Erle Stanley Gardner
Bare Hands
Chapter I
On Guard
The country was rolling. Between the long hills draws stretched back to the purple mountains. In the early morning the wind blew gently down these draws, and the breeze was tainted with carrion. For this was Mexico, and, in Mexico, it frequently happens that the cool morning breeze carries the taint of carrion, particularly when it sweeps gently down sloping draws.
At the mine three men gazed over the landscape with anxious eyes. They were too accustomed to the carrion smell to notice it or comment upon it.
“We should get help to-day.”
Vincent Shaffer, immaculate, clean-shaven, spoke with nervous rapidity.
Robert Standish was older by thirty years. His eyes had bleached into expressionless calm. He gave the impression of one whose soul had soaked up emotions until, like a piece of old blotting paper, it had no more power to absorb.
“The relief,” he said, “would probably be as bad for us as the other.”
Dan Harder said nothing. He drew in his breath as though he might speak, but exhaled again, his great fingers twisting in inarticulate reticence.
He was a figure to command attention anywhere. His shoulders were so broad that they dwarfed his great height. His waist was slender, but the chest seemed almost deformed, so deep was it. But the striking feature of the man was his hands.
From the elbows down his body departed from normal. His forearm was as thick as an ordinary leg. His wrists were great masses of bone, and his hands were veritable hams. Just as a police dog puppy seems to run to paws, so did Dan Harder seem to run to hands.
Vincent Shaffer pointed.
“Look, look, dust!” he exclaimed, and there was a note in his voice that was almost hysteria.
Then it was Dan Harder spoke:
“Little cloud, one or two horses on the trail. Keep yore shirt on.”
Robert Standish stepped back into the cool shadows of the ’dobe house. When he returned he had a pair of powerful binoculars. He raised them to his eyes and studied the trail.
“One man, traveling fast.”
He lowered the glasses and swept his eyes over the sun-flooded flat. The deserted mining buildings glared in the sun until the eyes ached from contemplation of their dazzling outlines. The miners had left in a body.
The reputation of the Wolf was such that the populace fled before him. Even the Federal troops who were ostensibly trying to capture the bandit, managed to keep far enough in the rear so no sudden change of front would find them in actual conflict with the bandit’s gang.
The horseman swung down the steep side of the hill, hit the more level going of the canon, spurred his mount to top speed, then laboriously climbed the sharp pitch to the flat where the mining buildings writhed in the sun.
“Señores, good morning,” he greeted, in the language of his race.
“And to you,” gravely returned Standish, his expressionless eyes sweeping over the horseman in indifferent curiosity.
The man had ridden far and fast. His horse was tired. Despite the cool of early morning, the animal was caked with sweat and dust. The rider sat wearily in the saddle. A rifle was in his hands rather than in the saddle scabbard. The cartridge belt was almost empty. A pistol hung from a holster, worn black with much use.
The rider indicated the purple mountains.
“The pass is far?”
“About eighteen kilometers,” advised Shaffer.
The rider sighed.
“Is there perhaps a little food for a weary man?”
Standish bowed with grave courtesy.
“Our men have left. We are doing our own cooking. But if the señor will enter we will make some coffee, and there is food in tins.”
At the suggestion of dismounting, the man straightened in the saddle.
“No, no. You misunderstand. I have no time. I sit here too long now, waiting for my horse to get his breath. Coffee, no. I have no time. Señores, I beg of you, give me a can of the frijoles. I will eat from the can as I ride.”
As he spoke the words became more rapid. His reddened eyes swept back along the trail he had followed.
“He comes!” he exclaimed.
The men followed his gaze.
It could not be said that a cloud of dust was arising from the trail. Rather the entire horizon seemed to gather a dusty haze about itself. The body of riders was yet too far away to show a distinct dust cloud. It was as a faint fog, miles distant.
Vincent Shaffer ran to the ’dobe. From a locked box he extracted cartons of shells, piled them in glittering brass heaps upon a spring cot. His nervous hands buckled a revolver about his belt. For the tenth time that morning he looked at the rifle which stood against his bed, snapped open the lock to make sure a shell was in the firing chamber, tested the magazine.
Robert Standish brought out the can of beans.
The rider accepted it with thanks, looked at the pile of glittering shells.
“He is a devil, señores. Could you spare me a few of the shells? You have plenty. I have but few. East night I was surrounded, but I fought my way out.”
Vincent Shaffer heard the words.
“No, no, we have none too many.”
The rider smiled gravely.
“Señor, you have more than enough. If you have to fire one, you will be fortunate if you have the chance to fire two. The Wolf moves fast when he makes his kill. You gringos are brave. You are more than brave, you are foolish. Come, flee with me. With the four of us, with the ammunition you have, we can hold off any attack from the rear. We will ride through the pass and be safe.
“I have come far. I have seen the bodies of many men, and some of them had white skin. Come, amigos, is it not better that we ride?”
Standish shook his head doggedly.
“Then he would find the mine deserted and take a good title. We protect the property of our employers.”
The rider shook his head slowly.
“It is wonderful! No wonder that you of the north have much money. Always are you willing to lay down your lives lest your precious property should be taken. Is there, then some special heaven for the gringo which gives him standing according to the property which surrounds his corpse?”
Standish flashed the man a swift look. His words bordered on insolence, and yet, at a time like this, a certain amount of leeway was given.
“Give him some shells, Vincent, and let him be off,” he said crisply.
Shaffer’s reluctant hands furnished a few shells to the rider.
The man accepted them with a grin in which there was more insolence than thanks. He stuffed them in his belt, clapped spurs to his horse and clattered on up the canon.
The men followed him with their eyes for a moment, then looked back down the canon.
The cloud of dust had become whiter, had assumed outline. In a few moments it would top the crest of the rolling ridge. They watched it in fascination.
It was Dan Harder’s slow voice that cut in on their thoughts.
“The rider didn’t go up the trail,” he said.
“Huh?”
Standish snapped out the word impatiently.
Harder pointed one of his thick fingers.
The trail dipped down into the canon, crossed a dry stream-bed, and then ran through some brush. Half a mile farther it once more climbed from the wash and it was to this part of the trail, clearly visible, that Harder pointed.
Had the man remained on the trail, the dark blotch of horse and rider would have showed on the trail where it swung round the face of the slope. But the hill glinted in the sunlight, silent, deserted, not even a wisp of dust showing where anything had been along the trail.