Max Brand Read Free

awful
thing, and we're going to pay—we're going to pay!"

2
*
    Their trails divided after that. Sandersen and Quade started back for
Sour Creek. At the parting of the ways Lowrie's last word was for
Sandersen.
    "You started this party, Sandersen. If they's any hell coming out of
it, it'll fall chiefly on you. Remember, because I got one of your own
hunches!"
    After that Lowrie headed straight across the mountains, traveling as
much by instinct as by landmarks. He was one of those men who are born
to the trail. He stopped in at Four Pines, and there he told the story
on which he and Sandersen and Quade had agreed. Four Pines would spread
that tale by telegraph, and Riley Sinclair would be advised beforehand.
Lowrie had no desire to tell the gunfighter in person of the passing of
Hal Sinclair. Certainly he would not be the first man to tell the
story.
    He reached Colma late in the afternoon, and a group instantly formed
around him on the veranda of the old hotel. Four Pines had indeed
spread the story, and the crowd wanted verification. He replied as
smoothly as he could. Hal Sinclair had broken his leg in a fall from
his horse, and they had bound it up as well as they could. They had
tied him on his horse, but he could not endure the pain of travel. They
stopped, nearly dying from thirst. Mortification set in. Hal Sinclair
died in forty-eight hours after the halt.
    Four Pines had accepted the tale. There had been more deadly stories
than this connected with the desert. But Pop Hansen, the proprietor,
drew Lowrie to one side.
    "Keep out of Riley's way for a while. He's all het up. He was fond of
Hal, you know, and he takes this bad. Got an ugly way of asking
questions, and—"
    "The truth is the truth," protested Lowrie. "Besides—"
    "I know—I know. But jest make yourself scarce for a couple of days."
    "I'll keep on going, Pop. Thanks!"
    "Never mind, ain't no hurry. Riley's out of town and won't be back for
a day or so. But, speaking personal, I'd rather step into a nest of
rattlers than talk to Riley, the way he's feeling now."
    Lowrie climbed slowly up the stairs to his room, thinking very hard. He
knew the repute of Riley Sinclair, and he knew the man to be even worse
than reputation, one of those stern souls who exact an eye for an
eye—and even a little more.
    Once in his room he threw himself on his bed. After all there was no
need for a panic. No one would ever learn the truth. To make surety
doubly sure he would start early in the dawn and strike out for far
trails. The thought had hardly come to him when he dismissed it. A
flight would call down suspicion on him, and Riley Sinclair would be
the first to suspect. In that case distance would not save him, not
from that hard and tireless rider.
    To help compose his thoughts he went to the washstand and bathed his
hot face. He was drying himself when there was a tap on the door.
    "Can I come in?" asked a shrill voice.
    He answered in the affirmative, and a youngster stepped into the room.
    "You're Lowrie?"
    "Yep."
    "They's a gent downstairs wants you to come down and see him."
    "Who is it?"
    "I dunno. We just moved in from Conway. I can point him out to you on
the street."
    Lowrie followed the boy to the window, and there, surrounded by half a
dozen serious-faced men, stood Riley Sinclair, tall, easy, formidable.
The sight of Sinclair filled Lowrie with dismay. Pushing a silver coin
into the hand of the boy, he said: "Tell him—tell him—I'm coming
right down."
    As soon as the boy disappeared, Lowrie ran to the window which opened
on the side of the house. When he looked down his hope fled. At one
time there had been a lean-to shed running along that side of the
building. By the roof of it he could have got to the ground unseen. Now
he remembered that it had been torn down the year before; there was a
straight and perilous drop beneath the window. As for the stairs, they
led almost to the front door of the building. Sinclair would be sure to
see him if he went down