“I knew Gorgie was dead,” admitted Pete thoughtfully. “But I hadn’t heard about Lammer. Too bad, Bud. Why don’t you take that as a signal and break away from the game?”
“I’m going to after this deal,” said Bud. “But this one was too big for me to pass up.”
“How big?”
“Only eighty thousand dollars,” said Bud, drawling the words.
Pete gasped.
“Eighty thousand dollars,” went on Bud, avoiding the face of Pete and musing, as though already planning how he would spend his share of the money, ”and it’s in a tin box you could split with a can opener. Easy! Eighty thousand for picking it up.”
“And how far?”
“Get there before midnight if you start at dark, or a little before.”
Pete sighed and shook his head. The temptation was vast. He had not saved up a great deal of money, in his life of adventure.
“You ain’t talking to me, Bud,” he decided. “Sorry, but you ain’t talking to me. Drop it!”
Again Bud showed his intelligence by failing to press his request.
“Matter of fact,” he said a little later, “I think I can manage the job all by myself. It’s a rickety old safe. And I have all the time I want. Blockhead hired me to guard his safe! He’s away from his ranch, and they ain’t nobody but me there. Can you beat that?”
“I can’t raise that,” said Pete dryly. “He hires you to guard his coin, and then you grab it from him? No, I sure can’t lay one over that!”
“Don’t get me wrong,” protested Bud. “This gent is about the orneriest that you ever seen. Don’t see nothing but the worst side of everybody. Don’t really trust me, but he figures they’s no way into the safe except through the combination.”
Bud chuckled at the idea.
“What’s his name?” asked Pete.
“You ain’t been long in these parts,” said Bud cautiously. “Probably you wouldn’t know him.”
“Try me.”
“Bill Jordan is his name.”
Bud knew that there had been one clash between Jordan and Reeve already. He had saved this shot for the final effect, and he was not disappointed. Pete Reeve came out of his chair as though an invisible hand had jerked him up.
“Jordan?” he said through his teeth. “That skunk?”
“You know him?”
“Know him! It was him that threatened to run me out of the country!”
Pete Reeve bit his lip nervously, drew out his revolver and looked to its action, shoved it hastily back into the holster, and then looked with a strange mixture of dismay and eagerness at Bud.
“I’d give ten thousand if I hadn’t seen you to-day, Bud,” he said.
“Why?” said Bud innocently.
The reply was an oath. Pete Reeve hurriedly left the shack, but Bud smiled his lopsided smile and nodded in content. He knew that he had hooked his fish, and now that the hook was in, it might be well to let the fish run for a while instead of attempting to land him at once.
Patience was rewarded. Within ten minutes Pete Reeve had come back into the shack.
“Are you sure about the coin?” he said abruptly.
“Dead sure.”
“Then I’m with you.”
“Shake!”
“It’s for to-night?”
“To-night.”
“And then I’m through.”
“Me, too,” said Bud, with more meaning than Pete Reeve could guess.
Chapter XI
The Rescue
It was not difficult to make their excuses to Bull Hunter. Bud told the big man during the afternoon that he preferred, as a rule, to make his journeys by night during the hot weather. As for the absence of Pete Reeve, he was merely riding a step or two along the way with his old friend, for Bud was leaving that region, and would not be back for many a moon.
The grave face of Bull Hunter did not change by one iota during this explanation. He heard it from Bud, in fact, with his head turned partly away, stroking the big head of the lobo; but just as he himself was nodding to the explanation, The Ghost lurched a little forward.
Bull became thoughtful. It was the invariable habit of the big animal to twitch forward in this uneasy fashion when some one winked at him. A dozen times he had done it when his master had blinked inadvertently. But who could have winked now? Bud Fuller, of course, winking at Pete Reeve, as much as to say: “You and I know the real truth about this night’s journey.”
And Bull, still with head bowed, lest they should see his emotion in his raised face, knew sadly what was coming. The long inactivity of Pete had at last proved too much for him, and now he was about to start on another wild career. Yet Bull was wise enough to make no protest, give no advice, offer no plea. Pete had practically promised to give up the old life, and when a man breaks a promise it is foolish to remind him of it. Friendships that have lasted half a lifetime are destroyed by just such strokes. So Bull said nothing but waited gloomily for the dark and their departure.
They left, however, while the twilight was still bright, waving carelessly to Bull. He watched them drop over the hill, and absently he stroked the head of The Ghost, who had whined with pleasure the minute the two men disappeared. The Ghost’s conception of happiness lay, apparently, in the absence of all men other than the master.
So on this evening The Ghost whined with pleasure when he saw that they were to be left alone. He picked the red rag of a handkerchief off the floor - that hateful rag which he had so often been forced to carry to little Pete Reeve - and took it into hiding in a far corner. Some day he promised himself the pleasure of tearing that rag into small bits.
But as he dropped it in hiding, the master appeared behind him, stooped, and picked up the rag. After this he began walking up and down the shack, and The Ghost followed at his side, whipping back and forth close to the wall, and always keeping the face of the master in view. The big man was in thought; his decision was a sudden leaving of the shack, bearing the saddle over his arm.
The wolf dog followed, rejoicing. The saddle meant a long ride on Diablo, and those rides were always a joy to The Ghost. They gave him a vague taste of his old life. The moment Bull swung into the saddle and sped across the hills, The Ghost started at his gliding gallop, with which not even the gait of Diablo could compare. That frictionless lope kept him up with the stallion and carried him easily far ahead. He had learned from the frequent calls of his master during other rides that he was never to pass out of sight or out of hearing. That apparently was against the law. So he merely wove a loosely twisting trail back and forth about the straight line of the stallion’s course; and as The Ghost ran he was reading the story of the night, his accurate dog-nose noting every sign.
Presently, on the horizon straight before them, he saw two riders against the sky; and shooting to the left, his nose caught the scent of the little man’s horse. They were following Pete Reeve, then, and his companion! If that were the case he would overtake them at once. He loosed himself into a few seconds of wild running, only to be caught by the soft, controlled alarm whistle of the master. He turned and found that Bull Hunter was sending his horse cautiously down the slope, taking advantage of a clump of trees which he artfully kept between him and the two distant riders of the night.
The Ghost paused with his head on one side, to think. The manners of a stalking man are the manners of a stalking beast, and it was apparent to The Ghost at once that Bull Hunter was chasing the two rather than trying to catch up with them. It ceased to be a stupid ride. It gained an interest, even an excitement.
Now The Ghost glided off into the night, and on the top of the next ridge, he flattened upon the ground. Sure enough, the two horsemen were in the midst of the next gully, traveling leisurely. The