*CHAPTER XVII*
*THE RUSH*
The marshal was leaving the hotel after breakfast the following morningwhen he saw Jerry walking briskly toward him from the station and hewaited for the agent to come up.
"Those two old prospectors just passed the station, going west along thetrack," Jerry informed him. "From the way they were loaded down itlooked as though they are moving their camp. And how men as old as theyare can carry such packs is beyond my understanding."
"Thanks, Jerry," said the marshal. "Go back to th' station. I've gotto take a ride. Trouble's brewin', I reckon."
Passing the hotel on his way to Carney's stable, Tex saw a running minerhurrying into it and in a moment an excited half-score of armedprospectors poured into the street, shouting and gesticulating. Thelittle crowd picked up additions as it passed along the street andheaded westward to strike the railroad at an angle. Some of them hadpartners with them and, when the tracks had been reached, quite a numberturned and ran eastward toward their camps to pack up belongings andsupplies.
"Mental telepathy?" murmured Tex, watching them in some surprise. "Hankand Sinful are too clever rascals to tell anybody anything of value thatthey might know. Huh! That's only a name, I guess, for subconsciousweighing of facts subconsciously received: instinctive deductions fromobservations too vague to be definitely recognized. Instinct, I'mafraid you have more names than most people recognize. But it does beatthe devil, at that! An animal does seemingly wonderful and impossiblethings because of the keenness of its scent, which passes ourunderstanding; birds of prey have eyes nearly telescopic in power--buthow the knowledge of this gold strike has spread about so quickly wheneveryone concerned in it naturally would be secretive, is too much forme. One thing is certain, however: it is known, and I have work to do,and quickly!"
Omar welcomed him and soon was stringing the miles out behind him assmoothly almost as running water. There was no need to urge the animalat its best speed, for it was doing two miles to the miners' one andeasily would beat them to the scene of action.
When he reached the second fork, Blascom was not at the hut and, leadingthe roan into a brush-filled hollow, the marshal took his rifle from itsscabbard and went up to the scene of the miner's operations. His hailwas followed by a startled crouching on the prospector's part and arifle barrel leaped up to the top of the ditch.
"Don't shoot: It's Jones," called the marshal, slowly emerging from hiscover. "I come up to warn you that th' rush has started. Hank an'Sinful ought to get here in about half an hour, th' others a littlebehind them. I'm aimin' to be referee: th' kind of a referee I once sawat a turf prize fight: he had to jump in an' thrash both of th'principals--an' he did it, too. Get that bonanza cleaned out and cachedyet?"
Blascom swore as he stood up again. "Yes: but nobody's goin' to git_this_ without a fight! How th' devil did they find out I'd struck itrich?"
"Shore this claim is staked an' located?" demanded Tex.
"Yes; an' there's work enough done on it to make it stick. But how didthey find out I'd struck it?"
"Don't know," answered the marshal. "You better climb out an' go offan' hide somewhere in th' brush from where yore rifle will cover th'cache. They're keen as hounds an' there's no use takin' chances oflosin' th' greater to save th' less. I'll handle this end of it. Ifyou hear a shot you better slip back an' look things over. Get a rustleon you--time's flyin'."
In a few minutes the creek bed and the little hut appeared to bedeserted. Blascom lay on his stomach at a point from which he could seehis cache and the ditch as well. After a short silence there came thesound of a snapping twig and a few minutes later Sinful's greedy eyespeered over the creek bank down at the big ditch. He slid a rifle overthe edge and looked around eagerly. To his side crept Hank, who addedhis scrutiny to that of his partner. Sinful spoke out of one corner ofhis mouth as he gazed intently down the creek bed, where one corner ofBlascom's hut could be seen through the scrawny timber on the littlepoint. Hank nodded, crawled to the edge of the bank and was about toslip over it when a low warning from the brush at their side froze themboth.
"Stay where you are," said a well-known voice, cold and unfriendly."That claim's got one owner now, an' he ain't lookin' for no partners,a-tall. Better shove up yore hands an' face th' crick. You knowme--an' so far you ain't seen me miss, yet."
Tex emerged from his cover, a Colt in one hand, a pair of shininghandcuffs clinking from their short chains as they swung from the other.Snapping one over Sinful's wrist he curtly ordered Hank to his partner'sside and linked the two together. Disarming them he unloaded theweapons, appropriated the cartridges, and searched them both to makecertain they could do him no injury.
"Sit down," he said, "an' keep quiet. Th' real show is about to start.Who all did you chumps tell about this strike?"
Hank glared at Sinful, Sinful glared at Hank, and then both glared attheir captor. "Nobody, so strike me blind!" snapped Sinful. "Hankain't been out of my sight since we left here yesterday. Think we'refools?"
"Anything but that," grimly rejoined Tex. "Shut up, now: I want tolisten. Any play you make that don't suit me will call for a gun buttbein' bent over yore heads. If I need you, I'll call: an' you comea-runnin'. Hear me?"
"We could come faster if we was loose from each other," whispered Sinfulin bland innocence. "Couldn't we, Hank?"
"Can't come fast, a-tall, hooked up this way," said Hank earnestly.
"Shut up!" snapped the marshal in a low voice.
A winged grasshopper rasped up over the bank and rasped back againinstantly. A few birds chirped and sang across the creek bed andchickadees flashed and darted in an endless search for food. Severalbirds shot suddenly into the air from the fringe of timber and brush onthe farther bank halfway between the ditch and the cabin, quicklyfollowed by vague movements along the ground. Then more than ahalf-score of men popped into sight and, leaping from the steep bank,landed in the bed of the creek and scurried to different points, fooledby the numerous sumps which Blascom had dug in his quest for water.None of them had the knowledge possessed by Hank and Sinful, and theweather conditions had been such that the ages of the various sumpscould not be quickly determined. Each man, eager to grab a hole whilethere was one left to grab, and to become established, chose a mark andappropriated it without loss of time. No sooner had the scurrying crowdselected their grounds than the marshal, who had crept along the top ofthe high bank, jumped over it and held two guns on them, guns which theyhad good reason to respect.
"Han's up!" he roared. "_Pronto_ an' high! You-all know me--don'tgamble! I drop th' first man that makes a gunplay. _Hank! Sinful!_"he shouted. "Come a-runnin'!" Crouched, he faced the scowling crowd,his steady hands before his hips, his steady guns ready to prove hismastery. The handcuffed pair, squabbling as they came, shuffled up tohim.
"You yank me any more an' I'll bust yore fool head!" growled Sinful tohis bosom friend. "Just because yore laigs is longer is no reason forplayin' kite with me! Knock-kneed old fool! Here we are, Marshal: whatyou want?"
"Hold yore han's close," ordered Tex, his left gun slipping into itssheath, his right becoming even more menacing. With the free hand hefished out the key, handed it to Hank and waited until he had made useof it. It went swiftly back into the pocket and the left hand againheld a gun. "Slip around an' take their weapons!" he snapped. "Don'tget between them an' me. Lively!"
"We ain't goin' to spoil yore aim, Marshal," Hank assured him with greatfervor. "Come on, you bald-headed old buzzard--git them guns for th'marshal!" He gave his companion a shove forward. "He done us a goodturn--an' one good turn deserves another. Come on!"
"Who you shovin'?" blazed Sinful, starting away.
"You ain't got no right, cuttin' in here!" shouted a red-faced, angryminer, his companions growling and cursing their hearty endorsements."Yo're a town marshal, not a county sheriff! Turn them guns off us!"
br /> "I got a wider range than marshal," rejoined Tex grimly and not for aninstant relaxing his alertness. "Gus Williams said so when he 'pintedme; an', besides, I got th' very same authority out here as I have intown: twelve sections of th' Colt statutes as made an' pervided. Blascomhas legally established his claim, drove his stakes, and done his workon it. When he comes he'll p'int out his boundaries. Hold still, youtwo! Git 'em all, Sinful; don't overlook nothin', Hank! No use turnin'this crick into a slaughter-pen."
"I ain't likely to overlook nothin'," replied Sinful, moving morerapidly, "though I'm shore bothered by these here cussed contraptions onmy wrist. You'll notice Hank unlocked _his_ end of 'em! D--d claimjumpers! A man's rights ain't safe no more these days. Hank an' meshore would 'a' planted some of this passel if they'd bothered us. Howth' devil did they find out about it, _I_ want to know?"
"What you reckon yo're goin' to do with us all?" sneered a wrathyprospector, his hands slowly coming down toward a harmless belt.
"I'll tell you that after I see Blascom," answered the marshal, firing ashot into the ground. He ordered Sinful and Hank to pile the weapons athis feet, locked them together again and ordered them to get closer tothe rest of the miners. The shot brought Blascom as rapidly as he couldget there with a due regard to caution. Obeying Tex's terse command heslid down the bank and went to him.
"Shore yore claim takes in th' ditch an' th' riffle?" asked Tex in awhisper.
"Th' new one does," answered Blascom. "I sent off th' papers withJerry, like you said, th' day I got th' dynamite."
"Th' old one any good?"
"Not much; not much better'n day wages. 'Tain't no good without water;but neither is th' other, now."
"This crowd is fooled by yore old sumps," explained Tex hurriedly. "Ifwe drive 'em off they'll be back ag'in, an' mebby add yore murder to th'rest of their crimes. I can't stay here day an' night; an' if I could,they'd get us both after dark, or at long range in daylight. You got tolet 'em stay. By tomorrow there'll be twice as many. I'm scaredsome'll come slippin' up any minute an' turn th' tables on us. You letSinful an' Hank divide a quarter of th' sand pannin' between'em--they'll commit murder for half that, an' you've got to havepartners in case of a rush. Besides, rain's due any day now, an' youneed 'em to beat it."
"I hate like--" began Blascom stubbornly.
"We all has to do things we hate!" cut in his companion. "You can't doanythin' else. If you can, tell me quick!"
Blascom shook his head. He could do nothing else. He turned and facedthe crowd, telling it to go ahead and stake out claims where each manhad started to, on condition that there was to be no more jumping andthat they join him in putting up a solid front against any newcomersother than partners. The scowls died out, heads nodded, and the hustleand bustle began again from where it had left off.
Tex called the Siamesed pair to him and they listened, with their eyesglowing, to Blascom's offer of limited partnership, Hank nearlyswallowing his cud when asked if he was satisfied with the terms.Sinful smelled a rat and looked properly suspicious, his keen old mindracing along on the theory that no one ever gave away anything valuable.Suddenly he grinned so expansively that a generous stream of tobaccojuice rolled down his sharp chin.
"Us three ag'in' that gang," he mused. "Huh! Fair enough, _I_ says.Hank an' me can lick 'em by ourselves. Can't we, Hank?"
"Shore!" promptly answered the other weather-beaten old rascal. "Weshore kin, Sinful!"
Tex smiled at the cheerful old reprobates, bound closer together nowthan ever they had been before. "I ought to dump th' pair of you in th'new jail," he said, "though it shore wouldn't get no benefit from it.Yo're a pair of land pirates an' you both ought to be hung from th'yardarm of some cottonwood tree. Hold out yore hands till I turn youloose. You two youngsters want to keep th' bargain, or I _will_ hangyou!"
"Glad to git shet of them cuffs," growled Sinful. "Hank takes sich longsteps an' walks sideways, th' old fool. We'll play square, won't we,Hank? There; he said so, too. We allus has felt kind of friendly toBlascom, ain't we, Hank? Shore we has. An' he needs us to keep oureyes on them blasted claim jumpers. 'Sides, he's a friend of yourn,Marshal: an' we ain't forgettin' them few dollars we won from yout'other night--_are_ we, Hank?" His shrewd old eyes baffled Tex'sattempt to read just what he thought about the poker game.
"We ain't!" emphatically replied Hank, spitting copiously andvehemently. "We'll make these claim jumpers herd close to home; yes,sir, by glory!" He paused a moment and leaned nearer to his companion'sear. "_Won't_ we, Sinful?" he suddenly shouted.
"Who you yowlin' at that way?" blazed Sinful, and then his eyes poppedwide open in frank surprise. "Cussed if th' doc ain't got th' fever,too!" he ejaculated. "Here he comes up th' crick! Beats all how newsdoes spread! An', great Jerus'lam: if he ain't as sober as a watchedPuritan!"
Nodding right and left Doctor Horn rode slowly among the busy claimjumpers and drew rein in front of Tex and his companions.
"How do you do, gentlemen?" he said, smiling. "I see you're quite busy,Marshal, which seems to be a habit of yours. I happened to have apatient out this way, down on the lower fork, and while I was in hisvicinity I thought I would drop in and compliment Blascom for his careof Jake. While the efficient treatment he first received undoubtedlysaved his life, Blascom's nursing comes in for well-earned praise. Heis still a sick man, although out of danger. I hope you will disregardour former conversation, so far as my part of it is concerned, Marshal.Good day to you all," and wheeling, he rode up a break in the creek bankand slowly became lost to sight among the bowlders and timber.
Sinful had watched both men carefully while the doctor spoke, and now hecovertly glanced at the marshal, who was gazing after the departingphysician. Then he looked at Blascom, and from him to his own,disreputable partner.
"Come on, Hank," he said. "If any of these gold thieves start swappin'claims, we'll play 'em a smart tune for 'em to dance to. There's shorebeen a-plenty of lives saved on this crick plumb recent--our own, mebby,among 'em. An' who do you reckon yo're a-starin' at?"
"You, you pore ol' fool!" retorted Hank. He blew out a bleached cud,rammed in a fresh one, nodded at Blascom and the contemplative marshal,and followed his impatient partner toward their packs and guns.
Tex slowly turned and looked after them. "Hey, Sinful!" he called."You still makin' coffee in old tin cans? If you are, you want to watch'em close on account of sand gettin' in 'em!"
Sinful nudged his companion, stopped, scratched his head, and thengrinned.
"Don't have to use 'em _now_. We got all our traps along, an' th' oldcoffeepot is with 'em, kivver an' all. Anyways, _we_ don't mind a littlesand once in awhile--_do_ we, Hank?"
"No, sir, by glory!" cried Hank. "Not no more, we don't, a-tall!"