Who spilled the water?" yelled Red, staring blankly at theoverturned canteen.
"Pshaw! Reckon I did, Red," apologized his friend ruefully. "Now of allthe cussed luck!"
"Oh, well; we've got another, an' you had to wash out yore eyes. Luckywe each had one--_Holy smoke!_ It's most all gone! The top is loose!"
Heartfelt profanity filled the room and the two disgusted punchers wentsullenly back to their posts. It was a calamity of no small magnitude,for, while food could be dispensed with for a long time if necessary,going without water was another question. It was as necessary ascartridges.
Then Hopalong laughed at the ludicrous side of the whole affair, therebyrevealing one of the characteristics which endeared him to his friends.No matter how desperate a situation might be, he could always find in itsomething at which to laugh. He laughed going into danger and coming outof it, with a joke or a pleasantry always trembling on the end of histongue.
"Red, did it ever strike you how cussed thirsty a feller gets justas soon as he knows he can't have no drink? But it don't make muchdifference, nohow. We'll get out of this little scrape just as we'veallus got out of trouble. There's some mad war-whoops outside that areworse off than we are, because they are at the wrong end of yore gun. Ifeel sort of sorry for 'em."
"Yo're shore a happy idiot," grinned Red. "Hey! Listen!"
Galloping was heard and Hopalong, running to the door, looked outthrough a crack as sudden firing broke out around the rear of the shack,and fell to pulling away the props, crying, "It's a puncher, Red; he'sriding this way! Come on an' help him in!"
"He's a blamed fool to ride this way! I'm with you!" replied Red,running to his side.
Half a mile from the house, coming across the open space as fast as hecould urge his horse, rode a cowboy, and not far behind him raced abouta dozen Apaches, yelling and firing.
Red picked up his companion's rifle, and steadying it against thejamb of the door, fired, dropping one of the foremost of the pursuers.Quickly reloading again, he fired and missed. The third shot struckanother horse, and then taking up his own gun he began to fire rapidly,as rapidly as he could work the lever and yet make his shots tell.Hopalong drew his Colt and ran back to watch the rear of the house, andit was well that he did so, for an Apache in that direction, believingthat the trapped punchers were so busily engaged with the newdevelopments as to forget for the moment, sprinted towards theback window; and he had gotten within twenty paces of the goal whenHopalong's Colt cracked a protest. Seeing that the warrior was no longera combatant, Mr. Cassidy ran back to the door just as the stranger fellfrom his horse and crawled past Red. The door slammed shut, the propsfell against it, and the two friends turned to the work of driving backthe second band, which, however, had given up all hope of rushing thehouse in the face of Red's telling fire, and had sought cover instead.
The stranger dragged himself to the canteens and drank what little waterremained, and then turned to watch the two men moving from place toplace, firing coolly and methodically. He thought he recognized one ofthem from the descriptions he had heard, but he was not sure.
"My name's Holden," he whispered hoarsely, but the cracking of therifles drowned his voice. During a lull he tried again. "My name'sHolden," he repeated weakly. "I'm from the Cross-O-Cross, an' can't getback there again."
"Mine's Cassidy, an' that's Connors, of the Bar-20. Are you hurt verybad?"
"No; not very bad," lied Holden, trying to smile. "Gee, but I'm glad Ifell in with you two fellers," he exclaimed. He was but little more thana boy, and to him Hopalong Cassidy and Red Connors were names with whichto conjure. "But I'm plumb sorry I went an' brought you more trouble,"he added regretfully.
"Oh, pshaw! We had it before you came--you needn't do no worrying aboutthat, Holden; besides, I reckon you couldn't help it," Hopalong grinnedfacetiously. "But tell us how you came to mix up with that bunch," hecontinued.
Holden shuddered and hesitated a moment, his companions alertlyshifting from crack to crack, window to window, their rifles cracking atintervals. They appeared to him to act as if they had done nothing elseall their lives but fight Indians from that shack, and he braced up alittle at their example of coolness.
"It's an awful story, awful!" he began. "I was riding towards Hoyt'sCorners an' when I got about half way there I topped a rise an' saw anester's house about half a mile away. It wasn't there the last time Irode that way, an' it looked so peaceful an' home-like that I stoppedan' looked at it a few minutes. I was just going to start again whenthat war-party rode out of a barranca close to the house an' wentstraight for it at top speed. It seemed like a dream, 'cause I thoughtApaches never got so far east. They don't, do they? I thought not--thesemust 'a' got turned out of their way an' had to hustle for safety.Well, it was all over purty quick. I saw 'em drag out two womenan'--an'--purty soon a man. He was fighting like fury, but he didn'tlast long. Then they set fire to the house an' threw the man's body upon the roof. I couldn't seem to move till the flames shot up, but thenI must 'a' went sort of loco, because I emptied my gun at 'em, which wasplumb foolish at that distance, for me. The next thing I knowed was thathalf of 'em was coming my way as hard as they could ride, an' I litout instanter; an' here I am. I can't get that sight outen my headnohow--it'll drive me loco!" he screamed, sobbing like a child from thehorror of it all.
His auditors still moved around the room, growing more and morevindictive all the while and more zealously endeavoring to create astill greater deficit in one Apache war-party. They knew what he hadlooked upon, for they themselves had become familiar with the work ofApaches in Arizona. They could picture it vividly in all its devilishhorror. Neither of them paid any apparent attention to their companion,for they could not spare the time, and, also, they believed it best tolet him fight out his own battles unassisted.
Holden sobbed and muttered as the minutes dragged along, at times actingso strangely as to draw a covert side-glance from one or both of theBar-20 punchers. Then Mr. Connors saw his boon companion suddenly leanout of a window and immediately become the target for the hard-workingenemy. He swore angrily at the criminal recklessness of it. "Hey, you!Come in out of that! Ain't you got no brains at all, you blasted idiot!Don't you know that we need every gun?"
"Yes; that's right. I sort of forgot," grinned the reckless one, obeyingwith alacrity and looking sheepish. "But you know there's two thunderingbig tarantulas out there fighting like blazes. You ought to see 'emjump! It's a sort of a leap-frog fight, Red."
"Fool!" snorted Mr. Connors belligerently. "_You'd_ 'a' jumped if one ofthem slugs had 'a' got you! Yo're the damnedest fool that ever walked ontwo laigs, you blasted sage-hen!" Mr. Connors was beginning to lose histemper and talk in his throat.
"Well, they didn't get me, did they? What you yelling about, anyhow?"growled Hopalong, trying to brazen it out.
"An' _you_ talking about suicide to me!" snapped Mr. Connors, determinedto rub it in and have the last word.
Mr. Holden stared, open-mouthed, at the man who could enjoy a miserablespider fight under such distressing circumstances, and his shaken nervesbecame steadier as he gave thought to the fact that he was a companionof the two men about whose exploits he had heard so much. Evidently thestories had not been exaggerated. What must they think of him for givingway as he had? He rose to his feet in time to see a horse blunder intothe open on Red's side of the house, and after it blundered its owner,who immediately lost all need of earthly conveyances. Holden laughedfrom the joy of being with a man who could shoot like that, and hetook up his rifle and turned to a crack in the wall, filled with thedetermination to let his companions know that he was built of the rightkind of timber after all, wounded as he
was.
Red's only comment, as he pumped a fresh cartridge into the barrel, was,"He must 'a' thought he saw a spider fight, too."
"Hey, Red," called Hopalong. "The big one is dead."
"What big one?"
"Why, don't you remember? That big tarantula I was watching. One wasbigger than the other, but the little feller shore waded into him an'--"
"Go to the devil!" shouted Red, who had to grin, despite his anger.
"Presently, presently," replied Hopalong, laughing.
So the day passed, and when darkness came upon them all of the defenderswere wounded, Holden desperately so.
"Red, one of us has got to try to make the ranch," Hopalong suddenlyannounced, and his friend knew he was right. Since Holden had appearedupon the scene they had known that they could not try a dash; one ofthem had to stay.
"We'll toss for it; heads, I go," Red suggested, flipping a coin.
"Tails!" cried Hopalong. "It's only thirty miles to Buckskin, an' if Ican get away from here I'm good to make it by eleven to-night. I'll stopat Cowan's an' have him send word to Lucas an' Bartlett, so there'll beenough in case any of our boys are out on the range in some line house.We can pick 'em up on the way back, so there won't be no time lost. IfI get through you can expect excitement on the outside of this sieveby daylight. You an' Holden can hold her till then, because they neverattack at night. It's the only way out of this for us--we ain't gotcartridges or water enough to last another day."
Red, knowing that Hopalong was taking a desperate chance in workingthrough the cordon of Indians which surrounded them, and that the housewas safe when compared to running such a gantlet, offered to go throughthe danger line with him. For several minutes a wordy war raged andfinally Red accepted a compromise; he was to help, but not to workthrough the line.
"But what's the use of all this argument?" feebly demanded Holden. "Whydon't you both go? I ain't a-going to live nohow, so there ain't no useof anybody staying here with me, to die with me. Put a bullet through meso them devils can't play with me like they do with others, an' then getaway while you've got a chance. Two men can get through as easy as one."He sank back, exhausted by the effort.
"No more of that!" cried Red, trying to be stern. "I'm going to staywith you an' see things through. I'd be a fine sort of a coyote to sneakoff an' leave you for them fiends. An', besides, I can't get away; mycayuse is hit too hard an' yourn is dead," he lied cheerfully. "An'yo're going to get well, all right. I've seen fellers hit harder thanyou are pull through."
Hopalong walked over to the prostrate man and shook hands with him. "I'mawful glad I met you, Holden. Yo're pure grit all the way through, an'I like to tie to that kind of a man. Don't you worry about nothing; Redcan handle this proposition, an' we'll have you in Buckskin by to-morrownight; you'll be riding again in two weeks. So long."
He turned to Red and shook hands silently, led his horse out of thebuilding and mounted, glad that the moon had not yet come up, for in thedarkness he had a chance.
"Good luck, Hoppy!" cried Red, running to the door. "Good luck!"
"You bet--an' lots of it, too," groaned Holden, but he was gone. ThenRed wheeled. "Holden, keep yore eyes an' ears open. I'm going out to seethat he gets off. He may run into a--" and he, too, was gone.
Holden watched the doors and windows, striving to resist the weak, giddyfeeling in his head, and ten minutes later he heard a shot and thenseveral more in quick succession. Shortly afterward Red called out, andalmost immediately the Bar-20 puncher crawled in through a window.
"Well?" anxiously cried the man on the floor. "Did he make it?"
"I reckon so. He got away from the first crowd, anyhow. I wasn't veryfar behind him, an' by the time they woke up to what was going on hewas through an' riding like blazes. I heard him call 'em half-breeds amoment later an' it sounded far off. They hit me,--fired at my flash,like I drilled one of them. But it ain't much, anyhow. How are youfeeling now?"
"Fine!" lied the other. "That Cassidy is shore a wonder--he's all right,an' so are you. I'll never see him again, but I shore hope he getsthrough!"
"Don't be foolish. Here, you finish the water in yore canteen--I pickedit up outside by yore cayuse. Then go to sleep," ordered Red. "I'll doall the watching that's necessary."
"I will if you'll call me when you get sleepy."
"Why, shore I will. But don't you want the rest of the water? I ain't abit thirsty--I had all I could hold just before you came," Red remarkedas his companion pushed the canteen against him in the dark. He waschoking with thirst. "Well, then; all right," and Red pretended todrink. "Now, then, you go to sleep; a good snooze will do you a world ofgood--it's just what you need."