I said: “What about that line? Can’t it be fixed?”
He said: “I was just going over to tell you, Mr. Bryant. Part of it was cut away and we haven’t anything around here we can use for a splice. I dropped down by the creek and told Captain Rawlins, and he’s got the road almost fixed by now. He’s going to send a truck into town right away.”
I said that was fine and turned around and almost ran into Fred Ardella. He started to walk back to the office with me and said, as we went along: “I saw Deiss talking to you, Mr. Bryant. Hey! Did he tell you his brother was here last year? Did he tell you about his brother being a caretaker here, over the winter?”
I said that was the first I’d heard of it.
He said: “Yeah! I guess he had a pretty good time, from what Deiss says, too. Some of his friends came up and stayed damn near all winter with him. They brought a lot of liquor and they had their wives, or girls, with ’em, and they must’ve just raised hell. I know Deiss got canned over it, and then went back and got in jail. For manslaughter. It was a stick-up or something, I guess.”
All of a sudden things started to make sense. I said: “Fred, I want you to do me a favor. I want you to hang around with Deiss and never leave him alone for a minute. Will you do that?”
Fred said: “If he don’t want me around he’ll tell me to get the hell away. He’s bigger than I am.”
“Just watch him then.”
“You afraid he’s going to run away? He’s been talking about it — he’s got about half the camp in the notion.”
I said: “It’s just that. I’ll depend on you, Fred.”
He said my trust was well placed and swaggered away. I think it was one of the few times anybody had ever told him they had any faith in him and I think he liked the idea a lot.
And then Captain Rawlins came up the road in the truck — with the bodies.
I said: “I think I’ve got it figured, Captain, but I’ll have to have help. As soon as the state police get here, I’ll start out. But I’d like Lieutenant Ward to get me a copy of the brand-register for this county. It will be at the courthouse.”
“He can get it,” said Rawlins. “And we won’t wait for the state police, either. You and I will go. We’ll try and get this settled before the police get here. Now what’s this about this young fellow? What’s his name? Deiss?”
I said: “I don’t want him left alone for a second. He’s too smart. He’s known what this was all about right along, I think.”
Rawlins said: “If he knows anything, I’ll find it out if I have to skin the young devil alive. There’s been murder done over this, Mr. Bryant. I mean to know what it’s all about.”
I said: “O.K. Put on your gun and I’ll show you. It might even be a good plan to take along a rifle.”
“Like that, eh?” he said. He looked a lot happier than he had a moment before. “If I can just get my hands on the devil that cut out that road and shot that boy last night I won’t need a rifle. I’ll do what’s proper with my bare hands.”
But he belted on his gun and took one of the regulation army Springfields from the gun rack.
And then we started.
I should have thought of it before. I had the answer in my hands during the night, when I’d heard the man who’d come down by the truck, talking with his partner. I should have known what had happened when he complained about his feet being sore — but the remark hadn’t tied in with anything at that time. The news about the caretaker and his friends was the answer — the thing that made everything else fall into line. We went down the road to where I’d gone up above it and shot at the man on the horse and then played Indian later. We followed broken brush and horse tracks for about a mile and then I pointed at a rock setting fairly in the little path we were following and said: “I’m right! Isn’t that blood?”
Rawlins said: “By the Lord Harry! It is. You’re right.”
I warned: “We might have a long way to go. I don’t know just how far the man had to walk.”
“I’ll walk my feet down to the ankles,” Rawlins said grimly. “Just for one crack, and I’m going to make it a good one.”
A couple of miles farther on we found the horse. Shot through the left hind leg, high up in the muscle — and again through the body.
I looked it over and saw it was branded 7Y, and said: “O.K! I’m right. But I think we’d better go back and wait for the state police. This is all the evidence they’re going to need in order to make an arrest.”
Rawlins said: “I’m an officer, and I have the same right to arrest, Mr. Bryant. We’ll follow along as we’ve been doing.”
That seemed to be that.
Chapter Five
There Was a Reason
The ranch was a dirty little place and we’d taken two hours to get there, from the spot we’d found the dead horse. The house itself was out in a stumpy field, with no shelter near except the barn — and that was so flimsy it offered no protection.
We looked it over, and Rawlins said: “Well, here it is. And we know what we’re after. Let’s get going at it, Mr. Bryant.”
I’d been thinking, all the time since we’d found the horse. I said: “Now wait a minute. These people, if they’re the right ones, are facing murder charges already. If the two of us start walking across the clearing, and they start shooting, they’ll nail us both. We’d be in the open and they’d be shooting from the cover of the house.”
He said that was true — and what of it?
I said: “Look! You’re a crack shot with a rifle and I’m just fair. You stay here in the edge of the clearing and keep ready. I’ll go up to the house and see what it looks like. That way, if anything should happen, you can hold them and I can get away.”
He said: “I’ll go up to the house. They might possibly start shooting before they even talk with you.”
“You’re in uniform — I’m not. They’ll be curious about me — and they’d know what you were after. My way’s best.”
He argued, but he knew I was right. And he so wanted to get the man, or men, back of the murders that he gave in.
He grumbled: “All right, go ahead. Keep that gun handy though. Keep it in the waistband of your trousers but keep your coat over it. Maybe they’ll think you’re unarmed.”
I said I’d do that and started toward the house. I tried to walk as though I was just stopping in for a casual how-d’ya-do, but my knees were shaking so hard I could hardly get over the ground. I felt a little bit sick at my stomach and dizzy as well, because, if I was right, I was going to meet a cold-blooded deliberate murderer — and there was nothing but Rawlins and that army rifle to back me up if it came to trouble.
I had a feeling it would, too.
The man who opened the door was chewing tobacco. He looked me over, not saying anything, and then spat tobacco juice so it landed right by my shoe. He had about a month’s beard on his face and looked as though he hadn’t had a bath in six.
He finally said: “Well, mister! What might you be after? Hey? What you doing here?”
I said: “I was just out walking around and looking over the country. I’m a stranger here.”
“You’re a... liar,” he said. “You’re John Bryant’s boy and you come up to work at that damn camp the government’s got up on the mountain. What you snooping around here for, hey?”